Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.
Acts 2: 44 - 47 NKJV
I ran across a question the other day that I feel deserves a closer look. That question is, what is authentic Christianity? What does bare bones Christianity look like? Is this something we believers need to work towards? Does God desire us to be authentic Christians? Indeed, as I pose these questions I feel as if I am back in church listening to a sermon from some pulpit pounder who is trying to rally his congregation. First, what is it that we think of when we think of authentic Christianity? People will, of course, have differing views on this. For me, mention authentic Christianity and I think of worship bands, hymns, full pews and collection plates. Someone else might see Christianity as worship. However, I believe that we cannot do justice to this question until we define what Christianity is. Wikipedia describes Christianity as a "Monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth." There you have it, Christianity is a man made religion based on the teachings of Jesus. The issue that I have with the entire authentic Christianity question is that it is based upon something that distorts the truth of Christ Jesus. I was reminded of this this past week when I ran into my old friend and co worker Larry. Larry is retired now, but spends most of his time in the role of a chaplain. I have no doubt that he loves the Lord, but as I listened to him speak I could hear the thousands of years of church teachings in his stories. Maybe I'm jaded or maybe I've been away from church for too long, but listening to Larry talk about the Lord made me feel like I was watching a Oral Roberts special. So, I asked him a question. "Larry, do you believe in the truth of Christ Jesus which Paul speaks to in Galatians 2:20?" After looking up the verse I quoted, Larry looked at me with a blank stare. I could tell that he had not seen that scripture in the way I was showing him before. He walked away refusing to believe that Jesus could ever live in the lives of sinners.
Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually
1 Corinthians 12: 27 NKJV
I'm not surprised that Larry walked away without even taking the time to consider what I was asking of him. I get that a lot. Larry is one of those believers who would embrace authentic Christianity and all of the traditions and teachings that go along with it. Even I once walked in the halls of Christian churches. I started out in Sunday school learning the stories of the bible. From there I graduated to learn the traditions and customs every authentic Christian needs to know. What made me walk away? The very teachings of the Christian church. Whether God had revealed to me a new way of seeing Him or not, I knew that listening to the church doctrine was not for me. The doctrine the pastor asked me to swallow that day was a look inside the teachings of the church. After hearing a sermon on the death and resurrection of Christ and how He had died to forgive my sins, the pastor invited all who had sins to confess to come forward. I was done with the dog and pony show. In that moment, Christianity became just a series of laws and regulations to me. What should I expect from a man made religion? Not much I'm guessing. So, what do I see as authentic Christianity? Well, take away the fancy church building and all of the traditions associated with it and you'd be pretty close to how I see authentic Christianity. I see authentic Christianity as knowing who Jesus is in me {Galatians 2:20}. After all, I follow Jesus, not someone's rendition of who Jesus is.
So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another
Romans 12: 5 NKJV
~Scott~
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