Am I a Christian???

First off, i want to apologize for the length of time between my last post and this one.  Things have been pretty busy with a new role at work and with family things going on around the house, etc.  Those are secondary excuses, really.  I suppose the most prevalent reason for the absence from this blog has been a lack of inspiration in regards to what to write about.  I have many different ideas that I've floated around in my head and that i want to tackle in this blog at some point.  However, the ideas aren't totally flushed out yet and they need some time to ferment before serving. 

So I thought I'd go back to the basics.  Back to the beginning, if you will.  Back to where it really all begins for most of us.  What does it mean to be a Christian?

In reality, this isn't quite back to the beginning.  Being a Christian presupposes that we already faith.  Even though it shouldn't be, for some the Faith and  Christianity thing is kind of like the chicken and egg.  Which came first?  I'd imagine that for a whole lot of people, myself included, we were "Christian" before we knew what that fully entailed.  For others, maybe you were "Jewish" before you knew what that fully entailed.  For me at least, I was baptized into the church before I could talk and most certainly before I could ever read or think for myself.  My parents had grown up in a church, as had their parents, and their parents before them.  It was just something that we did.  Truthfully, it was my mom who dragged us to church and forced my sister and brother and me to participate as choir members or acolytes.  Dad avoided churches except for funerals and weddings.  But the fact remains, I was definitely a "Christian" before i had any notion of what that really meant.  I don't think it was until I went to private school in the eighth grade and was exposed to people of the Jewish faith that i even really understood that there were other religions out there to choose from.  Religion just wasn't something that 13 and 14 year-olds went around talking about.  If I had friends who were not "Christian" at that time in my life, I certainly didn't know it until I was in the 8th grade.      

To fully grasp what it means to be a Christian, I thought it might be useful to examine what a Christian is.  Is it someone who was simply baptized in a church?  Is it someone who regularly attends church?  Do you have to be baptized and attend church to be a Christian?  Can you do one and not the other?  Is it something completely different?  So, what IS a Christian? 

If  you had asked me to answer that question 20 years ago, I probably would have said a Christian is someone who believes that Jesus of Nazareth was the son of God, that he died to pay for my sins, and that he was raised from the dead after three days in a tomb.  That's Christianity in a nutshell, isn't it?  In a basic sense, yes (those three beliefs can certainly be expounded upon in far greater depth and detail).  And for far too many of us, that's where our Christianity ends.  I would suggest that there are at least two more critical components of what makes a person a Christian. 

The Christian faith's core foundation comes from the Old Testament and is largely shared by our Jewish brethren.  It is set in the idea that humankind can never live up to God's perfect expectations and we are in need of a saviour.  We are, in our very nature, fallen beings.  The Old Testament set out to arrange a system in which humans could atone for their own transgressions through ritual sacrifices of animals (often times these animals were expected to be biggest, strongest, and purest of the herd or flock... perhaps to impart a stronger sense of regret for those transgressions... perhaps to strengthen the ideas of value of life?).  The animals were the saviours.  Paying with their lives to wipe the slate clean.  This set the tone for the ultimate sacrifice which was foretold by Isaiah and other Old Testament prophets and came centuries later in the form of human flesh.  Jesus died that we may be saved (John 3:17).

While Judaism is still waiting for the Saviour, Christianity has already seen and acknowledged our Saviour.  It was Jesus.  But does the fact that Jesus died and was sacrificed for us all we need to be saved?  According to the Gospels, no.  Romans 10:9 says "if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.".  It is not enough to simply accept Jesus' sacrificial act and move on.  We must confess it and we must also believe it.  In our hearts. 

One last thing that makes a Christian a Christian is the act of repentance.  The idea that repentance is needed in order to be truly saved can be found throughout the New Testament.  For most people, repentance is thought of as simply a "confession of sins".  But it is more than that.  Merriam-Webster defines "repent" as "1) to turn from sin and dedicate oneself to the amendment of one's life; 2)to feel regret or contrition; 3) to change one's mind".  Most people would feel comfortable with the second definition only.  The more important aspects of repentance, at least in my opinion, are found in the first and third definitions.  It's not enough to just feel sorry about our sins and regret them.  We need to then make conscious efforts to change ourselves and steer clear of those transgressions in the future.  If we just continue on down the same old path and find ourselves making the same old confessions week in and week out, have we truly repented?  And to compound the issue further, repentance also includes changing one's mind.  In the Christian sense, this isn't simply deciding that today I'll wear black shoes instead of white shoes.  Truly repenting should include changing the way we think about ourselves, others, and our relationship with God. 

So am i truly a Christian?  I'd like to believe so.  I believe those three basic beliefs (Jesus is the Son of God, He died for my sins, and He was raised from the dead by God).  I have confessed it.  And I truly believe it with my whole heart.  I have confessed my sins and professed my inequities before God.  But I don't think I pursue repentance as fervently as I could or should.  This is largely due to the fact that my new relationship with God is just that.  New.  I am still trying to figure out what the "righteous" path is.  My gut tells me that the righteous path is the path spelled out by Jesus in the New Testament.  The simple answer is to love one another and Christ loved us.  But there is much more to than that.  Jesus taught much more than this.  If I am to truly and properly repent, I need to know what that change should look like. 

Next time we'll explore this path to change and explore what it means to be Christian in the light of Jesus' teachings.  I'm guessing that I will find that I have fallen far short of the ideal and that I have a lot of work to do.  And that will be okay.  I know I'm not perfect.  I know I need help.  I know it's going to take work.  The important thing for me is recognizing that there is work to do.  I am ready and willing to undertake the task. 

As always, thanks for reading.  Please feel free to comment and share any words of wisdom or encouragement!  All comments are welcome!