Thinking About Becoming a Christian?

[Lindaf42]

I'm thinking about becoming a Christian. But I don't know anything about it.

[Michael2012]

I'm thinking about becoming a Christian. But I don't know anything about it.

Hi Lindaf42,

I'm just curious, and so allow me ask. If you say you don't know anything about becoming a Christian, why are you thinking about becoming one?

[Lindaf42]

I'm thinking about becoming a Christian. But I don't know anything about it.

Hi Lindaf42,

I'm just curious, and so allow me ask. If you say you don't know anything about becoming a Christian, why are you thinking about becoming one?

I'm thinking about becoming a Christian. But I don't know anything about it.

Hi Lindaf42,

I'm just curious, and so allow me ask. If you say you don't know anything about becoming a Christian, why are you thinking about becoming one?

I did not say I did not know anything about Christianity, I said:

"I did not know anything about it." It being the procedure.
I just assumed it was apparent.  But I have found out there are many versions.

I want to learn the correct procedure to become a Christian.

[Michael2012]

I'm thinking about becoming a Christian. But I don't know anything about it.

Hi Lindaf42,

I'm just curious, and so allow me to ask. If you say you don't know anything about becoming a Christian, why are you thinking about becoming one?

I did not say I did not know anything about Christianity, I said:

"I did not know anything about it." It being the procedure.
I just assumed it was apparent.  But I have found out there are many versions.

I want to learn the correct procedure to become a Christian.

Thank you for clarifying. Nonetheless, would you be patient and even kinder still to answer my question "why are you thinking about becoming a Christian?".

[TonkaTim]

I want to learn the correct procedure to become a Christian.

I would not say there is a standardized procedure. It is more about coming to belief, personal knowledge, of God. Sometimes folks kinda believe before they fully realise they do. Why they become more & more curious. They desire God.

Since it seems English is your native language, I think it is safe to assume you are familiar with the Bible. Probably read a bit of it. At least a couple of the Gospels in the Bible. You know what Easter is supposed to be about. You may have even seen one or even two of the Jesus movies. Maybe heard the actual gospel preached a couple of times too.


Assuming this I would ask you about what you think about all that.


Do you believe it already? & that is why you are asking?

[chosenone]

Hi linda, read this, it explains it well.

https://www.thoughtco.com/how-to-become-a-christian-701019

[RB]

I did not say I did not know anything about Christianity, I said:"I did not know anything about it." It being the procedure.I just assumed it was apparent.  But I have found out there are many versions.I want to learn the correct procedure to become a Christian.

Hearing, believing, repenting, being baptized into the religion of Jesus Christ, and living according to his commandments that are found in the scriptures, which for me would be the KJV version for the English speaking people of this world, being the oldest and the one our forefathers used and trusted in which came out shortly after the invention of the printing press, which was one of the main tools used in the great Reformation period to put the truth into every hand of the plowboys, etc. that they used to come to the knowledge of the truth 

Acts 26:28~"Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian."

How did Paul almost persuadest King Agrippa? He reason with the king out of the scriptures concerning JESUS CHRIST who is the King of kings and Lord of lords. If one hears, and believe, then they should repent of their past life of serving sin, and be baptized into the religion of Jesus Christ and follow his commandment that found in the scriptures so we could know how to walk and please God.

[Faithbuilders]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

[EddyLowe]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

Some Christians tell me I have to be baptized to be saved, are they deceived?

[Faithbuilders]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

Some Christians tell me I have to be baptized to be saved, are they deceived?

Baptism is important, but not needed to be saved. There was a bad guy who died on a cross next to Jesus, he saw that Jesus is the Son of God - Jesus told him that he would be with Jesus in heaven. He did not have time to get baptized, or anything else. Baptism is a work, and the bible says that we are saved by grace alone, not by works.

So the two points I told you are all that you need.

[EddyLowe]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

Some Christians tell me I have to be baptized to be saved, are they deceived?

Baptism is important, but not needed to be saved. There was a bad guy who died on a cross next to Jesus, he saw that Jesus is the Son of God - Jesus told him that he would be with Jesus in heaven. He did not have time to get baptized, or anything else. Baptism is a work, and the bible says that we are saved by grace alone, not by works.

So the two points I told you are all that you need.

I would like to hear your take on this here that that is written in the bible the account where Jesus said to Nicodemus " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. "

How would you fit it in to what you believe about salvation seeing how this directly contradicts the thief on the cross account?

[MeMyself]

Some will say that the thief on the cross was Christ's prerogative to save anyway He saw fit, but we should not believe that means it is the way all are saved, because baptism is required for the rest of us.

I say, whatever you do that is not of faith is sin. So, for some, the confession and belief that Christ was raised from the dead, with a heart full of faith, its enough that they be saved.
For others, they don't feel saved and safe until they are baptized.

This has been discussed over and over again and no absolute can be agreed upon.  There are scriptures that speak of baptism after confession, so some believe it must be right after...others believe it important and should be done a.s.a.p and others still down play it too much IMO and leave it off the table completely.

I do believe the Romans account of how to be saved, is how one is born again; for it says in Romans 10:10 10for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

God bless.

[Carey]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

Some Christians tell me I have to be baptized to be saved, are they deceived?

Baptism is important, but not needed to be saved. There was a bad guy who died on a cross next to Jesus, he saw that Jesus is the Son of God - Jesus told him that he would be with Jesus in heaven. He did not have time to get baptized, or anything else. Baptism is a work, and the bible says that we are saved by grace alone, not by works.

So the two points I told you are all that you need.

I would like to hear your take on this here that that is written in the bible the account where Jesus said to Nicodemus " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. "

How would you fit it in to what you believe about salvation seeing how this directly contradicts the thief on the cross account?

