How Not to Become a Christian

“But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” John 1:12–13 

Three ways you cannot become a child of God. That's right. How not to become a Christian, be careful, like most ‘Christians’ you might find yourself described below. 

You cannot be a Christian simply by being born into a Christian family.  I'm amazed at how many people, when asked how they know they are Christians, will answer, "Because I think my grandmother was," or, "Because my dad is a Christian, or “Because everyone in my family is a Christian."  It's a strange delusional thought process that they have twisted into believing that their family somehow has Christian "genes."  Do not mistake what I am writing, having Christian parents is a great privilege.   There is nothing more wonderful  than being raised with biblical values and to develop a Christian worldview.  But that does not make you a Christian.  You still must personally believe in Jesus. You cannot live off the faith of your mother, father, sister or brother.

You cannot become a Christian by compulsion.  No one in the world can make you a Christian. No minister or priest can make you a Christian by mere baptism or a sacrament.  You cannot be reborn through a ceremony, by raising your hand,  or by standing up or sitting down, or by going forward, or by kneeling at a bench,  or by reading a creed,.  None of these things, in and of themselves, will make you a Christian.

You cannot make yourself a Christian by your own will.  Not only does faith have nothing to do with your family background or compulsion, it also has nothing to do with desire.  You can not just say, "From this second on, I am a Christian!"  Becoming a Christian is a direct result of and continual decision to putting your trust in God and God alone.  God is the one who saves you, not yourself, your family, your friends, your money, your knowledge, or strength.  To think otherwise would  be compared to a drowning person thinking he can save himself or another drowning person.  

Becoming a Christian involves choosing the narrow path and turning away from sin (really, be honest with yourself, have you?)  and trusting Jesus and Jesus alone for your salvation.  It involves honestly saying "yes" to God's invitation to change your heart.

The Prayer of Mother Theresa

    Make us worthy Lord to serve our fellow men throughout the world,

    who live and die in poverty and hunger.

    Give them through our hands, this day, their daily bread

    and by our understanding love give peace and joy.

    Lord, make me a channel of thy peace.

    That where there is hatred I may bring love,

    That where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness,

    That where there is discord, I may bring harmony,

    That where there is error I may bring truth,

    That where there is doubt I may bring faith,

    That where there is despair I may bring hope,

    That where there are shadows I may bring light,

    That where there is sadness I may bring joy.

    Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted,

    To understand than to be understood,

    To love than to be loved.

    For it is by forgetting self that one finds.

    It is by forgiving that one is forgiven,

    it is by dying that one awakens to eternal life.

    Amen.

Mother Theresa 

Spirit of the Fruit - Smart?

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” Galatians 5:22-23

Admit it, you want people to think you are smart, you want people to look up to you for your knowledge, for your understanding of God, for you maturity as a Christian.  If you right now are saying “No, I don’t” then you are either delusional or a liar. 

It is obvious that while we must certainly know Him to love Him and to know Him we must study Him.  However that may make what I am about to write seem strange for someone to write who spends so much time trying to “know” God.  However the truth is, that no one has studied Him more completely than Satan, and it hasn’t done him a bit of good. 

When Paul describes the body of Christ as a body, part of which includes hands, ears, and so forth, we are quick to claim our territory — we are the brain of the church. Leave it to the American Christians to miss the point. 

Re-read Galatians 5:22-23 again, ‘smart’ is not one of the fruits of the Spirit. It goes without saying that we are to love God with all our minds.  However, we are to love God with all our minds, not simply seek to understand Him.  “We do not, of course, increase the intensity of our emotions by reducing the capacity of our brains.  Neither, however, will we ever bear the fruit of the Spirit if the seed of the Word is planted only in the rocky soil of our brains rather than the fertile soil of the heart.” Ligonier Ministries and R.C. Sproul.

Unless and until we learn to stop pursuing academic knowledge for knowledge’s sake,  and start seeking the kingdom of God, we will not, get better.  We are to put behind us all our earthly desires and worries.  We are to stop seeking those things that the those of this world seek. Start trying to be the salt. 

The fruit of love, in the end, is the fruit of the Spirit.  Love begets love. Love bears joy. Love bestows peace. Patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control: all these break forth in the heart. None of these, however, comes from the barren soil of our intellectual curiosity.  If I were a doctor I would diagnose the condition that we are suffering from when our knowledge fails at traveling the distance from our heads down to our hearts, as spiritual emptiness. There is not a magic pill to cure that emptiness, The  truth is, that we will not begin to get better until we come to embrace this obvious truth: we come into the kingdom not as scholars or students, but as children. www.ligonier.org/tabletalk