If Christians are like this, why believe?

Because the failures of followers are not evidence against their teacher. Jesus predicted his people would sometimes betray his name, and he calls that a scandal, not a norm to accept.

Should I confront the person who hurt me?

That is your decision, made with wise, safe people around you, and never if it would put you in danger. You are not obligated to reconcile with someone who is unsafe or unrepentant.

Are all Christians hypocrites?

No, though every honest one falls short. The point is that Jesus is not measured by them. He is the standard they fail to meet, and the one who forgives them, and you.

Your pain is real

Hurt by Christians

When the people who hurt you were the ones singing about grace on Sunday, the wound cuts in a particular way. It can feel like proof that the whole thing is a lie. Your anger is fair. The failure was theirs, not yours, and not God's.

You were judged when you needed mercy. You were talked about instead of talked to. Someone who called you brother or sister betrayed you, and then acted as if you were the problem for being hurt. And underneath it all is a quiet, corrosive question: if these are God's people, why would I want their God?

What is true

It is worth saying plainly: Christians can be, and often are, hypocrites. Jesus said so first, and more harshly than any critic. The Christian claim is not that his followers are good people. It is that they are forgiven ones who often live far below their King. So you are not measuring Jesus when you look at the people who hurt you. You are measuring how badly they represented him.

What Jesus said, and did

“Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones.”

Matthew 23:27

“For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”

Romans 3:23

“By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”

John 13:35

One small step

Your one small step: separate the two questions you have been forced to answer as one. Is Jesus who he said he is, and were these people good to me. You can answer no to the second without it deciding the first.

If you want to pray

Jesus, some of your people wounded me deeply. I do not want to judge you by them. Show me who you really are, apart from everyone who misrepresented you. Amen.

Honest questions

If Christians are like this, why believe?: Because the failures of followers are not evidence against their teacher. Jesus predicted his people would sometimes betray his name, and he calls that a scandal, not a norm to accept.
Should I confront the person who hurt me?: That is your decision, made with wise, safe people around you, and never if it would put you in danger. You are not obligated to reconcile with someone who is unsafe or unrepentant.
Are all Christians hypocrites?: No, though every honest one falls short. The point is that Jesus is not measured by them. He is the standard they fail to meet, and the one who forgives them, and you.

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There is no rush

You do not have to decide anything today. You can read a little, close the page, and come back tomorrow, or never. Nobody here is keeping score, and you owe no one an answer. When you are ready, and only then, the gentlest place to meet Jesus is in his own words, watching how he treats the tired, the ashamed, and the ones everybody else gave up on.

Read Matthew 11: come unto me Someone can pray with you

Jesus Christ is Lord.

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