This may, or may not, come as a surprise to you; however, the first followers of Jesus didn’t call themselves “Christians.” It was, in fact, a derogatory term used by people outside the Jesus community.
Acts 11:26 reads, “In Antioch the disciples were first called Christians” (ESV).
They were called by others. It was not the name they chose for themselves.
What then did they call themselves?
The answer is right there in the verse: disciples.
The word “Christian” is only used 3 times in the whole Bible; whereas, the term “disciple” is used 281 times in NT. And yet today, we normally describe ourselves and others as Christians rather than disciples.
Sadly, altering the term that we use to describe ourselves, believers have lost the clarity the word “disciple” conveyed.
In fact, as Steve Lawson notes in his book The Cost, our use of “Christian” today obscures the fact that a lot of people who call themselves Christians are not actually disciples,
“…large numbers of people, who either attend church or who are morally good people, wrongly presume that they have a right relationship with God. Tragically, though, they have never actually committed their lives to Him. Surely, they know about Jesus. They have a degree of knowledge about Him in their heads, but they do not truly know Him in their hearts. They have been lulled into a false sense of assurance about salvation that they do not possess. Churches are full of such people…In many pulpits, the message of salvation has been obscured, if not altered. As a result, many people pull up short of what it truly is to be an authentic believer in Jesus. I fear that many think they are trusting in Him, but, in reality, have not yet done so. Instead, they have believed in a sugar-coated message with a shallow imitation of the real truth. The result is a synthetic salvation.”
Scriptures speaks directly of this:
– Matthew 7:22 – On that day many will say to me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?”
– 2 Corinthians 13:5 – “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!”
– 1 John is an excellent test of salvation.
When we read The Parable of the Wheat and Tares, we see that in opposition to Jesus Christ, the devil tries to destroy Christ’s work by placing false believers and teachers in the world who lead many astray.
Matthew 13:37-39 reads, He answered, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world, and the good seed is the sons of the kingdom. The weeds are the sons of the evil one, and the enemy who sowed them is the devil.”
The Church in America is increasingly questioning historical, orthodox beliefs on homosexuality, gender roles, sufficiency of Scripture/Christ’s death, and this may be, in large part, due to the result of tares amongst the wheat.
So let’s pray and work towards “Disciples,” a terrifyingly clear term of what an individual becomes when they truly place their faith in Christ.
