How to Be a Christian
How To Be A Christian
THE SEARCHER: For years I have tried to be a Christian.
I have tried and failed so many times that I am not
going to try again because I have no faith left to try.
THE TEACHER: What did you try and in what have
you lost faith?
THE SEARCHER: I suppose I tried to get God in my
life, but I have been defeated so I have lost faith in myself.
You see, I really wanted to be a Christian, to have
God’s presence, guidance and help in life. I took special
instructions, I joined the church, I tried hard to be a Christian;
but in my heart I knew there was no change. I went
to the altar again and again and yet I received nothing. I
have sought and cried after God so much and so many
times that I feel that I am a complete failure.
THE TEACHER: Did you ever stop to think that salvation
is a gift, that it is unnecessary for you to go
anywhere to get it? You can find God anywhere and miss
Him everywhere. Do you realize that receiving salvation
is not dependent upon what you do but what Christ Jesus
did for you? Do you realize that to be a child of God, to
receive eternal life, to be saved, converted, born again,
is to receive something instead of giving something?
You become a Christian by receiving a gift from the
very heart of God directly to you. You, like so many
others, thought that receiving Christ depended upon what
you gave up, what you surrendered, how much sin you
confessed. It doesn’t.
You become a Christian by believing that God raised
Jesus from the dead, by confessing him as lord in your
life.
THE SEARCHER: Surely it can’t be as simple as that. I
thought and heard and was taught that I must do certain
things and give up other things.
THE TEACHER: If that were true, then you would be
earning your salvation; you would be working for it.
There is nothing in the Bible that indicates such a process.
Look at Isaiah 53:6: “All we like sheep have gone
astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and
the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.”
God is describing you as well as the rest of us. You
have turned to your own way. That is why you are lost.
But God laid on Jesus the iniquity of us all. You by
your good works and efforts cannot save yourself. God
simply laid your sins on Jesus. So far there is no requirement
on your part, is there?
Notice John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that
he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
This is the Father, God, giving His Son as your substitute
and requesting simply that you believe God did
this for you and that you claim Jesus as your Savior. He
does not ask you to do a thing except to believe and
believing is acting upon what The Word says He did for
you.
No, you have not sinned so much that Jesus cannot
save you. Notice His Word in Hebrews 7:25: “Wherefore
he is able also to save them to the uttermost that
come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make
intercession for them.”
Jesus saves to the uttermost and as you notice there
is still no work on your part except believing to receive
what he has done.
Romans 10:9 and 10 says, “That 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. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness;
and with the mouth confession is made unto
salvation.”
Let us look at these verses closely. If you confess
with your mouth Jesus as your Lord, you are acting on
your believing. You still have not done any works for
your salvation, have you? This is not hard to do, is it?
Your own way thus far has not been a happy way, a
way of joy and peace, nor a successful way. It has been
a way of hardship and defeat. Romans 5:1 says, “Therefore
being justified by faith, we have peace with God
through our Lord Jesus Christ.” We are justified in him
and we have peace with God.
Now God says that this is all yours and that He wants
you to change from being the lord of your own life by
yielding and confessing with your mouth Jesus as your
Lord.
THE SEARCHER: That’s easy for me to do. I know
that God sent Jesus into the world and that he was raised
from the dead. It’s easy to confess Jesus as Lord.
THE TEACHER: If you have confessed Jesus as Lord,
what does The Word say that you are?
THE SEARCHER: That I am saved.
THE TEACHER: Do you believe that God raised Jesus
from the dead and have you confessed Jesus as Lord?
THE SEARCHER: I do believe and I have confessed.
But I never thought salvation was that easy to receive. I
am a child of God now?
THE TEACHER: I John 3:2: “Beloved, now are we
the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we
shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear. . . .we
shall see him as he is.”
How do you know you are born again and a child of
God?
THE SEARCHER: Because The Word says I am. I
believe God raised Jesus from the dead and I confessed
Him as my Lord, so The Word declares I am a child of
God.
But what about having eternal life?
THE TEACHER: I John 5:13: “These things have I
written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of
God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and
that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.”
Do you believe on the name of Jesus?
THE SEARCHER: I most assuredly do.
THE TEACHER: Then what have you?
THE SEARCHER: I have eternal life. Now I know
according to The Word I do not have to wait until I die
to find out whether or not I have eternal life. I have eternal
life now.
But what about this righteousness of God that makes
it possible for me to stand in His presence without any
sense of sin, guilt and defeat; do I have that too?
THE TEACHER: Notice II Corinthians 5:21: “For he
hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that
we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”
God made Jesus to be sin that you might become the
righteousness of God in him. If he became sin for you
and you accept him as your Savior (your substitute),
you are made the righteousness of God in him now.
THE SEARCHER: Have all the gifts of God been given
so freely?
THE TEACHER: Ephesians 2:8–10 says, “For by grace
are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it
is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should
boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ
Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained
that we should walk in them.”
THE SEARCHER: I never dreamed that receiving
Christ could be as easy as that. I now know that I am a
new creature in Christ, having eternal life now, and that
I am righteous before God, and Satan has no more power
over me if I give him no place. How I thank God through
Jesus my new Savior and wonderful Lord!