What is a "Christian?"

A friend recently reflected on what it means to be a Christian. This seemed to me to be a worthwhile exercise, so here are a few brief thoughts on the matter. First, and most obvious I think, is that a person saying she is a Christian does not make it so. In fact, as my friend David Dark points out, calling oneself a Christian seems a tad presumptuous, even tacky, to use one of the late, great Will Campbell's favorite words. Second, and equally obvious, is that regular attendance at a religious institution's services does not a Christian make. Consuming products that have been labelled "Christian" for marketing purposes, whether they be formal services, music, television, books, education, jewelry, or Jesus fish magnets, does not make a person a Christian. Products cannot be Christian. Third, a person is not a Christian simply because he believes in God, Jesus, the Bible, etc. Jesus made this clear when he stated that not everyone who called him Lord would participate in God's kingdom. James reiterates that belief, on its own, is of no use. Everybody believes something, including demons, according to James. Belief, like religious talk, is cheap. What makes a Christian, it seems to me, is doing God's will. What counts is not what we think about Jesus, but whether we actually do what he said. Jesus made this plain on several occasions. As noted above, he concluded his Sermon on the Mount with the admonition that what counts is what we do, not what we say. That in order to have a house built on a rock, we have to put Jesus' teachings into practice. He reiterates this point in Matthew 21 in his parable of the two sons. John records Jesus saying in chapter 14 that if we love him, we will keep his commandments. It's the doing that really matters. So what does this doing look like? Some of it is very challenging and counter-cultural, such as being committed to nonviolence, loving people who would do us harm, and not serving money or treasuring material things. In Matthew 25, Jesus made clear that he is particularly concerned with what we do for people who regarded as "the least." Do we care for the poor, the malnourished, the sick, the imprisoned? These are people that are seldom even on the radar of many self-professed "Christians" who can regularly be found warming up padded pews in church buildings and constantly have the name of Jesus on their lips. Jesus seems to indicate that his followers should be especially interested in caring for people who find themselves excluded from faith communities. Thus, as we seek to be Christians, we must ask ourselves how well are we loving and caring for people that some religious institutions would blasphemously claim are outside the reach of God's grace. Jesus boiled it all down by saying that we must do for others what we would like to be done for us, which sums up the law and the prophets, and that we should love our neighbors as ourselves. So, am I loving others selflessly, or am I my own primary concern? How do I welcome others, even when it inconveniences me? Am I willing to sacrifice my own comfort, my own agenda, my own preferences in order to lovingly meet the needs of others? More personally for me, how do I treat people who disagree with me? My honest responses to questions such as these demonstrate how narrow is the road.