This question has been asked since the time of Christ’s sojourn on earth. Who qualifies to wear the name of the world’s saviour?
First, we must answer the how. Just naming the name of Jesus is not enough. Even He said that those who claimed Christianity would be excluded from salvation because they did not live their faith: Matthew 7:21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.
The Kingdom of Heaven on earth is the community of souls we call the Church. Since we take Jesus’ words as true, then many who place the mantle of piety on themselves are false followers.
To become a Christian one must follow the old formula I learned many decades ago: Hear, believe, repent, make the Good Confession and be baptized. But as one wag commented about this was that some went into the baptismal water a dry sinner and came up a wet one, for no difference was seen in attitude and actions. Not all who follow the rites of entrance into the community of believers are going to be saved.
Jesus words in Matthew 7:21 are often ignored in sermon and print. It is uncomfortable to know that some of those we worship with and some of our relatives do not live up to the standards expected of Jesus’ followers today. So what we do is to fall back on the old bromide that a loving God will not reject anyone who is ‘sincere’.
After becoming a Christian, you must live like a Christian. We find that in the example of Jesus and the writings of the New Testament. Just to be ‘better’ than our neighbors is not enough. (An aside — none of us are ever going to be good enough to deserve salvation. It is the free gift of God; however Christians are to be distinguished by their character and their actions.)
And to be clear, Christianity is not simply a list of what we don’t do, ala the Old Testament and the Ten Commandments. Christians have a faith that is active.
Two Biblical passages give a quick look at what Christians are like. The first comes from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5:1-12, the Beatitudes. Each of these shows what the Christian character is like. Long ago, I was taught that these defined the “Kingdom man”. A short list are: humility, empathy, meekness, righteousness, merciful, a pure heart, peaceableness.
If anyone measures up favorably with Jesus’ words, then he or she may well claim to be a Christian.
Jesus also listed some attributes of a Christian in Matthew 25, on how we treat our fellowman. Christians feed the hungry, give water to the thirsty, visit the sick and those in prison, give clothes to the needy and are hospitable to strangers. Do we measure up? To do these things for the unfortunate we demonstrate that we are Christian.
In his writings, the apostle Peter also gave a list of Christian attitudes and actions.
In 2 Peter 2 he wrote: 5But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to yourfaith virtue, to virtue knowledge, 6to knowledge self-control, toself-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, 7togodliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love.
Again, we see some very important traits the Christian should have.
To be a Christian is not to judge ourselves by how well we stack up against our neighbor (for we always choose the worst of our neighbors), nor how much of a Chrisitan our parents or grandparents were. Only the yardstick of Jesus life and teaching and the words of the New Testament can be used.
No one will ever be perfect; only Jesus was. But we can know we are in the community of believers if we make every effort to shed the actions, actions and words that we know are unworthy of our calling.
Every day we need to measure our spiritual lives, our actions to others, and the words we say against the standards God has left for us. As we improve our spiritual side each day, we can, perhaps, answer the question, Who is a Christian?, with the words, ‘I am, by the grace of God.’