Short answer: why are you asking me? You can figure it out yourself.
Long answer: well, let’s put it this way . . .
I was not raised a Christian. I was raised in a house that had inherited Christianity. We had Christmas trees and Santa Claus. We went to church, occasionally, and my parents participated in church activities, mostly before my birth and then in my early childhood.
By the time I became old enough to think things through, my parents were no longer active church-goers, but my dad (bless his heart) would get up Sunday to drive me to church and drop me off because I wanted to go.
At church I struggled to figure out what was in the Christian Bible—it was so long and boring, and it mostly made no sense in its stories. But there were things in it that moved me or inspired me. The book of Isaiah, for example, with its repeated assurances from the Creator of the Universe: “I am with you.” The smooth, confident, relaxed teachings and life of Jesus set in the catastrophe of his doom and execution. The early Christian church with such promise of Good News.
I got more involved in church and became a Christian, several times—that is, as I grew in my understanding of what was required I made the mental choice to say “Yes, Lord, I will follow You.” The efforts of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, Campus Crusade for Christ, and the kindness of people around me helped to focus my decisions, and by the end of high school I was pretty solidly an evangelical Christian.
Through my young adult years and my middle adult years I maintained the faith and attempted to maintain the obedience. There were mental & spiritual attributes to aim for, and specific behaviors to follow. I think I did fairly well.
But it took a long time to figure out that what I was looking for in the early years—the wonderful stories, the easy confidence of a true faith, the assurance of living a life of goodness and holiness and faithfulness—wasn’t what I had ended up in.
More and more as I grew older, I was more and more constrained in what I could say or do or think. There were so many rules! So many things I had to do as a Christian, or not do.
I had to go to church, every week. Tithe. Pray. Read the scriptures, over and over. Teach. All these things were in the category of “religious obligations” and they were fine.
But there was more.
Somewhere in my early adult years I got Christianity confused with the American conservative political movement, and now I had increasing obligations.
I had to despise the poor and demand ever-increasing cuts in government services to the poor – because Jesus hated lazy people. And yet the entire New Testament is focused on the poor and needy, the humble and lost. We spoke of faithfulness to Jesus, we read the scriptures—and we despised the poor.
I had to hate liberals and anyone who said America wasn’t perfect as is, except for a few changes to make sure things stayed the same. I had to hate any efforts to extend political accommodation to black Americans, Asian Americans, Latin@ Americans—you name it, they were excluded. We Christians weren’t “white Americans” (even though we were)—we were just “Americans,” and if people wanted to be Americans and accepted as Americans, they had to leave their identities aside and be like us. Real Americans.
I had to oppose gay marriage, abortion, equal rights for women, taxes for government services, government regulation, science and education, public welfare—anything that was against the American conservative way of thinking was also against Jesus, and faithful followers of Jesus would also be against it.
I tried, I really tried. I made the effort to exclude gays from American life. I made the effort to keep women as second-class citizens with regard to their bodies. I made the effort to completely disassociate myself from Black Americans, to see them as the worst of humanity, the kind of people who were always asking for what wasn’t theirs.
And when I would try to share the gospel with people and met with their observations that my Christianity represented all these things, I tried to explain that no, we didn’t dislike them, and no, we didn’t want to exclude them, and no, we didn’t want to put them in their place, but that the gospel was somehow “pure” and “holy” in spite of it being an arm of the conservative political power structure, that it had no power to change lives to repentance and justice and personal and social holiness, but that its power was reserved for middle-class white families with few if any observable problems.
It was, in fact, a gospel for the self-satisfied and self-righteous; the ones who needed the real gospel of Christ (the “Good News”) had no way to participate in this gospel for the “Good Enough.”
I was tired of trying to explain that my Jesus wasn’t a homophobe, even though anyone displaying homosexual tendencies would not qualify to participate in the gospel; that my Jesus thought women were majestic and good and full of goodness, but that they had no place in the kingdom as a leader; that my Jesus thought in God’s kingdom all were equal, but there was absolutely no reason for the children of God’s kingdom here on earth to experience anything approaching equality and indeed, the leaders of the kingdom here on earth were fully righteous in setting up one color of people above all other people as what was right and just and due.
I tried, I really tried. I tried to paint the conservative religious beliefs I held on to as something not as bad as it sounded, and I tried to explain the statements of people with far more power in the religious and conservative circles who, with straightforward words and coded messages and dog whistles told everyone else how they could never be a part of the conservative American “patriot” power struggle because they weren’t “real” Americans.
And eventually, I gave up. I walked away from it all. I stopped being that kind of Christian. I started thinking back to what drew me to Christ, what was lovely about Christ, what redemption was available in Christ.
And so I abandoned that false gospel of Americanism and white evangelicalism, and I tried, very hard, to re-think my faith and my salvation.
What, exactly, was the gospel for? What was Christianity for? What was the place of obedience to the kingdom’s call in a society where religiosity was good enough and indeed even praiseworthy?
I left it all behind and purposely decided to blow off anyone who would question my faith-walk.
I had people tell me, in private messages, in public social media posts, to my face, to my spouse, to my children, to my friends, that I was going to hell for abandoning the Republican-Christian party and religion. That standing up for equal rights for gay Americans was doing the work of the devil. That saying women were fully equal to men was somehow in direct opposition to God. That saying we white Americans have done (and continue to do) some despicable, terrible things to our Black American brothers and sisters was racist and divisive, and that just as a thief who repents still must return the stolen goods, we white Americans, even though we might fully acknowledge our participation in the theft of assets and labor from our Black American brothers and sister, we still owed them the return of their stolen assets and labor. (This doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of the multiple, continual theft of assets and labor from many people, both here in the Americas and worldwide, theft that has made America rich.)
But I’d rather work to be right and just than to earn favor with the system that kept me tied up in behavior-based Christianity, in unsatisfactory unease about my faith-walk, and in bondage to a religious-political system I simply could not believe in.
So when someone asks, “What is a Christian? What makes a Christian? How do I become a Christian?” I have to ask, “What do you want it to mean?” If you want it to mean siding with the rich and powerful and assured and comfortable—well, there are plenty of places to choose from.
if you want it to mean pursuing the heart of God, following Jesus, learning the way of the cross, giving all to the kingdom—well, there are also plenty of places to choose from.
It really depends upon you and what you want. Choose what you want, and you will find the path.