05/23/2026
The closer someone genuinely gets to God, the more unusual they start to look to the world around them. Not because holiness is strange, but because our culture has normalized the very things Scripture warns us about.
We now live in a world where rebellion is celebrated, compromise is applauded, and moral conviction is treated like a problem to overcome rather than a virtue to admire. Sin no longer hides in the shadows - it’s marketed, defended, joked about, and even encouraged. Meanwhile, righteousness is increasingly portrayed as foolish, narrow-minded, or extreme.
But this shouldn’t surprise Christians.
Jesus Himself said that His followers would be different from the world because they no longer belong to it. The more someone begins conforming their life to Christ, the more their life naturally stands in contrast to a culture drifting further from Him.
While the culture glorifies pride, Scripture teaches humility. While the world celebrates lust, greed, revenge, self-worship, and endless indulgence, God calls His people toward purity, forgiveness, self-control, sacrifice, and obedience.
Darkness will eventually begin viewing light as abnormal.
Satan’s strategy has never been to make evil appear evil. It’s to make sin feel ordinary, harmless, entertaining, and socially acceptable - while making righteousness feel restrictive, embarrassing, or outdated. That’s why many people can openly celebrate greed, immorality, drunkenness, pride, and hatred without feeling uncomfortable, yet become unsettled by genuine holiness, repentance, or wholehearted devotion to Christ.
But Scripture repeatedly reminds believers not to measure truth by majority opinion. Wide roads are often crowded. Narrow roads are often lonely.
If following Christ sometimes makes you feel out of step with the culture around you, that doesn't necessarily mean something has gone wrong. It may actually be evidence that your mind is being renewed instead of conformed. The goal of the Christian life was never to look normal to a world that rejected Jesus.