Is faith only a private matter? I hear arguments from some Christians that say that their faith is only a private matter, that it is only a matter of personal piety – how one acts privately.
But I find no Scripture to support such a claim. And I find many elements of this argument lacking on many levels. It seems like faith is a waste. If faith is only a private matter, then what’s the point? If faith is only a private matter, then how exactly is it transformative?
Scripture tells a different story. Jesus sends the disciples out to proclaim the Good News. That’s not a private piety. It has a public impact.
Jesus eats with sinners and tax collectors. That’s not a private piety only. It has a public impact – the Pharisees and Sadducees comment on it and criticize it. It impacts them. And it impacts the lives of the people Jesus ate with. It gave them dignity.
Matthew 25 records Jesus telling us about how the nations will be judged. That’s certainly not a private piety matter – it’s very public. It has public impact.
Jesus is labeled many things – Messiah, King of the Jews, King of King, Lord of Lords, Son of Man (or humanity if you think in the broader sense), and many more. All of these titles have public implications, not matters of private piety.
Jesus wasn’t crucified because of his private piety. He was crucified because of his public ministry and what it meant. It was having an impact on people’s lives in very public ways – affecting the status quo and all that supported and defended the status quo. And what was the status quo? Simply put, the status quo was oppressive, exploitive, deadly, and destructive. Jesus was a threat to all of this. If all he wanted to do was private piety, he would have not had a public ministry at all. He would not have had disciples. We would not have traveled through the land. He would not have been resurrected. He would not have appeared to people after the resurrection. He would have been completely forgotten in history because he would have had no impact on anyone.
That’s what an emphasis on private piety leads to.
That’s not to say that piety is unimportant. It is important. But that’s not where faith ends. It’s only the beginning.
Here’s how I know that faith is meant for more than just private piety. Sin isn’t just a private matter.
Sin is the brokenness of relationship. In order to have relationship, there needs to be more than just the self. There is an other. Sin breaks the relationship with the other – this makes it public. Sin has implications on the rest of creation – hence it has a public impact. We read this in the story of the Fall in Genesis 3. Because of sin, the ground is cursed too. When sin persists, the entire world suffers. Sin exploits and oppresses, it kills and destroys. It has a very public impact.
And faith exists to counter sin. How can faith do that though if it is only a private matter? It can’t.
Both sin and faith are public matters ultimately. As much as we would prefer to not face the reality of the public nature of sin, we are called too. We are called to name sin where it exists and to live out the faith we have been given – publicly. Sin is like a stain. We can choose to ignore the stain and pretend that it doesn’t exist. But we are only fooling ourselves. Faith is the oxyclean that comes in and knocks the stain of sin out – making things right again. Really right. Not, “let’s pretend we can’t see what’s obviously there” right. That’s just avoiding conflict because we are uncomfortable with conflict.
Living out this kind of public faith isn’t easy. There will be critics – those devoted to sin and the lies it tells. There have been many who have died for faith. They paid the ultimate price for fully living their faith. But what’s the point of claiming a faith that you aren’t willing to die for? What’s the point of claiming a faith that you aren’t willing to live out in a public manner? What’s the point of hiding the faith that we have been given because we are soooo concerned with our own safety that we will never speak out when faith cannot be silenced? That’s not faith at all. If faith is only private piety, then it is not really faith. It’s just another form of sin – a self-centered care and concern for one’s own safety and comfort. If faith is anything, it isn’t that.
Sin is both private and public. And so is faith.
Laced up Lutheran 
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There are a number of ways I could respond to this post… all of them supportive of it.
I will say this much: I almost finished my undergraduate Bible education before I had the notion that my faith was a private matter argued successfully out of me. It was N.T. Wright who finally persuaded me.
I will say that I always knew the presentation of the Gospel was public. After all, how can you share it if not SHARING it? But I thought the response to it and all that came after were matters of private, personal piety for much of my life, and my church NEVER challenged that notion.
Hmmm…
Now I would want to enhance your discussion. I have no doubt that to pursue my thought on THIS point would involve more posts which branch out off the current one, but I wonder if it isn’t worth pondering here at this point.
What about money?
Especially as a Christian…
If FAITH is actually a public matter, what is a Christian’s money??? Is that not public too – or at least a community matter???
I keep posting about the poor and homeless vis-à-vis the church on my blog all the time. I noticed recently that as I chase all the bunny trails presented by people like Corbett, Fikkert, Lupton AND numerous local church leaders… that we always seem to address this relationship looking at how to deal with the fact that so often the poor, the bum… the needy person will take the gift, the alms, we give and squander it. (Thus the book title: When Helping Hurts.) The concern becomes one of “enabling” bad/destructive behavior. This is deemed BAD. And I don’t deny the phenom! It is real.
BUT
Does the Bible care about this?
Even CARE about it?
Maybe… maybe it does come of for review in a FEW places. But it NEVER supersedes the giving of alms – it never becomes a reason to NOT give the alms or to second guess almsgiving or even (that I can tell) to enhance the almsgiving (you know… such as give a sandwich instead of cash).
ON THE OTHER HAND…
And this IS IN THE BIBLE!
AND IT IS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT… the GRACE part!!!!
Those who claim to give but who really hold back the giving are struck dead instantly with no chance to repent after being confronted!
Woah! And Woe!!!!
That should keep us up at night! That is a hard teaching for anyone with money who loves Jesus too.
So… what about the cash? Is that public too?
Or am I making too much of this?
What do you think?
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Good questions. I have several thoughts. First, I think it is important to keep in mind that all the writers of Scripture lived in a time and culture in which there was no concept of individualism. In that sense, money isn’t solely a private matter, because nothing was. If you look as Jesus talking about hating one’s father and mother, sister and brother, there’s a reason for this. It has to do with the fact that following Jesus meant, for some people, the leaving of one’s family. There are practical reasons for this. A family worked in order to support itself. If one family member started following Jesus, then they didn’t participate in some community things. They would have brought shame on themselves and therefore, their families. If a family had shame, it would lose business. If it lost business, then it had less money – that means there was housing issues and feeding the family. So in light of this, yes, money has a public concern to it. We still practice this in churches in the sense of making the pastor’s compensation a public matter – for anyone to see if they can get access to the budget.
On a different note, there’s a reason why Jesus talked about money a lot – because of the public impact that money has based on how it impacts decision making and how we use it.
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