Celebs, Conversions, and Criticisms

Right and wrong ways to deal with celebrity conversions:

It happens quite often: some famous celeb – a movie star, a rock star, or even a porn star – will come along and seem to have a conversion to Christ. When something like this happens, you routinely will get two main sets of responses. Some believers will just accept whatever they hear and assume, ‘Yep, fantastic, he or she is now a Christian’.

At the other end of the spectrum, some believers will make it clear that they fully know the human heart, and they will assure us that this celeb is NOT a Christian, he does NOT have the Holy Spirit, and we should basically want to have nothing to do with him.

Both responses are clearly wrong, and it could be that the second one is the worse of the two. Let me speak to each one in turn. I do so in light of the recent Grammys and the short testimony given by Jelly Roll there. As I said in my recent piece about him, I never heard of him before.

But given all the attention he was getting, I looked into his life a little bit and then penned my piece. It is found here: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2026/02/02/jelly-roll-jesus-and-the-grammys/

Uncritical gullibility

One unhelpful extreme that some believers can have is to just accept whatever they hear and ask no questions. They will take at face value any claim of someone being a new Christian. This can be just as bad as assuming that anyone who says he is a believer at any stage of his journey is in fact one.

That is, you might have a pastor who has been in Christian ministry for decades. But if he comes out and insists that abortion is just fine, or homosexual marriage is something God blesses, and so on, then we all should be asking some really hard questions. Is this person a real Christian, or just a wolf in sheep’s clothing?

But the new convert – if he indeed is one – cannot be judged too quickly for the simple reason that passing from darkness to light, from death to life, is just the beginning. The process of justification – based solely on grace through faith – takes place in an instant. But the rest of one’s journey – sanctification – is the stuff of a lifetime.

Thus new believers have SO much to relearn, rethink, and redo. Old habits have to be reconsidered and dealt with. Old beliefs and attitudes must be carefully gone over and reevaluated. All this takes time. Yes, we should expect to see some signs of new life sooner or later. But we are all on different spiritual journeys, and some converts clearly have a new life that is easily seen early on – but not everyone does.

Harsh and ugly judgmentalism

Consider the other extreme. That Jesus reserved most of his anger and wrath for the Pharisees should tell us which of these two responses might be worse. With Jelly Roll, and others, I have had a number of Christians coming to my various sites insisting that they know for a fact that he and others like him are NOT saved and are NOT actually Christians.

While we should want and expect to see fruit in the lives of new believers, two things must be said. One, as mentioned, it takes time for new believers to develop into mature and well-rounded disciples of Christ. Expecting them to be nearly perfect in the first few months is not very helpful.

Indeed, not only was I still doing drugs for a while and throwing out the occasional curse word AFTER I was converted, there are areas in my life even now – after being a believer for 55 years – that God is still showing me I need to really work on.

Two, the truth is, only God ultimately and fully knows the human heart. He alone knows with absolute certainty who is and who is not one of his. We are NOT God and we do not have this infallible ability to make such absolute judgments. Sure, as said, we can test for their fruit as Jesus said (Matthew 7:15-20). We can and should observe their life, their doctrines, and so on.

But if someone were to look at my life on any given day even now, they might see how I was so rude to others online or so impatient with my children, and they could easily judge me and say, ‘Nope, he sure ain’t no Christian’. I am so glad God is so much more gracious and patient with me than are so many judgmental Christians.

The biblical response

It seems the correct Christian response is neither to just accept without any sort of evidence or fruit that the person has indeed become a real deal Christian, nor to just dismiss out of hand their claims to being Christ-followers. A third option is to avoid both unhelpful and unbiblical extremes.

One person who was getting tired of all the armchair critics said this to me online:

“So tired of people dissing on Jelly Roll. Sure he may have been heard to drop some language after the awards and his wife’s choice attire didn’t exactly scream demure but gee whizz, give the bloke a break. He’s a baby Christian, still learning and like most of us, has a way to go. He stood in front of his peers and proclaimed the name of Jesus with a Bible in his hand. To me that speaks volumes.”

I responded with these words: “Yes, there are two extremes to avoid: elevate on pedestals new Christians before they are more or less mature and ready to be a solid witness for Christ; and Pharisaically cut them no slack and just criticize, when we should be praying for these newish Christians.”

Indeed, probably one of the most important things I have to keep saying to those who so proudly sit in judgment on new believers is this: ‘Please tell me: are you spending as much time on your knees before God praying for these folks as you are criticising them? If not, then we might not need to take your concerns all that seriously.’

In sum, not asking hard questions and just embracing anyone and everyone who claims to be a follower of Christ is NOT the way to proceed. Putting them on some sort of pedestal when they are just babes in Christ is going to harm them and harm the testimony of the Christian church.

But neither is acting like an arrogant Pharisee and passing judgment on others, pretending that you know as much as God does about every human heart. Putting yourself in the place of God in this way is a serious sin indeed – idolatrous in fact – and must be renounced and repented of.

And please keep this in mind: In each camp the person doing these things can have good intentions:
-The person asking few questions does not want to sin by judging (in the sinful sense of the word). That is a good thing.
-The person judging wants to keep sin and deception out of the Christian church. That is a good thing.
But the truth is, virtues pushed to unbiblical extremes can become vices.

So both unbiblical responses stink, and I wish more Christians would just ease up a bit here. Again, praying for these new converts – or those who claim to be new converts – should aways be our first port of call. If we are not on our face before God seeking to intercede for these celebs and others – those that Satan is doing all he can to keep them from Christ and salvation – then we have failed them and we have failed our Lord.

[1288 words]