Why Being A Christian Is So Much More Than Just A Title
As my friend stepped down from the church podium, here she was approached by a “sister” who felt it imperative to let her know that her dress was a few inches too short to attend church, being a christian and all. Instead of encouraging the young lady for participating in church activities her first instinct was to criticize.
What ensued later was a downward spiral, my friend stopped attending church regularly and before long, she stopped attending altogether. Sadly, this has been the fate for a number of young people already struggling with being a good christian. The older members of the church feel its their duty to lay down the law. Oftentimes while they may mean well, their actions can serve as a stumbling block.
Being christian is hard! As Christians, we are judgemental. We see a young lady sporting a tattoo or being a gay christian and we instantly start being judgemental. Like the Pharisees, we waste so much time pointing out flaws and what we should and shouldn’t be doing than supporting our brothers and sisters and showing them Christ.
Being A Christian In Your Everyday Life
What does it mean to be a christian? Here are some examples of how you can go about being christian in your daily life.
Being a Christian means , offering a solution instead of criticizing. Instead of telling that young lady that her dress is too short, why not offer to take her on a shopping trip and teach her about modesty? Even better, treat her to some new modest clothing.
Being a Christian, you aren’t better than your fellow brother or sister. We are all dust! The next time a “questionable” character steps into your church, instead of turning up your nose, welcome him or her with open arms.
Being Christians, we are called to be “fishers of men” not to cut and scale the fish. Its the holy spirits job to convict them. In this article, we will dive into what does it mean to be a christian.
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Why Being A Christian Is So Much More Than Just A Title
Do you know those people who call themselves Christian, and live under the “Christian” umbrella, but when you get to know them, they don’t really look like Christ?
You know who I’m talking about? Drama always seem to surround them and they never seem to really be content with life.
But then, there are those other Christians that inspire your own faith just by living! They exude Christ-like qualities!
I was raised in a Christian, Texan, conservative, home schooled home. My parents are fully devoted Christians, and I have been so blessed to have them as models for being christian in an authentic way.
After meeting many incredible people from all different types of backgrounds, I’ve started to form a hypothesis that what differs an inspirational Christian from an imposter Christian comes down to a person’s answer to this one question:
Are you willing to TRULY love others?
Being A Christian | Chick-Fil-A-LOVE
As a teenager, I used to worked at Chick-fil-A (VERY stereotypical for a home-schooled Christian, I know, but that’s what I did.) While there, I saw, on multiple occasions, an individual in the drive-through say “can I pay for the car behind me please?”
The first time, the request completely shocked me. Mostly, because I wasn’t exactly sure how to do that on the register, but also because it was an intentional act of radical love and that ALWAYS catches people off guard. Often, when this happens, the person who just had their meal paid for would pay for the car behind them, and that person the car behind them, and on and on until the unfortunate person who was in front of a car with a $50+ order.
For the second (or third or fourth…) person, paying for the car behind them is an act of kindness and a beautiful display of receiving kindness and passing it on. However, it’s also, in a way, paying a debt. In the immediate state of gratitude, we all – as humans – feel pressured to return or reflect the kindness shown to us. It is actually kind of expected of anyone who considers themselves a “generous” human being. How to start being a Christian? Show unconditional love to others even when you think they don’t deserve it.
Being A Christian | Worldly Love
But here’s the issue.
How often do we as Christians show love just because it’s expected of us. How often do we show kindness because someone was just recently nice to us, and we feel pressured to be nice to others and “humbly” relieve ourselves of our ”vanity.”
“We need to invite this family over to lunch because they recently had us over.” “I need to remember to send this person a birthday card because they sent me one.” “This person came to this thing of mine so I need to go to this thing of theirs.”
Now, don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with this worldly love. It’s just human nature.
But this type of love isn’t RADICAL love. This is type of bare minimum love just keeps someone in that content, prideful state of thinking they are a decent person. And when we fall into this cycle, life loses its purpose and meaning, and, more importantly, our faith starts to become dormant.
Being A Christian Is About Showing Unconditional Love
How radically different would we live if we were in constant awareness that a KING had just DIED for us? Would we give quicker? Maybe more? Would we go more out of our own convenience to serve and love others? Would more of us be like those “first payers” who realize that our calling to love requires doing more than what is “expected” or “comfortable”?
Over and over again Jesus says that the only way into the Kingdom of Heaven is to lay everything else aside and follow Him in the act of radically loving others (Mark 10:17-31 & 42-45)
I truly believe that this marks the difference between an inspirational Christian who’s on fire for Jesus and an imposter Christian who is just lukewarm.
Constantly living a life of true love, however, is pretty dang hard. In fact, it’s down right impossible! But it’s at THAT point when we can turn to God who is always forgiving of those who repent and always loving to those who are weak. With our hearts in position to TRULY love, our minds on guard against what worldly love looks like, and God working through us, our days suddenly become more than just human beings working through our short lives.
In the true state of loving humility, God can take any life and use it for His everlasting, ground shaking, eternal Kingdom Expanding work!!!
With that purpose, that drive, and that PASSION, I promise, your faith will come alive and become an inspiration to those around you!
“Jesus looked at them and said, With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”
What Does Being A Christian Mean?
Being christian is about showing unconditional love just like Jesus to our brothers and sisters despite our differences in opinion, not Christians being judgemental. I would love to hear from you, What does it mean to be a Christian? What does being a christian mean to you? Let me know in the comments below.
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Thank you for sharing this topic of what does being a Christian really mean. It seems lately I’ve seen far too many Christian’s with their judgment and it’s made me take a look at my own life. Unfortunately, I’ve seen some of my own thoughts as judgmental. Thank you for bringing that to my attention. Loving like Jesus means loving everybody, always. I’m on a personal mission now to make that a priority.
I am guilty of being judgemental too but as Christians we need to remind ourselves that we need to show love regardless of whether or not we feel the individual deserves it. That’s what being Christian is all about.
Having and showing Radical love like that is something we forget to do. We tend to fall into a pattern of living life. But being a Christian means imitating Christ. And that pattern of living takes effort! Thank you for calling us out, and reminding us of the truth!
Showing radical love can be a challenge at times, but through Christ, our weakness can be made strong.