What Is A Christian Lifestyle?

A Christian lifestyle is a way of living every moment of our lives with Jesus Christ at the very center of our lives. It is easy to say, but difficult to do. We cannot put Christ at the very center without denying ourselves, putting aside some of our own inclinations and desires. Most of us rank our family most important. As important as our family is, it cannot be the center of our lives. Jesus Christ must occupy that position. Jesus made harsh comments about people putting family ahead of the kingdom of God. This was done to help us realize that we are able to love our family more genuinely with a Christlike love. Putting Christ first enables us to do that far more effectively and selflessly than ever before.

A Christian lifestyle is one that sees each person as a sister or brother in Christ. It is a lifestyle in which prejudices, generalizations, stereotypes, and labels disappear. We are freed by the grace of God, to see each person as a unique child of God who is loved, sustained and redeemed by God and worthy of a place in eternity. People of all races, nationalities, economic backgrounds, educational levels, and geographic areas will greet us when we come into eternity with Christ. If we choose to live a Christian lifestyle, and we must if we are to belong to Jesus Christ, then we must love and serve as freely, as openly, and without exception as he.

This life is one in which values, decisions, and choices reflect the presence of Christ. Some decisions are clearly right or wrong, clearly in accord with the way of Christ or clearly contrary to the will of the Lord. These are easy. The same is true with values. As members of the body of Christ, we value certain characteristics, attributes, ways of living; we disvalue others that are discordant to the body of Christ. Ananias and Sapphira demonstrated selfishness and greed, clearly violating Christian values (Acts 5:1-11).

How do we know what is the will of God? As a denomination, The United Methodist Church helps with that through the Social Principles. They are issued by the General Conference every four years and published in The Book of Discipline of The United Methodist Church. The Social Principles list the church's stance on some of the great issues facing our families, our communities, our nation, and our world. We may not all agree with each, but we must acknowledge that the General Conference, the only group that can speak for our denomination, has prayfully and carefully considered the topics, sought to determine the will of God in each, and stated where we stand as a denomination. Some of the statements in the Social Principles are not absolute; Christians still struggle with many difficult problems. But the Social Principles seek to intersect the subjects involved and the way of Christ as revealed in the Gospels. Some issues are not mentioned in the Social Principles; these are ones on which the church has not chosen to speak or the most appropriate Christian response has not been determined.

Go To Page: 1 2

Articles in this Topic    Discussions in this Topic