In a 2019 survey, nearly 205 million people, 65% of of every man, woman and child in the United States identified themselves as Christians. Throughout the world, it is estimated that there are over 2.4 billion people, almost a third of the total world population who identify themselves as Christians. The chances are good that if you’re reading this blog you consider yourself a Christian as well. But are we really? Do we truly know what a Christian is or do we just think we do? And if we desire to be a Christian, what has to take place to become one?

Peter Kreeft is a professor of philosophy at Boston College and the author of over 95 books on Christian philosophy, theology and apologetics.

In his book, The God Who Loves You, Kreeft talks about repeatedly asking his students over many years, “What Is A Christian?” And how repeatedly, no matter how the response might be worded, the answers are always the same. They are always in terms of beliefs, feelings or deeds. His students say “a Christian is one who believes the teachings of Christ”. But Kreeft’s response is “don’t even the demons believe—and shudder (Jas 2:19)”? Or they say “ a Christian is someone who trusts Christ”. But he responds “but doesn’t that mean that being a Christian depends on my feelings toward God at any particular moment”? They say “a Christian is someone who follows Christ’s way of life or at least tries to”. He says “if that’s true, then how many good deeds does it require to become a Christian”?

Kreeft says that “the answer to ‘What Is A Christian’ has to be more than just what we believe, feel or do. To be a Christian means becoming a different being, a new creature with a whole new nature. Jesus himself tells us in John 3:3 that a Christian is someone who has been born again. It is not something that we can do on our own. It is God’s love that gives us this new birth. Letting God into our soul changes not just our attitudes but also our being. And because we receive real life-changing love from God, we are truly transformed from darkness to light. We are ‘born again’. We receive a new life, a kind of spiritual blood transfusion from God. We receive a new life from God’s love, not just a lifestyle. Our destiny is to be so intimately united with God that, as the mystics say, we not only see God’s face but we also see With God’s face.”

C.S. Lewis, a British writer and lay theologian has a lot to say about becoming a Christian in his book Mere Christianity (Book IV). I have paraphrased some of what he said.

“Now the whole offer which Christianity makes is this: that we can, if we let God have his way, come to share in the life of Christ. Christ is the Son of God. If we share in this kind of life we also shall be sons of God. We will love the Father as He does and the Holy spirit will arise in us. Every Christian is to become a little Christ. The whole purpose of becoming a Christian is simply nothing else.

“And now we begin to see what it is that the New Testament is always talking about. It talks about Christians ‘being born again’; it talks about them ‘putting on Christ’; about ‘Christ being formed in us’; about us coming to ‘have the mind of Christ’.

“These are not just fancy ways of saying we need to read and study what Christ said and try to carry it out. They mean much more than that”. They mean a real Person, Christ, here and now in the very room where you sit reading this blog, and in that very room where you say your prayers, is doing things to you. “He is killing the old natural self and replacing it with the kind of self He has. At first, only for moments and later for longer periods. Finally, if all goes well, turning you permanently into a different sort of thing; into a new little Christ, a being which in its own small way, has the same kind of life as God; which shares in His power, joy, knowledge and eternity.” But, we have to do our part for all this to happen. We have to allow God to make these changes.

“Christ says ‘Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked—the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours’.

“The terrible thing, the almost impossible thing, is to hand over your whole self—all your wishes and precautions—to Christ. But it is far easier than what we are all trying to do instead. For what we are trying to do is to remain what we call ‘ourselves’, to keep personal happiness as our great aim in life, and yet at the same time be ‘good’. We are all trying to let our mind and heart go their own way—centered on money or pleasure or ambition—and hoping, in spite of this, to behave honestly and chastely and humbly. And that is exactly what Christ warned us we could not do. As He said, ‘a thistle cannot produce figs’.

“Christ warned people to ‘count the cost’ before becoming Christians. ‘Make no mistake,’ He says, ‘if you let me, I will make you perfect’. The moment you put yourself in My hands, that is what you are in for. Nothing less, or other, than that. You have free will, and if you choose, you can push Me away.” You can say no, and I will respect your wishes. “But if you do not push Me away, understand that I am going to see this job through. Whatever suffering it may cost you in your earthly life, whatever inconceivable purification it may cost you after death, whatever it costs Me, I will never rest, nor let you rest until you are literally perfect—until my Father can say without reservation that He is well pleased with you. This I can do and will do. But I will not do anything less.”

So, if what these two respected, religious writers have said is true, if to be a Christian means more than just what we believe, feel or do? If to be a Christian means becoming a different being, a new creature with a whole new nature? If we must receive a new life, a kind of spiritual blood transfusion from God? If we must receive a new life from God’s love, not just a lifestyle? If it’s really true, don’t we have to ask ourselves—Has this ever happened to me?

And if it hasn’t, or even if I’m just not sure if it has or not, do I really want to be a Christian, do I really want to be a little Christ and am I willing to do what is necessary to become one?

As C.S. Lewis says, “it’s far easier than what we’re all trying to do instead”.