What is a Christian?

A Christian is someone who has:

• Accepted that (like everybody!) they don't match up to God's standards, and actually deserve to be punished by God for their rebellion against him 
• Realised that they can't do anything about this themselves - however hard they may try to live a good life
• Understood that God has done something about it - by sending his Son, Jesus Christ, into our world.  Jesus paid the penalty for our rebellion instead of us when he died on the cross, and God then raised Jesus from the dead again 
  
• Believed in Jesus and asked for God's forgiveness on the basis of what Jesus has done for them
  

So Christians aren't better people than anybody else  - they're just ordinary people who have realised their need of help and forgiveness and who have asked Jesus to provide it.  Once someone becomes a Christian, though, the great news is that God gives that person a fresh start, living in their life through his Holy Spirit, being constantly there to help them and giving them the ability to start to live differently.  Christians should then try to make it their aim to please God to show their gratitude for all he has done for them.

The new life that Christians experience isn't just for here and now, either - God promises that it is an 'eternal' life  - one that he guarantees that Christians will continue to enjoy forever in an unimaginably wonderful existence that God is preparing for them after they leave this world through death.  This is all fantastically good news - the best you will ever hear!

How do we know all this?  We know it because God has told it to us in his book, the Bible.  You can find out more about the Bible here.  If all this is new to you, you might well want to explore the evidence more for yourself - if so, click here to find out more about how you can explore the facts about Christianity.