There is a great deal of discussion in evangelical circles regarding the concepts of sympathy and empathy. Most people tend to equate the two terms as being synonymous, however, there is a distinct and important difference. Merriam-Webster describes the difference this way:

Sympathy is a feeling of sincere concern for someone who is experiencing something difficult or painful. Empathy involves actively sharing in the person’s emotional experience.

To give it a more practical explanation, Pastor Gabe Hughes gives this example:

Sympathy is when you see someone in emotional quicksand, and with a foot on solid ground, you reach for the person to help them.

Empathy is when you jump in the sand to experience it with them, and now you both need help.

In other words, where sympathy looks at the circumstances of a person’s plight and is motivated to help him in his distress, empathy drives a person to feel what the other person is feeling. Empathy is desirable because people understand what it feels like to have someone who feels the way they do. However, sympathy does not simply find itself trapped in the quagmire of emotions, it actually looks at the issues of a problem creating the emotional state. In fact, it is a component of compassion, which is a biblical concept exemplified by Christ himself (Matt. 9:36; 14:14–21; 15:32; Mk. 6:34; 8:2–3; Lk. 7:13–15).

Many people today focus on empathy because there is a perceived benefit to understanding and feeling the emotions of someone who is suffering. There is a sense in which people believe they are being more kind and loving if they can simply feel the pain of another, that they might be more understanding to the afflicted if they feel what they feel. There even seems to be some biblical support for the idea, for we are commanded to comfort others in the ways we have been comforted by God in our trials (2 Cor. 1:3–5).

While there is nothing patently anti-biblical about recognizing the similarities between the emotions people feel in times of suffering, empathy as a concept is overly concerned with appealing to others in shared feelings rather than seeking to lead emotions into their proper place by identifying the issues surrounding one’s suffering and how peace can be found in bringing those issues to Christ. Empathy can trap oneself in emotions where sympathy and compassion drive Christians to bring biblical solutions that glorify Christ.

Enter evangelical elitism. Given that empathy is the watchword of the sociopolitical left, many evangelical “thought leaders” attempt to appeal to the world by adopting and foisting progressive ideologies on the church. Among their efforts to appease the left, these elite leaders have become quite adept at “performative empathy.” Evangelical elites will seek out the approved demographic groups and social justice causes of the left and make public overtures of being empathetic to charges of unjust suffering, oppression, or the plights of disenfranchised people.

The reason that this empathy is performative is that it requires nothing from the elites except to publicly align themselves with the approved causes. Then they lecture the rest of the church, the peasantry as it were, for not being as empathetic as themselves. It gives the appearance of noble humanity for the afflicted while providing no actual means of alleviating the problems. Furthermore, if there is any pushback from the church at large, it can be leveraged as evidence that the elites are greatly needed to lead Christians into being a more loving body of people.

Recent examples of such performative empathy include telling churches to love their neighbor by complying with COVID shutdown orders, while simultaneously applauding the Black Lives Matter protests and riots. Public displays of support for LGBTQ persons by “apologizing” for the church being discriminatory and “pronoun hospitality” have been plentiful while remaining relatively silent on the abuse perpetrated on children whose bodies have been needlessly mutilated to perpetuate the ideology of gender confusion. More recently, evangelical elites have championed Anti-ICE protests in the name of loving the sojourner, while utterly ignoring the rampant criminal acts that illegal immigration has brought into the nation, including the trafficking of women and children brought across the border.

These same evangelical leaders have also joined in the chorus of calling President Trump a racist for a poorly edited video which included an autoplay of a second parody video not created by the administration. This chorus was remarkably silent in the wake of the truth of the nature of the video, and no lectures were given about sinful rushes to judgment. Lastly, when people across the nation objected to a sexual deviant being promoted by the NFL as the half-time musical act at the Super Bowl, Christians were lectured about insensitivity to other cultures being given space to hear music in their own language, disregarding the crass nature of the music and suggestive dancing performances.

Professing Christian elitists who engage in performative empathy are seeking the applause and recognition of the world around them. Much like the Pharisees of Christ’s day, they love the attention of others (see Matt. 23:4–7). They want to be promoted by the world as the true Christians that all others should aspire to be, and they place a heavy burden on the church they never demand of themselves. Well did Jesus speak of such people when he condemned the public prayers of the religious leaders who did so, “that they may be seen by others” (Matt. 6:5).

Performative empathy is simply that, a performance. Religious leaders who are quick to identify with approved demographics while remaining silent before a culture that is awash in sexual depravity, moral degradation, and murders the most innocent among us, babies in the womb, gain a standing with the world at large because they do nothing to confront the sin-hardened hearts of the people. They stand on a virtual stage, dancing to the tune played by the progressivist orchestra in hopes of procuring a pittance of applause and approval. And all it costs them is the denial of God and his Word.

Christ made it clear to the church, if anyone claims that they love him, they must obey his commandments (John 14:15). When the church goes forth and makes disciples through the preaching of the gospel, believers are to be baptized and taught to obey all that he has commanded (Matt. 28:19–20). This means that believers are called to emulate Christ in his public preaching where he called sin sin and taught that salvation could only come through repentance and faith in him.

Those who refuse to confront the culture at large with these truths are liars and deceivers, and much like the hired hands who flee when the wolves come (John 10:12–13), they fear the disapproval of the world at large. They are not beholden to the true Shepherd for they will not wholly preach his message to the very sinners who desperately need the gospel. Yet, like the religious leaders of Jesus day, they burden the church and bind them up with man-made traditions (Mk. 7:9–13). They are actors and performers who care not for Christ and his word, and if they do not repent, they will face the same woes Jesus called upon the religious leadership of his day (see Matt. 23).

Christians indeed should be moved by the afflictions and sufferings of those around them. Every trial a person faces is either a taste of the judgment to come, or it is a refining fire designed to bring a person closer to Christ. Christians should care about caring for their brethren first and foremost because we are called to use our gifts to comfort and build up the body of Christ. Then we are to care for those in the world facing genuine affliction because our service to the unregenerate is a model of Christ taking the undeserving and, by his mercy and grace, meeting their greatest need, redemption.

Christians therefore should not merely be appeased to make performative gestures that will make them look better to the watching world, but genuinely address the issues in a person’s life. Christians should not just try to feel what others feel, but look to Scripture as to how to alleviate the burdens of another, even if it means exposing those feelings as spurious and deceitful. Genuine sympathy and compassion care for the entire person, seeking to not only bring temporal care but, ultimately, lead them to the greatest deliverer that can be provided, Jesus Christ himself. And if that costs the church by making Christians look terrible in the eyes of the world, we should remember the words of our Savior, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you” (John 15:18).