Not a good Christian.

I remember saying to a friend in high school, "I want to be a Christian one day."

He asked me why, and I replied "I just think they’re good people, they seem better than most of us."

I even wrote this in my journal in 2015 (~2 years before I came to truly know Jesus),

"I really pray with all my heart that I will one day become a Christian who not only believes in God but believes God. I want to love God before everyone else. I want to trust him. I want to KNOW Him." (28th Feb 2015)

My reason was because I believed Christians were better people. Nicer, friendlier, the obedient child, the smart student, the goody two shoes...Basically the classic 'good Christian' stereotype.

Thinking back, although I was interested about God, there were a couple of key barriers that prevented me from fully committing to Christianity.

(This is me in detective mode because I definitely didn't care enough to put a name to these barriers back in 2015.)

One - It all seemed too fictional and more like an escape from reality than reality itself.

Two - I didn’t believe I was good enough yet to call myself a Christian.

I'll mainly talk about barrier #2 in this post.

As a Christian now, I feel uncomfortable when people refer to me as a 'good Christian'. Because I 100% disagree.

The whole idea of 'good Christian' was something that both encouraged and discouraged me from Christianity. It encouraged me when I met friendly Christian people who were genuinely good and nice to me and others.

It discouraged me when I met unfriendly Christian people who did not make me feel loved, belonged or valued. I couldn't accept how one could declare that following God will make my life better and I will be better, if it clearly doesn’t seem to be working for you? 😅

I was willing to walk into Christian gatherings not because I thought christianity was true but because I thought it could give me some help to be a better, nicer and more likeable person.

I wasn’t planning on having my whole worldview changed. I didn't want to dedicate my whole life to Jesus. Neither did I aspire to become one of those weird people who handed out mini bibles/flyers in public. I especially did not wish to believe to an extent where I'd post deep and thought provoking bible verses/quotes online. I was only interested to just believe enough to make me 'good' and perhaps make it to heaven.

If you know me now, I’m literally everything I didn't want to be 🤣 and ... I LOVE it. But, it wasn't because I discovered that good Christians were a legit thing, but because I discovered almost the exact opposite.

I do remember being told, "Christianity isn’t for good people. It’s for broken and sinful people."

But I wished that someone could’ve expanded on what the difference was between being sinful (imperfect) and not knowing Jesus, versus sinful (imperfect) but knowing Jesus.

If non-Christians can be just as good or perhaps even better people than Christians (e.g. kinder, smarter, more generous), then what's the point of God?

Firstly, I had to get over barrier one because even if everything God promised me was great, if it was untrue, then it wouldn't matter anyways. After tackling this and discovering that there was evidence for the Gospel I was confronted with the next barrier.

I needed to understand that even if there was no such thing as 'good Christians', following Jesus and believing in the Gospel is STILL important.

I want to share this analogy that helped me understand the importance of following God even if I can't call myself a good Christian.

Let's imagine that after a major traumatic event the world is now filled with injured patients in need of help. Everybody is injured and needs to be treated. But the only way to get to treatment is by getting on an ambulance that drives to a hospital that can treat everybody.

The major traumatic event can be interpreted to portray what happened in the garden (Genesis 3). Being a Christian is like being one of the people in the ambulance. I am injured just like all the other people around me (outside and inside the ambulance), but the difference is that I am inside that ambulance, headed towards healing. I see Jesus as the driver of the ambulance, taking me towards this healing.

I like to think of those 'physical injuries' as my flaws and hurts. For example, being short-tempered, hurting others, being hurt by others, lying etc. these are all experiences that leave invisible but deep scars. They are all barriers preventing me from having an intimate relationship with a perfect God. Someone once told me that sin is essentially anything that becomes/is a barrier between me and God.

So as a Christian, I don't think I'm 'good' or 'better' than others who are also hurting or struggling around me. But I just see it as me choosing to follow the only path that promises complete healing and restoration. For me it was discovering that getting on that ambulance and entrusting my life to Jesus was the only True way to a perfect life worth living forever.

I am a Christian because I believe that I will never reach the standard of ‘good’ that is needed to be in perfect relationship with God. Therefore, I am not a good Christian! It is me admitting that I am broken and I need Jesus to die for the punishments I rightly deserved so that my broken relationship with God could be mended.

It breaks my heart and slightly frustrates me when I do something wrong and it leads to people questioning my faith. Receiving comments like, "I thought you were a good Christian..."

That hurts deep man. My heart breaks because yes, I was in the wrong. But it saddens me even more so that people who respond like this totally missed the entire point of Christianity.

As a Christian I have a continuous goal of conforming to the image of Christ. (Ephesians 4:13; Colossians 3:3-10; Romans 8:28-30)

If I didn't believe in God then why do I even try to be 'good'?

How do I even come to a unanimous criteria with others on what defines good?

I could only try to conform to a standard that is always changing and always subjective.

The point of Christianity is I am able to openly admit I am not good and I know why I am not good. I also know the standard that defines good.

I know why I should even bother trying to be good. My heart and perspective has changed dramatically.

I realised that the key differences between pre-Jesus and post-Jesus me is that I have this intense, supernatural, motivation and power to change. I wanted to before, but my motivation levels fluctuated regularly depending on what people were saying/doing and what I was feeling. Now I have an unchanging standard of good to live by - Jesus.

I am filled with flaws and weaknesses. But if I didn't believe in a perfect God, I had no real reason to strive for perfection. But as a Christian I know why I can't completely get rid of this innate desire to do good.

It was powerful and liberating when I finally understood that although I'm imperfect, I'm not defined by it. When I admit in my heart and confess with my mouth that I am broken yet fully confident that I am fully loved and purposed for good. There is unexplainable freedom.

Accepting Jesus changed my life.

But am I a good Christian? Nah...

More like a broken, hurting and sinful Christian who may seem 'good' because I have a HUGE reason to want change. A reason that is bigger than myself, bigger than my friends and bigger than the world! I also have a supernatural source of power within me (God/Holy Spirit) that constantly convicts my heart to do 'good' things and turn away from sinful things.

The only thing that makes me different from non-Christian me is that I am now redeemed and set free from my lack of 'good' by the only good Christian there ever was - Jesus Christ.