What is Christianity Really About?

Christians are followers of Christ. Following means learning about Christ, knowing what He said, taught, and did, so that we can then speak, teach, and do as Christ has done. Following Christ means to actively think, talk, behave, and live as Christ Himself did, and in order to do this, we must all major in theology, studying the Bible so that we can rightly know how to follow Christ. So Christianity is about how Christians pursue and achieve thinking, talking, behaving, and living like Christ. I believe it is very important to clarify what Christianity is today for two reasons: (1.) Many churches today preach a Christianity that isn’t about us being conformed to the image of Christ, living more and more like Him, behaving as God commands. Instead, they preach how God helps us have better marriages, more money, how to get over heartbreak, how to improve your self-esteem, how to live your best life now and get rich quick. So instead of preaching that Christ IS life, they preach that Christ IMPROVES your life in Adam. Instead, Christianity is about entering into the family of God where we die from our old lives in Adam and receive new life in Christ. Christianity doesn’t improve our sinful lives, it does away with it and gives us new life, and this new life is a life aiming and desiring to please God and live like Christ. And to live like Christ means to love what is good and abhor what is evil. But, in order to love what is good and abhor what is evil, we must also learn what is good and what is evil. This is also what Christianity is about as I said earlier. And the way we learn what is good and what is sin is studying God’s Word. And it must be a serious study of the Word of God, if we would pour out many hours studying for a final exam for a history test or a science test or an English test, how much more so should we study for the final exam of life and eternity? We study the Word of God so we can know God in order to live like Christ. And if we do not have a desire to study the Word of God then we do not have a desire to know God and if we do not desire to know God, we certainly do not desire to live like Christ. (2.) Many other churches preach that Christ came to bring peace on this earth here and now and save the physically oppressed rather than the spiritually oppressed. This is often called social justice, where many Christians feel that one of our main goals should be to feed the poor with perishable food rather than the imperishable Bread of God. It isn’t always hungry people that these churches are concerned for, it’s more than that. Their gospel is to help all who are unhappy with life. They want to make them happy by giving them material things, treasures and pleasures on earth in material things, wealth, health, prosperity rather than wealth, health, and prosperity in heaven. In some ways, this is just an extension of (1.). How so? Because step one is about being God making you happy, God improving your life in Adam with self-help and moralistic, therapeutic deism as Michael Horton calls it. The next step in this is helping others have the same thing, their “best life now.” Both (1.) and (2.) believe that God gave Jesus to simply make us happy in the lives that we live here on earth. In other words, God wants us to be happy, not sad, He wants us to feel like we are loved, that we are special; He doesn’t want to see us sad or depressed, or oppressed, or afflicted. He wants us to have full stomachs and a full wardrobe, and He wants us to make sure others have these pleasures too. Oh, and most of all, He doesn’t want us to feel guilty about those mistakes that we make that are sometimes known as sins. Now here is the question: Is either (1.) or (2.) really what Christianity is all about? Does Jesus really just want us to be happy in this life, having the joys of health and food and feeling loved and having high self-esteem and getting rid of the guilt of our “shortcomings?” I think not. I think this is what the devil would like us to think Christianity is, when in reality Christianity, what it means to follow and live like Jesus Christ, is something entirely different. And next time I will lay out what I believe the Bible clearly teaches us about what Christ really said, taught and preached and how we are to go about imitating and living like Christ.