AN AUTHENTIC CHRISTIAN HAS FRUIT LIKE CHRIST The Americanized church tells us that all you have to do to be saved and go to heaven is to say the prayer to ask Jesus into your heart without going through the process of forgiveness to those who sinned against you and deliverance from your own pride and sin. Interestingly even Wikipedia states: In religion and theology, salvation generally refers to the deliverance of the soul from sin and its consequences. The truth is that when we make a decision to become a Christian like Jesus then we need to actually end up having similar fruit like Jesus had. Of course if we die the day after we decide to serve Christ then we don’t really have time to show our fruit just like the thief on the cross next to Jesus. But for everyone else who has been attending church for years our fruit of our lives should be closely aligned with Jesus if we are authentic Christians, understanding it’s a process of sanctification. In order to have similar fruit to Jesus in our lives we need to do what Jesus did and that is to forgive everyone who ever sinned…

Most people who call themselves a Christian live a life that is not the same as God’s expectations. Most feel that they should attend church once a week, read their Bible a couple times a year, give some money to the church, and do some service projects or outreach programs a couples times a year.  All the while still not living a sexually pure life, watching movies or listening to music that would grieve the Holy Spirit, treating their spouse and kids harshly, lying or tolerating sin in their lives, walking in pride every day.  Others may feel like they should become a teacher at their church or lead a small group, take a mission trip and serve a couple times a month at their homeless shelter, food bank, witness on the streets, pray over people at the mall and in the marketplace, fast a couple times a year, pray in tongues and prophesy.  Surely those who pray in tongues, prophesy, do deliverance and many miracles are on their way to heaven, or… maybe not? Is God impressed with our works and spiritual gifts?  Even the Pharisees and scribes were sharply scolded by Jesus and they did a lot of…

The Lord looks at our hearts and minds and ultimately at what our daily fruit is.  That is really the only way to know if a person is a real, authentic Christian or just a fake Christian in name only. How many people do you know who go to church regularly but still walk daily in pride, sexual sin, are controlling and demanding, selfish and mean?  Jesus did not like the Pharisees and scribes because He knew their hearts were evil and they simply acted pious in front of other people to make them look like they were godly as their pride was strong.  I used to think that people were Christians as soon as they asked Jesus to come into their hearts because that is what I was taught.  But then I observed many church attenders (including many pastors or their wives and other leaders) who chose to live lives of sexual impurity, ungodly behavior, pride and wanting to control and emotionally abuse their spouse and children causing much damage.  I learned why the divorce rate was so high amongst church attenders was because at least one of the two in marriage refused to own their evil behavior and…