Are You a True Believer?

Jesus seemed far more concerned with how people lived than what they believed.

What Does It Mean to Be a Christian?

If you ask most people — whether they’re still Christian, used to be, or just know Christians — you’ll usually get some version of this answer:

“Well… it means you believe…”

The sentences after that might shift slightly depending on who you ask.

• You believe Jesus is the Son of God.

• You believe he died for your sins.

• You believe he rose again.

• You believe you’re going to heaven.

But almost always, the definition starts with belief.

That’s how I understood it too for most of my life. Christianity was mostly about having the right answers. Right beliefs led to salvation. Wrong beliefs led to serious problems.

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How Did We Get Here?

In my Brief History series, I’ve shown how a lot of Christian ideas evolved slowly over centuries. But this one actually happened pretty fast.

Within just a generation or two after Jesus, belief had already become the centerpiece. Paul is a major part of that shift (maybe even earlier). Christianity, compared to almost every other ancient religion — including its own Jewish roots — quickly became a religion primarily about orthodoxy.

(That’s the big word for right belief.)

Most ancient religions were centered on practice: rituals, actions, ways of living. Belief mattered, of course — it always does — but right practice was the focus.

With Christianity, belief became the center.

And honestly, this is about as far back as my deconstruction usually takes me when it comes to Jesus himself. But I still can’t help but wonder:

Was this really what the historical Jesus wanted?

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Look at What Jesus Actually Taught

As I’ve said before: the Gospels are complicated. They were written decades after Jesus. They have agendas. They are, in many ways, propaganda. But they’re also rooted in historical memory.

And if you look at that memory, something is pretty clear:

Jesus seemed far more concerned with how people lived than what they believed.

Of course, love mattered. Motives mattered. The condition of the heart mattered. But the actual commands of Jesus? They’re deeply practical.

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The Two Big Ones

When asked to summarize everything, Jesus didn’t list a doctrinal statement. He gave two commands:

1. Love God.

2. Love your neighbor.

And when someone asked him to define neighbor, he told the Good Samaritan story — which basically says:

Your neighbor is the outsider. The one not like you. The foreigner. The one your tribe says to avoid.

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Even the Prodigal Son Isn’t About Belief

The parable of the Prodigal Son?

We’ve made it into a sweet story about God forgiving us when we mess up. And sure, that’s in there. But that wasn’t really the point Jesus was making.

He told that story to confront the Pharisees — the ones obsessed with being right. The ones who couldn’t celebrate when others were restored.

The point?

Don’t be like the older brother. Don’t be self-righteous. Don’t get mad when grace is extended to people who don’t deserve it. Rejoice when others find healing. Give freely even when it costs you something.

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The Sermon on the Mount: All Practice

And then there’s the Sermon on the Mount — Jesus' most famous set of teachings. It’s not a list of beliefs to sign off on. It’s a list of how to live:

Matthew 5

• Rejoice when persecuted (5:12)

• Be reconciled (5:24)

• Settle matters quickly (5:25)

• Don’t swear oaths (5:34)

• Don’t resist evil people (5:39)

• Turn the other cheek (5:39)

• Give more than is asked (5:40-42)

• Love your enemies (5:44)

• Pray for those who persecute you (5:44)

Matthew 6

• Give in secret (6:3-4)

• Pray in secret (6:6)

• Fast without drawing attention (6:16-18)

• Store treasure in heaven (6:19-20)

• Don’t worry about your life (6:25)

• Seek God’s kingdom first (6:33)

Matthew 7

• Don’t judge (7:1)

• Take the plank out of your own eye first (7:5)

• Ask, seek, knock (7:7)

• Do to others as you’d want them to do to you (7:12)

• Watch for false teachers (7:15)

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The Part That I Hate To Admit

And here’s where it gets hard. And I don’t say this lightly.

When I step back and make a list — just in my own life — of the 50 people I’ve known who seem to actually live the kind of life Jesus described…
The people who:

• love their enemies,

• forgive quickly,

• care for the poor,

• walk in humility,

• extend mercy,

• give generously,

• live with grace toward others...

When I list those people, there are just as many who don’t identify as Christians as there are who do.

In fact — and this pains me to say — if I’m being brutally honest about what I’ve seen in the last decade or so in America, it sometimes feels like the loudest "believing" Christians are actually less likely to practice the commands of Jesus than many people who don’t claim the faith at all.

Obviously, that’s subjective.

But to pretend there isn’t a massive disconnect between belief and practice right now feels dishonest to me.

There’s been a rising wave — especially inside parts of American evangelicalism — that feels not just disconnected from the teachings of Jesus, but sometimes openly hostile to them. A kind of anti-Jesus Christianity that calls itself biblical while actively opposing the very kind of love and mercy Jesus seemed to care most about.

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Let Me Be Clear

I want to be careful here. I’m not trying to "de-Christianize" anyone.

If you say you’re a Christian, you’re a Christian — as far as I’m concerned.

I don’t like it when people try to invalidate my faith because I no longer believe all the same doctrines they do. I refuse to do that to others.

But here’s where I land:

If you claim the belief, but refuse the practice — and then stand in judgment over those who are at least trying to live the practice because you judge their beliefs — that’s messed up, my friend.

If I could wave a magic wand tomorrow and change Christianity?

I wouldn’t abolish it.
I wouldn’t gatekeep it.

I’d simply say:

If you’re attempting to live the practices of Jesus — loving others, forgiving, living generously, extending grace — you’re in.

And when you fail (because we all fail), grace and forgiveness cover that too. That’s part of the practice.

But I would strip belief from being the entrance requirement. Because in real life, belief doesn’t seem to correlate much at all with whether someone actually lives this stuff out.

There’s a kind of firewall between belief and practice that I don’t think is ever going to be easily torn down.

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But Joe, What About…

I know what I’m saying can be attacked in a thousand ways, with plenty of New Testament verses thrown at me about how important believing is.

I get it.

I have YES / AND tattooed on my arms, so at some point it has to go there for me.

At some level, yes — belief and practice both matter. They always have. Belief shapes behavior. At least in theory it should.

But in the American church right now, we’ve taken belief so far up the mountain that practice has become optional. An afterthought. A bonus round for the extra-devout.

And I can’t stop hearing the words attributed to Jesus from John’s Gospel living rent-free in my head:

“They will know you are my disciples by your love for one another.”

I have no idea if the historical Jesus actually said that.

But it sure sounds like something he might have.

And honestly?

I hate to imagine him looking at what’s happened to his movement.

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Why I Still Call Myself a Christian

And by the way — for the last several months, one of the most common questions I get is why I still call myself a Christian.

I think today’s post might be my best answer.

I am still a Christian because, though I fail at it often — and have days I don’t even try like I should — the practices of Jesus, for me, are the way I want to live. I believe they lead to life. So I try to do them.

I’m a Christian, in essence, because I’m trying to live the way Jesus lived and taught, as much as I’m able.

That’s way easier than how I used to live — trying to be a Christian by forcing myself to try to believe things I didn’t.

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The Freedom In All This

This shift has been huge for me personally.

• I still wrestle with belief.

• I still study and question and wonder.

• But I no longer live in fear of having the wrong answers.

Instead, I try to ask:

Am I loving well?
Am I living generously?
Am I practicing mercy?
Am I being transformed into a more compassionate, grounded human being?

If so — I trust I’m on the path.

And if it turns out I was actually wrong about everything I believe?

But my wrong beliefs made me more loving, generous, kind, merciful and grounded?

I’m good with that.