This article appeared in the October 2005 issue of The Voice (Official Newsletter of the Evangelical Anabaptist Fellowship) and in The Messenger (EMC) Feb. 6, 2006: p. 4-6.

Real Christianity

by Pierre Gilbert

Maple Syrup and Square Dancing

What does it mean to be a Christian? As a teenager, that was an easy question to answer. For me, a Christian was someone who was born in a Catholic or Protestant home. We were not Muslims, Hindus, or Buddhists. We were Christians. That’s all there was to it. Or was it? Well, for one, my “Christianity” was more akin to folklore than real faith. Being a Christian was in the same category as eating maple syrup and square dancing. It was just part of my culture. That kind of Christianity did not really have any personal implication for the way I lived my life, and in all likelihood, that’s the way I would have lived the rest of my life except for one innocuous meeting with a fellow student at the age of 16.

You are a Pagan!

He and I were both musicians. He an atrocious trumpeter. I, an average saxophone player. After a while, we began to discuss religion. But this did not end up being the kind of conversation I had anticipated. Any religion talk I have ever had would normally turn to space aliens or the New Age. To my amazement, this fellow insisted on discussing the Bible and Jesus. And so, this civilized conversation quickly turned to a shouting match. And then, he said it straight out: “You are not a Christian. You are a Pagan!” Well, that did it. Who was he to tell me I wasn’t a Christian. By what authority could he say something like that? But that question made me seriously think about my faith, and it eventually revolutionized my life.

For him, one did not become a Christian until a personal and conscious decision was made to invite Jesus Christ into one’s life. Without a personal commitment rising out of a sense of profound need and a desire to be in relationship with God, one could claim to be a Christian but in name only.

Soon after, I took the step that eventually transformed my entire life. One evening, in the basement of a small Baptist Church, I asked Jesus to be my savior. That night, I experienced the new birth. I became a new creation. A child of God.

A Personal Encounter with the Living Christ

Now, when someone asks me what a Christian is, my answer is direct and to the point: A Christian is someone who has made a personal commitment to the person of Jesus. It’s someone who has had an encounter with the living Christ.

This kind of definition does not please everybody. Some say it’s too personal. That it overly emphasizes the individual over the community. That it is actually more an expression of modern-day individualism than real Christian faith. While there might be some legitimacy to that criticism, frankly, I think the disparaging of the personal dimension of the Christian faith is loony bin thinking.

For one, a community is essentially a collection of individuals. The quality of that community is always a function of the quality of the individuals that compose it. One cannot have a believing community without individuals making personal decisions. Two, we should not confuse an emphasis on personal salvation with individualism. Individualism is an outlook on life that emphasizes the self at the expense of others. Individualism in that sense is ultimately a decision to put oneself at the center of the universe.

Before my conversion, I was a self-centered individualist. When I accepted Christ, however, a radical shift occurred. My focus moved from self to God and others. In my case, and in the case of the other young people who came to Christ in those days, this decision was anything but another expression of individualism. It was about becoming a disciple of Christ and being part of the people of God. It was not about a free ticket to heaven and life as usual. It was about entering a new realm. The realm of life. It was about induction into the Kingdom of God and becoming Kingdom people.

Prescribing Sugar Pills to a Cancer Patient

For some, being a Christian is not so much about holding specific beliefs as living a certain way. In keeping with a society where strong Christian beliefs are shunned, it is not surprising to hear many Christians emphasize behaviour over belief, social activism over verbal witness. This too is an unacceptable definition of what a Christian is, for redemption is not simply about moral reform, as important as that is. Redemption is about transformation. To reduce Christian conversion to exhorting people to change their behaviour is akin to prescribing sugar pills to a cancer patient.

Radical Transformation and Reorientation

The New Testament uses a variety of images and expressions to characterize what it means to be a Christian. The apostle John in his first epistle uses a very interesting equation. For John, belief is central. The epistle begins by a reference to what was heard, seen, looked at, and touched…the Word of Life.1 In 1:5, John speaks of the message we have heard…and declare. A little later, the apostle reminds his readers of the importance of “testing the spirits,” something that is done by examining one’s statement of faith: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God…” (4:1-2). In 5:1, John states that it those who believe that Jesus is the Christ who are born of God. For John, propositional truth is a critical and inescapable dimension of the Christian faith.

But it does not end there. John’s first epistle seamlessly connects the dots between belief and practice. Real Christianity is not simply about a list of beliefs to which we give intellectual assent. Ultimately, being a Christian is about radical transformation and reorientation. A Christian is someone who has received and been transformed by the infinite love of God and who in turn becomes an unconditional conduit of that love for others.

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another (1 John 4:7-11).

1All scriptural citations are taken from the New International Version.