In this generation, it's a challenge for Christians to go counter-culture. People nowadays don't like it when they're rebuked for their sin and when they're corrected for their wrongdoing. They even find it weird when someone sticks to his virtues according to the Bible.
This should not surprise Christians, for it has been prophesied in the Bible long ago:
"But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God—having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people." (2 Timothy 3:1-5)
Staying holy in culture
While some Christians might want or think of adapting the culture to reach more people for the Lord, much care should be taken. Billy Graham once said, "We are the Bibles the world is reading; we are the creeds the world is needing; we are the sermons the world is heeding."
How we live speaks volumes louder than what we say or preach. Knowing this, we should take care how we live.
Ephesians 5:15-16 says, "Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil." We must live right!
Did you know that the whole earth, the whole "creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed"? (Romans 8:19)
How can the children of God be revealed if the children of God live like the world does? Brothers and sister, we should not live like the world. Rather, we must understand that as Christ was not of the world, so are we. We must choose to live holy, blameless lives, and be like the ones who "follow the Lamb wherever he goes." (Revelation 14:4)
How to live holy in a fallen world
Brothers, we must choose to live for God and His purposes, following His ways and not ours. While it is a very noble desire to reach people for Him, we must do so using His ways and not the ways of the world.
1. Don't copy the world...
"Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will." (Romans 12:1-2)
2. Live as children of light...
"For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord." (Ephesians 5:8-10)
3. ... and live a quiet, righteous life
"And to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody." (1 Thessalonians 4:11-12)
