What Is a Christian?

 •  5 min. read  •  grade level: 6
 
The writer remembers holding a series of largely attended gospel meetings in St. John's, Newfoundland. To the first meeting came a lady, who by her deep attention showed her interest in the preaching. At its close the writer asked her if she was a Christian. Brightly she assured him she was, that she had greatly enjoyed the meeting, and did not intend to be absent from one of them.
The last meeting came. Some 500 were present. The writer wishing to find out who would like to be saved suggested that those, who had this desire, should signify it by standing up for a moment. To his great astonishment the first person to stand up was this lady.
Soon he was by her side. He expressed his astonishment that she had stood up, when at the first meeting she had assured him that she was a Christian.
" But I found out during the meetings that I was not a Christian," she replied.
The writer then asked, " What did you think made you a Christian?"
She replied, and it is the reply of tens of thousands of earnest but deluded people, " I have always lived a good life. I take the sacrament and do all the good that I can. I teach my children to pray. I thought these things made me a Christian, but during the meetings my eyes have been opened to see the terrible mistake I have been making."
Wherein lay her mistake?—and a truly terrible mistake it was. Notice that in all she said she spoke ONLY of her own doings, and not one single word about the Savior, or the work He did on the cross. In short, with all her religiousness, she was not a true Christian. She did not belong to Christ. She was not saved at all, nor could she have been a Christian if she had relied partly on her efforts and partly on the Savior. It must be Christ, and Christ alone, as Savior for salvation.
We read, " The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch " (Acts 11:2626And when he had found him, he brought him unto Antioch. And it came to pass, that a whole year they assembled themselves with the church, and taught much people. And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch. (Acts 11:26)). The word, Christian, was a name given to describe disciples or believers. The word Christian means " belonging to Christ."
Reader, do you belong to Christ? Are you a real true Christian? Not a nominal Christian, with a name to live, but dead, as the Bible puts it.
A true Christian is one who has repented of his or her sins, and received Christ as a living personal Savior, relying upon His atoning work at the cross for salvation, disowning any merit by good works or human effort, but trusting entirely to the Savior for his or her soul's salvation.
This means a definite transaction between the soul and the Lord. Have you ever bent the knee of your heart, and come as a poor, unworthy hell-deserving sinner to the Savior, who says, " Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out " (John 6:3737All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. (John 6:37)).
What did the lady in Newfoundland do? She abandoned all thought of her doings making her a Christian, and she came as a poor empty-handed sinner to Christ, and trusted Him as Savior.
After the writer had returned to England, he got a letter from her in which she wrote of the wonderful way her eyes -had been opened to see her mistake, and how she had been enabled by the grace of God to become a true Christian by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ as a personal Savior.
Is the reader in earnest to be a true Christian? Study then very carefully the following Scriptures, for it is only the Word of God that can enlighten us on these vital subjects. Notice throughout these passages the emphasis that is laid upon BELIEVING.
" God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth IN HIM should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)).
Notice the word, " whosoever." That opens the door for you, whoever you may be.
Notice the present tense. " All that believe ARE "-the very moment they believe-" justified from all things." What a wonderful deliverance from the burden of sins! And you may have it here and now. You may be reading this in a railway station, in the privacy of your own room, on a seat in the park, in prison even, it matters not. This is the offer of God's wondrous grace. Will you accept it?
Again we read:-
" If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God bath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." (Rom. 10:99That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. (Romans 10:9)).
Note again the word believe -
" believeth IN HIM " (John 3:1616For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16))—the blessed Savior, the Son of God, who died on the cross for us-" believe in thine heart," a true belief, and hence the confession, not a mere profession, but the true confession on the lips of what is believed in the heart.
We ask, What is a Christian? The answer is, a true believer on the Lord Jesus, one who belongs to Christ. Reader, we ask you earnestly, Are you a Christian? If not, believe on the Lord Jesus this instant.
" Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved " (Acts 16: 31).
Then, and not till then, will you be a Christian.
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