Wednesday, January 10, 2018

What is a Christian

Though the Nephites were rejoicing because they had God's help in winning the battle with the Lamanites, there began to be dissensions among the Nephites. They started to fall away into wickedness. 
"...[Moroni] prayed mightily unto his God for the blessings of liberty to rest upon his brethren, so long as there should a band of Christians remain to possess the land—
14 For thus were all the true believers of Christ, who belonged to the church of God, called by those who did not belong to the church.
15 And those who did belong to the church were faithful; yea, all those who were true believers in Christ took upon them, gladly, the name of Christ, or Christians as they were called, because of their belief in Christ who should come." (Alma 46:13-15)
I believe this is the sore spot of why LDS people get a little upset or offended when people in other religions claim that "Mormons are not Christians". To us, it seems pretty straight forward. A Christian is simply someone who had a belief in Christ. There is a more "accepted" version of what it means to be a Christian, but honestly, that version was decided on by a group of probably mostly well-meaning men about what "rules" there are around a belief in order for it to be called "Christian". Let people call it what they want, that's fine. 
For me personally, I believe the term Christian should just refer to a belief in Christ and a trust in Him and His atonement. I am happy to go by that title.

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