Good Christians

In the preface to Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis talks about the way terms like “Christian” lose meaning over time. Lewis argues that "Christian" has become an adjective used to indicate a person’s moral quality. His observation rings true today – in our culture, “Christian” connotes goodness. To call someone a “Christian” is to say that he or she is a good, or moral, person. To suggest a person isn’t a Christian is perceived as a critique of his or her character. Accordingly, “Christian” is a designation that has been attached to different issues, parties, and candidates as a way of making political agendas palatable to certain segments of our culture.
Lewis points out that these usages strip the term “Christian” of its true meaning. He says,

People ask: "Who are you, to lay down who is, and who is not a Christian?" or "May not many a man who cannot believe these doctrines be far more truly a Christian, far closer to the spirit of Christ, than some who do?" Now this objection is in one sense very right, very charitable, very spiritual, very sensitive. It has every amiable quality except that of being useful.

In this introduction to his treatise on the basics of the Christian faith – or “mere Christianity” in his words – Lewis advocates for a return to the term’s original meaning. An understanding of “Christian” that has less to do with an internal set of beliefs or values, and more to do with a faith that translates into an embodied way of life. Lewis concludes,

We must therefore stick to the original, obvious meaning. The name Christians was first given at Antioch (Acts xi. 26) to "the disciples," to those who accepted the teaching of the apostles. There is no question of its being restricted to those who profited by that teaching as much as they should have. There is no question of its being extended to those who in some refined, spiritual, inward fashion were "far closer to the spirit of Christ" than the less satisfactory of the disciples. The point is not a theological, or moral one. It is only a question of using words so that we can all understand what is being said. When a man who accepts the Christian doctrine lives unworthily of it, it is much clearer to say he is a bad Christian than to say he is not a Christian.

The question of whether or not a person is a Christian is one that has to be answered, first and foremost, by the individual. Do you know who Jesus is? Do you know what he taught? Have you counted the costs of following him? And do you still want to follow? These are the questions that CS Lewis explores in ensuing chapters. And these are the questions we have to answer before we can legitimately claim the designation.