Use and Misuse of the term "Christian"

Acts 11:26  "and when he found him, he brought him to Antioch.  So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people.  The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch."

I will not claim the bulk of the words in this post to be my own, but rather I simply relay the words of C.S. Lewis from Mere Christianity regarding the use and misuse of the terms "Christian".  I think the distinction is an important one for us to be mindful of as we casually throw around the word and assign it (or deny its assignment) to others.

"Far deeper objections may be felt- and have been expressed- against my use of the word 'Christian' to mean one who accepts the common doctrines of Christianity.  People ask: 'Who are you, to lay down who is, and who is not a Christian?' or 'May not many a man who cannot believe these doctrines be far more truly a Christian, far closer to the Spirit of Christ, than some who do?'  Now this objection is in one sense very right, very charitable, very spiritual, very sensitive.  It has every available quality except that of being useful.  We simply cannot, without disaster, use language as these objectors want us to use it.  I will try to make this clear by the history of another, much less important, word.

The word 'gentleman' originally meant something recognisable; one who had a coat of arms and some landed property.  When you called someone 'a gentleman' you were not paying him a compliment, but merely stating a fact.  If you said he was not 'a gentleman' you were not insulting him, but giving information.  There was no contradiction in saying John was a liar and a gentleman; any more than there now is in saying that James is a fool and an M.A. [I believe this is the abbreviation for one that holds a Master of Arts degree, but I am not certain]  But then there came people who said- so rightly, charitably, spiritually, sensitively, so anything but useful- 'Ah, but surely the important thing about a gentleman is not the coat of arms and the land, but the behaviour?  Surely he is the true gentleman that behaves as a gentleman should?  Surely in that sense Edward is far more truly a gentleman than John?' 

They meant well.  To be honourable and courteous and brave is of course a far better thing than to have a coat of arms.  But it is not the same thing.  Worse still, it is not a thing everyone will agree about.  To call a man 'a gentleman' in this new, refined sense, becomes, in fact, not a way of giving information about him, but a way of praising him: to deny that he is 'a gentleman' becomes simply a way of insulting him.  When a word ceases to be a term of description and becomes merely a term of praise, it no longer tells you facts about the object: it only tells you about the speaker's attitude to that object.  (A 'nice' meal only means a meal the speaker likes.)  A 'gentleman', once it has been refined out of its old, coarse, objective sense, means hardly more than a man the speaker likes.  As a result, 'gentleman' is now a useless word.  We had lots of terms of approval already, so it was not needed for that use; on the other hand, if anyone (say, in a historical work) wants to use it in its old sense, he cannot do so without explanations.  It has been spoiled for that purpose.

Now if once we allow someone to start spiritualising and refining, or as they might say 'deepening', the sense of the word 'Christian', it too will speedily become a useless word.  In the first place, Christians themselves will never be able to apply it to anyone.  It is not for us to say who, in the deepest sense, is or is not close to the Spirit of Christ.  We do not see into men's hearts.  We cannot judge, and are indeed forbidden to judge.  It would be wicked arrogance for us to say that any man is, or is not, a Christian in this refined sense.  And obviously a word which we can never apply is not going to be a very useful word...

When a man who accepts the Christian doctrine lives unworthily of it, it is much clearer to say that he is a bad Christian than to say he is not a Christian."

The takeaways for me are these:

1.  Whether someone is or is not a Christian is a matter of fact, not opinion.
2.  Whether someone is, in fact, a Christian or not is beyond my ability to determine.  To the extent that I try to make such a determination, I am displaying "wicked arrogance" by implying that I can see into the heart of someone.  Only God can do this.
3.  The only thing I or anyone else can comment on are our observations regarding the person's behavior.  These are opinions, not facts.  And thankfully in my case, behavior is not a factor in determining whether someone is or is not a Christian.