Gone are the days where my dark, ringlet curls caused people to give me the nickname ‘curly wurly’. It’s clearly a name that I can no longer identify with! But the nickname Christian, for that’s what it was, a nickname, is it an accurate description of who I am? Can I identify with that term today? Well, yes, but. The ‘but’ relates to what the name Christian has become associated with in recent days that makes me uncomfortable. I, like others within the Collective, have distanced myself from that expression of Christianity, prevalent notably in parts of the USA now, associated with its president that I personally find abhorrent and alien to what I see in Christ and the ways of God’s kingdom.
Like Craig, I don’t particularly like labels but I can see that they can be helpful descriptors. So if I have to be described, I prefer the term, ‘a follower of Christ’. In the gospels, Jesus calls people to follow him, to be with him, to become like him and do as he did. As John Mark Comer, reminds us in his book Practising the Way, we become apprentices of Christ. Our relationship with Christ is what transforms, shapes and influences our life.
My encounter with God brought me into the mystery and wonder of a relationship with Christ, who is not only described as the Way and the Truth but one who has invited me into a way of Life. Into what St John of the Cross described as being in a ‘dependable relationship’ of trust in Christ.
I also like the term a ‘friend of Christ’, a term that Jesus gave to his followers, his disciples, “I have called you friends”. To quote another book, The Transforming Friendship by Leslie Weatherhead, it is relationship, one of friendship that I can identify with, perhaps more so nowadays than the term Christian.
I love the Quaker name for their denomination, The Society of Friends. It speaks to me of belonging, with other followers, as friends with Jesus and as friends together, within the family of God. If there was a bit more friendship, true covenantal friendship about in the church, there might be more respect, honour, understanding, tolerance and compassion and less contending, competing and conflict. The world in turn, as Jesus said, might know that we are his disciples, by our love for one another.
Perhaps I shouldn’t be too worried about the title I give to myself. I think it’s for other people to decide how they see and would describe me.
Just as those who witnessed the lives of those early, women and men who possessed a new way of living that centred around Christ, so they were given the nickname, Christian. Those who didn’t believe in Jesus nevertheless saw in those who did, their love and devotion to Christ who they followed. It was no surprise therefore that they gave them the nickname Christian, as Simon described as ‘Little Christ’. Someone whose life in some small way resembled Christ. And it is, as the apostle Paul points out, a mark of God’s Spirit at work in our lives, that as we grow in relationship with Christ, we become like him, (see 2 Corinthians 3:18).
This is challenging but I would much rather other people describe me as a Christian, a follower of Christ, rather than me going round proclaiming I am one. I would hope that they might see something of the light and grace of Christ in my life; in how I think, speak and behave that would lead them to the conclusion that I am a Christian. I’d hope that they would see evidence of my relationship with Christ rather than me having to tell them.
Am I a Christian? What do you think?
