“Be nice!” – from childhood we are encouraged toward this social grace. Be nice! As Christians, we are especially prone to deal with others by being nice. We’re encouraged to not rock the boat, not to embarrass another person, not to respond angrily, and not to use unflattering or coarse language. Nice, we seem to think, is part of the stock and trade of the Christian life.
I recently subscribed to the journal, Touchstone. It touts itself as a conservative Christian journal with contributors from Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox perspectives. The first issue arrived today, and as is my habit, I first perused the table of contents. Like a magnet, my eyes went to an article titled, Losing Winsome… on Spurning the Idol of Niceness.[1]
“What?!! - an article that pans being nice,” I thought. I have many friends and acquaintances that come from Niceville… midwestern-nice; Minnesota-nice. What are they ever going to do if we leave being nice behind?
But as I read the article, I began to agree more and more that being nice isn’t all it’s cracked up to be! First, the author makes a distinction between, “nice” and the Spirit induced Christian virtues, “kindness, gentleness and humility.” The fruit of the Spirit, “Kindness” (χρηστότης – chrēstótēs) is specifically singled out as something many Christians confuse with being nice.
In the face of a changing culture that is becoming more stridently anti-Christian, an argument can be made for not being nice, because in the face of anti-biblical values and behaviors that predispose people to God’s judgment, nice isn’t kind. Consider the benign example of a family having dinner at a restaurant where in the adjacent table, coarse language is loudly and rowdily exchanged. Is it kind to your family – to your children - to winsomely stay quiet for the sake of being nice? Or in the face of the growing trend of withholding vital information from parents, is it kind to be nice? In the face of a culture that at times vehemently opposes Christian values, sometimes violently, is it kind to be nice?
A while back, an older gentleman arrived on a Sunday to the church that I was serving. He introduced himself as a veteran – let’s call him Dave (not the name he gave me) - who had come to the veteran’s hospital located in that city to have an important medical procedure. He needed money to return home. He seemed so genuine that I gave him the money that I had in my wallet. A few weeks later I was filling in at a different congregation. Lo and behold, the very same person, “Dave,” came into that church with the very same story. He didn’t recognize me. I said something that wasn’t very nice: “Dave, you haven’t made it home yet?” He gave me a quizzical look. I said, “You came to my church a few weeks ago saying you needed to get home and I gave you the money that I had.” I didn’t feel good calling Dave on this, but I would probably have helped him if he had simply said that he gets what he needs to live by going to different churches, rather than using the same untrue story. I wasn’t nice and didn’t feel good about behaving that way. I think we all face such situations.
Was Jesus being nice when He called the religious leaders of his time, “Whited sepulchers, vipers, hypocrites?” Was He being nice when He told Peter, “Get behind me Satan!” Or when Jesus said to the Syrophoenician woman, “It isn’t right to take the bread from the children and cast it to the dogs,” when she was pleading for Him to help her demon-possessed daughter? Was Jesus nice when He flipped tables and chased people out of the temple courtyard with a whip?
Foster says, “The kind thing for Christ to do in these situations was not ‘nice.’” He suggests that being mean and impolite is necessary when wanting to do the right and moral thing. “It necessitated avoiding watery ‘winsomeness’ that wins by displaying truth, power, and righteousness rather than simply avoiding conflict and keeping one’s elbows off the cultural table.”[2]
Being nice to both Christian and non-Christians is certainly preferred to being quarrelsome. But we need to use Spirit-led wisdom to decide exactly when not to be nice and opt for kindness. The author (Foster) suggests that we not be fooled into thinking that if we feed the lion – that is the anti-Christian culture – your arm that it will be appeased. Be kind and do so in a nice way if the circumstances permit.
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