Many different answers are commonly given to this question. Most associate the term with a person’s background (“a Christian is anyone born in a Christian household”), or behavior (“a Christian is a person who regularly attends church or frequently reads the Bible”). Yet God’s Word tells us that being a Christian is not primarily an issue of family background or personal behavior; it is an issue of one’s relationship with God.

In the answer to this question, there is bad news and good news. The bad news is: we are all sinners. We all do things that are displeasing to God, and this separates us from our good and righteous Creator. Our sin has created a barrier between God and us, a gap that we cannot cross by our own efforts or merits. The good news is: what we can’t do, God has already done by sending His Son, Jesus Christ, to live a perfectly righteous life and die as a sacrifice for our sins. Then God raised Jesus from the dead and now offers to all people the free gift of forgiveness of sin and an eternal relationship with Him. To receive this free gift and enter into a relationship with God, all one must do is believe that Jesus Christ died for their sins and rose from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). By making that decision you become a Christian, a person in an eternally secure relationship with God.