A memory from my days as a young adult sometimes pops into my mind.  Morning coffee time in the office where I was a ‘draftsman’ – and the discussion turned to religion – or more particularly, to Christianity.  Someone asked for a definition of a Christian.  The boss’ secretary replied, “I’m a Christian...!”  I don’t recall whether she saw my raised eyebrows but she continued in a rather indignant tone of voice, “Well, I was born in Australia and I’m not Jewish!”  Okay that was back in the 1960s – in pre-multicultural Oz – when such views were still very common.  Australia was a supposedly Christian country and Christianity was, beyond doubt, the dominant Aussie religion.

I thought about that while reading a recent edition of The Weekend Australian Magazine.  It featured an article about British journalist Douglas Murray.  Murray was raised an Anglican but after reading some Muslim texts turned his back on the church and he now describes himself as a Christian Atheist.  He justifies this “contradiction in terms” on the basis that he was born in Great Britain.  Okay, perhaps not quite.  Instead he quotes philosopher-theologian Don Cupitt, “You may call yourself non-Christian, but the dreams you dream are still Christian dreams... You may consider yourself secular, but the modern Western secular world is itself a Christian creation.”

Such views were extremely common when I was growing up.  Back then we even had a preacher in the Presbyterian Church in Mansfield (Vic) who did not believe in the virgin birth, nor in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ.  He did not see the death of Jesus as being substitutionary – that Jesus gave His life-blood to set us free from sin, Satan and death.  However his claim to the name Christian and his claim to a Presbyterian pulpit was based on his respect for the teachings of Jesus – for example, in The Sermon On The Mount.  My boss’ secretary, Douglas Murray, Don Cupitt and our Presbyterian Clergyman in the 1950s all agreed that our Western culture has been shaped by the Christian faith.

The million dollar question is whether that gives someone born into our Western culture the right to call themselves a Christian.

In its simplest form a Christian is a follower of Jesus Christ.  But that immediately raises the question whether one qualifies if one merely agrees with the teachings of Jesus and follows those teachings.  And if so can we be selective about which teachings of Jesus we follow and which ones we reject.  That’s the problem with those people I just mentioned who claimed to be Christians.  They limit the teachings of Jesus which they follow to merely moral and sociological teachings.  They reject the metaphysical... the spiritual and theological teachings of Jesus.  The teaching of Jesus about compassion – as we find it for example in the parable of The Good Samaritan – they accept as valid for us today.  But not the teaching of Jesus where he states: “I am the way the truth and life, no one comes to the Father but by me.”  They endorse the words of Jesus about turning the other cheek and going the second mile but not His words to Nicodemus, “You must be born again.”  They agree with Jesus that we need to feed the hungry, visit the sick, clothe the naked and welcome the stranger but they disagree with His claims to give His life as a ransom for many.

Of course we can’t prevent folk from calling themselves Christians... not even those who want to be regarded as Christian atheists.  What we can do is to remind them of some key Biblical definitions of a follower of Jesus and ask them if they measure up.

A Christian is someone who accepts the claims of Jesus to be one with God the Father – “before Abraham was I am!”

A Christian is someone who believes that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son to be our sin-bearing substitute.

A Christian is someone who knows the need, both to repent from their sins and to turn in faith to Jesus for pardon and renewal.

A Christian is someone who believes Jesus is Lord and who submits to the Lordship of Jesus Christ in their daily life.

Christianity is more than just a philosophy that helped shape our Western culture – it’s above all a personal relationship with Jesus, the Son of God who gave Himself for me so that I might know God as my loving Father in heaven.

John Westendorp