Tag: Christianity

Categories
Bible

The Essentials of Christianity: Examining Christianity’s Differences from other Religions

a photo of the page from a dictionary for the word "definition" to point out the need for knowing the essentials of ChristianityWhat defines Christianity? What are the essentials? And if we can determine them, what should we do with them? Well, if you make up your mind about any given issue and then you encounter a Biblical truth that is contrary to what you believe, then you have a choice to make: 1) reject the Bible and cling to your belief, or 2) cling to the Bible and change your mind. What do you do when this happens in your life? When this happens, many people determine some way to justify their own beliefs and therefore reject what the Bible says.

It certainly sounds nice to say things like, “If God is love, then a loving God wouldn’t send anyone to hell.” But that isn’t what the Bible says. What should we believe? Our feelings or the actual words in the Bible? Which do you think is more trustworthy?

It sounds more pleasing to the ear to hear something like, “If God is love, then there must be many ways to God, and Christianity is just one of the ways. It can’t be the only way.” But that isn’t what the Bible says. Again, what should we believe? Our feelings which can change with the wind or the Bible that has remained constant?

Jesus said that He was the way, the truth, and the life, and that no one could come to the Father, except through faith and belief in Him. If that is the case, then Christianity is an exclusive religion. It excludes all of those who will not come to God through Jesus. Therefore, the Christian religion clearly states that belief in Jesus is the only way to salvation. And if our religion is the only way because Jesus is the only way, then we need to know what is so unique about Jesus so that we can explain it to others.

So, what makes Christianity unique? What are the essential aspects of Christianity that set it apart from other religions?

My last two posts led up to this post, as they dealt with: “how do you know what is right theology?”
(If you missed them, you can click on them here:
      Doubt: How Do I Know that Christianity is True and Right?
      How do you know that what you are hearing and being taught is truth? )
Jumping off from what we began in those posts, let me now share with you the Christian Essentials.

The original lists that I worked from were found at CARM.org and GotQuestions.org, as well as from a fellow pastor.

Nine Essentials of Christianity
1. The Bible as Inspired
2. Monotheism (There is only One God)
3. the Trinity (God in Three Persons)
4. the Deity of Christ (Jesus is Fully God)
5. the Virgin Birth (Jesus is Fully Man)
6. the Death of Christ for the payment of sins
7. the Resurrection of Christ
8. Salvation by Grace thru faith, and Not by works
9. Salvation is only thru Jesus

I’ll share a bit more about this next time.
And while you wait for the next post, maybe you can look over this list and see if you think there is something else missing from the Essentials? Certainly there are other important truths in the Bible, but is there anything else that is Essential to being a Christian?

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Categories
Worship

The Ignorance of God

“The Ignorance of God”
  by brian rushing

Sorry about the lack of any posts the last two-and-a-half weeks. I took a short break off from posting due to having a bit too much on my plate! You’ve been there, I’m sure. It is similar to being at grandma’s house when you are already full, but grandma insists that you need another portion of mashed potatoes, and so she serves you a few extra scoops against all your protests. You look at that fluffy mountain in front of you and wonder how you will be able to swallow another bite, much less finish it all! But you keep eating one bite at a time, until it is all gone. So I kept eating one bite at a time, and now am back on track with what seem to be regular portions on my plate. (though sometimes looks can be deceiving!) That being said, here we go again….

What do you know about God?
When you look up in the sky and see the vastness of this creation, do you feel that maybe you do not know enough?
a starry sky symbolizing our search in knowing God and our ignorance of Him and His ways
J. I. Packer wrote a book called Knowing God, and his reason for writing it was that he believed that the “ignorance of God — ignorance both of his ways and of the practice of communion with Him — lies at the root of much of the church’s weakness today.”

God has given us His Word so that we can know Him. But how well do we know God? Maybe the question would be even stronger if each of us turned it upon ourselves: “How well do I know God?” Am I actually ignorant of Him and His ways? Ignorant might be too strong of a word, but certainly it makes me evaluate what I know about God.

And if I do know some things about God, “What do I intend to do with my knowledge about God, once I have it?”

Will I take that knowledge and become proud and conceited about how much I know? We need to know things about God, but if we are gaining that knowledge for the wrong purpose, it can make us less spiritually healthy than we were before.

Here’s an example – In high school I was fairly physically fit (as were many of us). But then something happened after high school… my fitness seemed to leave me! (as seemed to happen to many of us!) Of course, I had been fit, so I knew how to lose weight and get physically healthy again. I had read plenty about having the right kind of diet and the types and amounts of exercises I needed to do. But I didn’t eat right and I didn’t exercise. I could get into a intellectual discussion with you about those things, because I had the right knowledge. I just didn’t apply the knowledge in a way that changed my life in any measurable way.

So, back to the spiritual area of life – will I use my knowledge about God in the same way as I used my knowledge about fitness? Will I just have it up in my head and use it in discussions that puff up my pride so I feel good about what I know, or will I use it to change my life in a measurable way?

       One can know a great deal about godliness without much knowledge of God. It depends on the sermons one hears, the books one reads, and the company one keeps. …there is no shortage of books or sermons on how to pray, how to witness, how to read our Bibles, how to tithe our money, how to be a young Christian, how to be an old Christian, how to be a happy Christian, how to lead people to Christ… and generally how to go through all the various motions associated with being a Christian believer.

…It certainly makes it possible to learn a great deal secondhand about the practice of Christianity. …One can have all this [knowledge] and hardly know God at all.

We come back, then, to where we started. The question is not whether we are good at theology…. The question is, can we say, simply, honestly, that we have known God, and that because we have known God the unpleasantness we have had, or the pleasantness we have not had, through being Christians does not matter to us?

If we really knew God, this is what we would be saying, and if we are not saying it, that is a sign that we need to face ourselves more sharply with the difference between knowing God and merely knowing about Him.

I want to know God intimately, deeply, and in a way that transforms my life. Don’t you?

So how can we get there? Stay tuned in the upcoming days for more thoughts on this with some assistance from Dr. Packer.

         (Quotes in today’s post are from Knowing God by J. I. Packer)