What Is A Christian & How Do I Become One?
A lot of people think that a Christian is someone who goes to church, reads their bible and prays - but is that really what one is ?
What ?
A Christian is somebody who is a follower of Jesus, who has asked Him to be 'their Lord and Saviour'. Some people would use the phrase 'born again' (taken from the book of John chapter 3), others might say 'saved' or others might refer to someone who has 'made a commitment', but they all mean the same thing.
How ?
To become a Christian there are basically 3 things that you need to do:
A - Accept that you mess up / don’t follow God in every area of your life (what the Bible would call a 'sinner'.)
B – Believe that Jesus took the punishment you deserve when he died on the cross because of the bad things you do/ think/ say (Sin) and because of this you can have a relationship with God and go to be with Him when you die.
C– Commit your life to Him. Pray and say sorry for what you have done and that you want him to be in charge of you life and ask Him to fill you with the Holy Spirit (3rd part (person) of God -the Trinity).
The following prayer is one you could pray if you want to do this:
"Father God, Thank You for loving me. I am sorry for the things I have done that hurt you. Thank You for sending Jesus to die on the cross for me. Please forgive me. I ask You to come and be Lord of my Life. Please fill me with Your Holy Spirit and help me to serve You for the rest of my life. Amen."
If you want to check the above things out, please get a Bible and have a look at the following bits. If you are not used to reading a Bible, it is basically lots of books stuck together and these are separated into chapters and verses. The chapter will be the big number and usually lasts for several paragraphs and the verse is the little number which will usually only be a sentence or two. Also at the front of the Bible there should be a contents page to help you find where each book is.
Try and use a modern translation like the Good News Bible or the New International Version (NIV) as these are the easiest to read.
Book of Romans, chapter 3 verse 23
Book of Romans, chapter 6 verse 23
Book of John, chapter 3 verse 16
1st Book of Peter (as there are 2! Usually called 1 Peter), chapter 3 verse 18
If you want to find out more then the Alpha Course (please refer to our Alpha page) is for you.
Living as a Christian is not something you do on your own, it was always meant to be lived out in community / family, so please come and join us on a Sunday, get involved with one of our midweek groups and let us know what has happened so you can be baptised!
To help you begin to grow in your faith, please check out the following books:
Questions of Life by Nicky Gumbel
Searching Issues by Nicky Gumbel
The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren
You may also wish to get some Bible “notes” which help you read the bible everyday. There are some called “Closer to God”and “Everyday with Jesus” which are both very good.