I grew up in a Christian family. My father was the pastor of the Reformed Baptist church in Melaka, while my mother was the MYF leader while she was growing up in the Methodist church. The bookshelves in my house were littered with Bible commentaries, Koine Greek and Hebrew lexicons, and a vast array of theological material. Names like John Stott, Peter Masters, Charles Spurgeon and J.I. Packer were household names to me. I faithfully attended every single camp my church organised, sometimes with a little coaxing from my parents, while at school, I zealously defended my faith. I tried very hard to be polite and well mannered, helping old ladies across the busy street, and I loved small cute animals. This was my pedigree. As far as me and my understanding of what being a Christian was all about, I was convinced that I was definitely a Christian, and a very good one too.
Despite my religious self-image, there were things which I thought about, and did which were strikingly different from whom I thought I was. I was comfortable telling the most outrageous lies; I’ve even made my mother cry out of rage. I hated my brother and sister with a fierce passion, and I thought I was always right. All these and more I denied and swept under the carpet. Thinking about them made me uncomfortable. I am a good boy. Good boy = Christian.
In 2007, I left for Japan. While I was there, I was placed in a host family whose mother was (and still is) highly critical of the Christian faith. During my stay there, she pressed me hard with arguments about Christianity frequently, hitting hard on the differences in my behaviour and my version of Christianity. Her questioning made me ask myself this: “What does it really mean to be a Christian?” I had no idea! My understanding of what a ‘Christian’ began to crack and slowly crumbled.
When I got back in 2008, I was reeling in confusion. My self-image as a ‘Christian’ has shattered completely, and my life was a mess. The things I did then only just served to widen the gap between my behaviour and my version of Christianity.
Yet, all was not lost. There was no sudden conversion, no flash of light, no voice from heaven, but God was at work in a series of events which led to my “ah-ha!” moment. After college, I spent some time deciding on which university to attend, and it was then when I had the time to speak to my dad about what it meant to trust in Jesus. Later on in HELP, I had the opportunity to attend a conference by the Gospel Growth Fellowship where I managed learn a little bit more. It was during a bible study series which I went through with my friends, Pastor Peter Kek and Aaron Liu when it all came together.
I realised that despite all my good ‘Christian’ work, I had been rebelling against my loving God who had created me. I had consciously rebelled against His plans on how to approach Him and told Him ‘Shut up and get lost! I decide how I want to come to you.’ This self-sufficient attitude of mine was exactly what the Bible defines as sin, and this sin is what God is going to judge us all for. No amount of ‘being Christian’ or ‘talking Christian’, even all the good I had done could pay for my rebellion and set me right with God.
The magnitude of my rebellion made God’s love so much more beautiful. This was what He did: He sent His own son to this world to take the punishment (death) on our part. Jesus took the full force of God’s justice on himself so that people like me could be forgiven. Even better, Jesus didn’t stay dead! God raised him from the dead and is He’s now God’s ruler of the world and will come back to hold us all accountable for our actions. But I know that when He comes back on that day, I will now be acceptable to Him, not on the basis of any of the good works that I’ve done but because Jesus has died in my place.
After so long, I have finally found the answer. Being a Christian is not about being good and living right so that I can go to heaven. It’s about trusting in Jesus’ sacrificial death for my complete forgiveness and then living under Jesus’ authority in response to the love He’s shown.
Question now is, where do YOU stand in your relationship with Jesus? =)
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