Christianity: Who is a Christian?
We next attempt to find out who is a Christian. The Messianic believer is forced to go to the Scriptures again to determine the true definition. The New Testament divides the world into three groups of people: Jews, Gentiles, and Christians according to 1 Corinthians 10:32. It plainly teaches that no one can ever be born a Christian; everyone is either born a Jew or born a Gentile. A Christian, however, is either a Jew or Gentile who has made a personal decision to become a believer in Jesus the Messiah. He is not one who merely holds a church membership or is baptized. These may follow the personal decision, but they cannot be the cause of one’s becoming a Christian.
A Christian is a Jew or a Gentile who has come to realize that a man is born in a state of sin, and, for this reason, is separated from God. Thus, the penalty for sin must first be paid if he is to come to know God in a personal way. However, being a sinner, an individual Jew or an individual Gentile cannot by himself pay the price or penalty for sin. This was the purpose of the Messiah, whom many Jews and Gentiles know to be Jesus. At His death, the Messiah became the substitute for sin and, thus, paid the penalty for it. Both the Old and New Testaments teach that without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin.
For example, in the Old Testament Leviticus 17:11 says: For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that makes atonement by reason of the life.
In the New Testament, this is stated in Hebrews 9:22: And according to the law, I may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and apart from shedding of blood there is no remission.
The clear teaching of both the Old and New Testaments is this: “without the shedding of blood there cannot be any forgiveness of sins.” Under the Law there was a temporary provision made by the shedding of animal blood. But the Messiah was to be the final blood sacrifice for sin. It is those who believe in the Messiahship of Jesus, among the Jews and among the Gentiles, who are biblically to be classed as Christians in Acts 11:26. Again, it is not a matter of baptism and it is not a matter of church membership. There is nothing else anyone can or must do to become a Christian except to believe on Yeshua.
The basic content of faith, that is, what one must believe to be a Christian, is found in 1 Corinthians 15:1–4: Now I make known unto you brethren, the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye received, wherein also ye stand, by which also ye are saved, if ye hold fast the word which I preached unto you, except ye believed in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all that which also I received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; and that he was buried; and that he has been raised on the third day according to the scriptures.
The content of faith is the gospel, involving the substitutionary death, burial, and Resurrection of the Messiah. What is the gospel? The gospel is three very simple and basic points: first, Yeshua died for our sins; secondly, He was buried; and thirdly, He rose again on the third day. There is nothing more to the gospel than this. That which determines whether or not a person is a Christian is his willingness to place his faith, or belief, in Yeshua as the substitute for sin.
What he must do is described in John 1:12: But as many as received him, to them gave he the right to become children of God, even to them that believe on his name.
A person who, at some point in his life, personally received the Messiah as the One who made atonement for sin, experienced what it is to become a Christian. Thus, if anyone says that he was born a Christian, this is an obvious sign, according to the New Testament, that he is not. Becoming a Christian is an experience by which one comes to know God through Jesus the Messiah and by which the sin separating the individual from God is removed. Christians are made, not born.
In summary: the New Testament teaches that everyone is born either a Jew or a Gentile; and Christians are Jews and Gentiles who believe in the Messiahship of Jesus.
Excerpt from Dr Arnold Fruchtenbaum:
MBS007 JEWS, GENTILES, CHRISTIANS: Pg 7-8
