Only Jesus Gets to Decide What Christianity Is

1/15/2025

When I was explaining to a PhD Muslim why most people who claim to be Christians actually are not Christians according to Jesus, I gave this example: “If a person claims to be a Muslim but does not believe in paradise, doesn’t really care about the Quran or Mohammad or Joma or Eid, are they really Muslim?” He said, “Of course not! That’s ridiculous! They might be something, but they are not part of Islam.”

I added, “A person can claim to be a giraffe or a frog, but if they don’t have the DNA or the characteristics, they can still claim it but that doesn’t make it so, in reality, right?”

It’s really not a problem for someone to be Catholic or atheist or join the chess club or country club if that’s what they want. There are Buddhists and Hindus and Muslims all over the world, with comforting rituals and special holidays to entertain them. That’s no problem if that’s what they want to do. If that makes them happy with the rituals and the holy men and the holy days, they are free, of course, to do that. Humans can entertain themselves any way they want and assuage their conscience and do rituals and Mardi Gras for fun.

But only Jesus gets to decide what Christianity is, what a church is, and who is saved.

Mother Theresa said to Bob _____ , in person, face-to-face at her convent in India, “We are saved by Mary.”

There is almost nothing in common with the life of Jesus and the teachings of Jesus about what the church is and what a Christian is and how to become a Christian between Roman Catholic, eastern orthodox, or any of the rest of institutional religion. Only Jesus gets to decide what is Christian, just as a human can’t decide if he’s a frog, and a Muslim can’t decide he doesn’t believe in the Quran or paradise and still be a Muslim.

Jesus said some very clear things about you cannot be My disciple, you cannot be saved, if you don’t deny your very self, if you don’t die to your own identity into the world and the world to you, and take up your cross. There is no way around that clear teaching about who is really a Christian and what is just institutional religion. The church is made up of only those who are part of Jesus by denying themselves and abandoning to Him in faith, in the world, but no longer of the world.