My Attack of Christianity Part II

The Verse

There is one verse that almost everyone has memorized, christian and non-christians alike.  That verse, as I'm sure you have guessed by now, is John 3:16.  "For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, and that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life."  This verse (along with a few others that say the same thing) is the foundation of most peoples faith.  That's a good thing, it should be the foundation of your faith.  Its what this is all about.  

By now you're probably wondering what I'm talking about.  Didn't I just say in my last post that there was one poorly misinterpreted verse that has created this pseudo-Christianity.  Yes I did, and let me tell you what I mean.  Yes this verse should be the center of your faith, but only if you truly understand it.  You may be saying, "truly understand it? it seems pretty simple to me" and that is where you are wrong.  Look at the verse more closely, specifically the words belief and Him.  The Greek word for belief is pisteuō. This is a Greek verb that translates as "to think to be true, to be persuaded of, to credit, place confidence in."  So belief right? (you're probably still thinking that you're just wasting your time by reading this but you're not I promise) yeah, seems like the definition of belief to me.  So lets look at the second word I brought up, Him.  For this we need not look at the Greek but who "Him" is referring to.  I'm sure you all know the answer to that question, Jesus Christ, the son of God.  (Now you're really thinking "way to go captain obvious") Here's my question for you, just who was(is) Jesus.  The son of God? Check!  A revolutionary? Check! A radical? Check!  A poor person? In the worldly sense of the word, check!  A saviour? Check.  A man who hung out with the outcasts, the lepers, the possessed, and the despised? Check!  A lover? Check!  The only perfect person ever? Check!  A teacher? Check!  All right, all right, you've got the point.  this was(and still is) one freaking awesome guy/son of God.  But i want you to think about everything I've said now.  The translation of pisteuō, being  "to think to be true, to be persuaded of, to credit, place confidence in. and the description of Him being all that it is.  Pay close attention to the place confidence in.  So we are told that by placing confidence in Christ, and by the transitive property, placing confidence in all that Christ was and is we are given salvation.  I don't know about you people, but when i place confidence in something it means I do it.  It means I think it will work.  (now you're thinking that i might not be so crazy after all)

What all that rambling was about is that, yes all that we need is belief in Christ in order to obtain salvation, but we have greatly misunderstood that belief as Christians.   Belief is not just something we do with our minds and hearts, its something we do with our body as well.  It is us showing just how much belief we have by our actions, not to please God and earn ourselves better spots in heaven, but because by truly believing in Christ we have gained His heart, and His compassions, and His love, and we want to share that with everyone.

Well once again thanks for reading my post.  If you haven't checked out the first one scroll down (if your not on my blog go to drummingandrew.blogspot.com).  Just a few more posts to go and you'll all be rid of me for a few days ;).  Its time we start living out our faith. BTW I apologise for the font issues, blogger went nuts and i didn't have the energy to fiddle with it.

Up next:   The Commission (which probably should have been the first post but ohh well)

(i got my greek from blueletterbible.org and my translation from studylight.org)