A Dirty Word in the Church

Copyright by Shea Oakley

All rights reserved

If you have spent some time in the contemporary Evangelical church you may have gathered that there are a number of “hot-button” words that are used more frequently than others. This is especially true of certain terms connected with efforts to exhort believers towards more holy living. One of these is “compromise”. I can think of few words in the lexicon of “Christianese” that convey more of a sense of distaste in the average conservative Christian’s heart than this one. In fact one might almost call it a dirty word.

For most human beings “to compromise” means to find a middle-position acceptable to two parties in conflict with each other with the goal of settling that conflict. Many non-Christians consider compromise to be a noble word; one indicative of mutual humility, the willingness to meet someone halfway in order to re-establish peace and balance in a relationship both parties consider to be valuable. While some non-believers may have disdain for this idea, and thus for the term that describes it, their motivation is often pride. For some compromise is equated with weakness and is simply out of the question in their human associations. These are often the people who leave a rather obvious trail of relational destruction in their wake. They would rather alienate family, friends and co-workers than give up any power in a relationship whatsoever. Such individuals usually end up more or less alone.

This brings us back to the use of the word in Christian circles. In our community the public use of the term “compromise” is usually in the context of the danger of making some concession to “the World, the Flesh and the Devil.” Any watering-down of the Gospel, any adoption of what is considered to be carnal behavior; any adaptation to the surrounding cultural milieu may earn the sobriquet of “compromise”. Nine times out of ten, if someone in a church publicly uses this word, its connotation is not only negative but often negative in the extreme. For instance to be labeled a “compromiser” is at best to be labeled a spiritual second class citizen and at worst a person on his or her way out of the faith.

Of course this negative connotation of “compromise” is not without some legitimacy. When someone is more interested in following the way of the world than the way of the cross that someone is a compromiser to the degree they willingly indulge in attitudes or behaviors that dishonor Christ. The first time someone came up with the idea of using this term to describe taking the easy way out and falling short of the mark spiritually they were not in the wrong. On the other hand whoever that person was probably did not know they were giving birth to a definition that would eventually become both overused to the point of cliché and wrongly used in inciting sometimes unnecessary guilt. They did not know that they were giving birth to one of the more effective clubs utilized by the more self-righteous among us.

The fact is that the word compromise is not used in the Bible to describe sin. In fact the word compromise does not, according to Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, appear in the Scriptures anywhere at all.

So it might be a good idea for some brave Evangelicals in the Church today to take the initiative to rehabilitate the term in question. We need to be reminded of the other use of “compromise” because the other use happens to be conducive to our sanctification. When two headstrong believers are butting those heads in unhealthy, pride-driven conflict both need to be gently urged to compromise. Ask any happily married Christian couple how they stay that way and they will tell you that reaching a compromise in an argument is often the only way to successfully resolve a difference. If the compromise reached in such a case is not a moral one than it is a blessing and a sign that two people are growing in Godly humility.

Personally I’d like to see the word gain a better place in our lexicon, for “compromise” to become a term more often used to describe how mutual humility can enhance human relationships then as a weapon to rebuke our brothers and sisters for falling into sins that we ourselves may be prone to.

Then maybe we will have one less dirty word in the House of God.