Born of water=natural birth, born of the Spirit=born again.  The relationship is further reinforced and clarified by Jesus' very next words where He again talks about a natural birth (born of flesh) and then rebirth; born of the Spirit.

And I like MeMyself's  explanation of the thief's salvation, done as Jesus saw fit.  There is no contradiction regardless of what one believes about the baptism of the rest of us.

[chosenone]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

Some Christians tell me I have to be baptized to be saved, are they deceived?

Baptism is important, but not needed to be saved. There was a bad guy who died on a cross next to Jesus, he saw that Jesus is the Son of God - Jesus told him that he would be with Jesus in heaven. He did not have time to get baptized, or anything else. Baptism is a work, and the bible says that we are saved by grace alone, not by works.

So the two points I told you are all that you need.

I would like to hear your take on this here that that is written in the bible the account where Jesus said to Nicodemus " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. "

How would you fit it in to what you believe about salvation seeing how this directly contradicts the thief on the cross account?

Jesus is clearly speaking of our physical birth(of water) and our spiritual birth(of the spirit).
Thats why He says 'Born again'.

[NorrinRadd]

FWIW, notes from the IVP Bible Background Commentary...


Matt.

3:5–6. Pagans wanting to convert to Judaism would repent and be baptized, but John here treats Jewish people on the same terms as pagans (see further comment on Mk 1:4–5.)

3:11. ...The prophets had predicted the outpouring of God's Spirit 7 on the righteous at the time when God established his kingdom for Israel (Is 44:3; Ezek 39:29; Joel 2:28). They also decreed fire upon the wicked (Is 26:11; 65:15; 66:24; Jer 4:4; 15:14; etc.). In Matthew 3:11, the wicked are baptized, or immersed, in fire (3:10, 12), the righteous in the Holy 8 Spirit.

3:12. Because the same Greek word can mean both "spirit" and "wind," the picture of wind and fire carries over from 3:11. Winnowing was familiar to all Palestinian Jews, especially to the farmers: they would throw harvested wheat into the air, and the wind would separate the heavier grain from the lighter chaff. The chaff was useless for consumption and was normally burned. Some other writers also described the day of judgment as a harvest (4 Ezra 4:30–32; cf. Jer 51:33; Joel 3:12–14) or the wicked as chaff (Is 17:13; Jer 13:24; 15:7; etc.). That the fire is "unquenchable" points beyond the momentary burning of chaff to something far more horrible (Is 66:24), in spite of the fact that Jewish tradition itself was far from unanimous concerning the duration of hell


Mark

1:4–5. Like many other ancient peoples, Jewish people practiced ceremonial washings. Their only once-for-all ceremonial washing, however, was the immersion that non-Jews had to go through when they converted to Judaism. Non-Jews who were converting to Judaism would immerse themselves in water, probably under the supervision of a religious expert. John's baptizing activity fits this model.


John

3:3–4. Jesus speaks literally of being born "from above," which means "from God" ("above" was a Jewish circumlocution, or roundabout expression, for God). One could also construe the phrase as meaning "reborn," which Nicodemus takes literally. (Ancient writers, including those of the Old Testament— Jer 1:11–12; Mic 1:10–15 —often used plays on words, and John includes quite a few other puns; they also sometimes used other characters as less intelligent foils for a narrative's main spokesperson.) Because Jewish teachers spoke of Gentile converts to Judaism as starting life anew like "newborn children" (just as adopted sons under Roman law relinquished all legal status in their former family when they became part of a new one), Nicodemus should have understood that Jesus meant conversion; but it never occurs to him that someone Jewish would need to convert to the true faith of Israel.

3:5. Converts to Judaism were said to become "as newborn children" when they were baptized to remove Gentile impurity. "Born of water" thus clarifies for Nicodemus that "born from above" means conversion, not a second physical birth.
The Greek wording of 3:5 can mean either "water and the Spirit " or "water, that is, the Spirit." Ezekiel 36:24–27 used water symbolically for the cleansing of the Spirit (cf. especially the Dead Sea Scrolls), so here Jesus could mean "converted by the Spirit" (cf. 7:37–39)—a spiritual proselyte baptism. Whereas Jewish teachers generally spoke of converts to Judaism as "newborn" only in the sense that they were legally severed from old relationships, an actual rebirth by the Spirit would produce a new heart (Ezek 36:26).

3:6–7. The "spirit" that is born from God's Spirit may reflect the "new spirit" of Ezekiel 36:26.

[silverblueraY]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

Some Christians tell me I have to be baptized to be saved, are they deceived?

Baptism is important, but not needed to be saved. There was a bad guy who died on a cross next to Jesus, he saw that Jesus is the Son of God - Jesus told him that he would be with Jesus in heaven. He did not have time to get baptized, or anything else. Baptism is a work, and the bible says that we are saved by grace alone, not by works.

So the two points I told you are all that you need.

I would like to hear your take on this here that that is written in the bible the account where Jesus said to Nicodemus " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. "

How would you fit it in to what you believe about salvation seeing how this directly contradicts the thief on the cross account?

Jesus is clearly speaking of our physical birth(of water) and our spiritual birth(of the spirit).
Thats why He says 'Born again'.

If you are " born again " that would mean you have alreay once before been born.
Born again would mean a second time.  Explain how, when and where you were previously born before as you have said you were again born a physical birth(of water) and a spiritual birth(of the spirit). If what you have claimed is true.

[chosenone]

You are right, there are many procedures; most are far more complexed than it needs to be. According to the word of God there is only two basic steps to becoming a Christian.

1) Confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord
2) Believe with your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead

And you SHALL be saved!

Thats it! You do that, and you are a Christian! Next step after that is find your self a good church that preaches the WHOLE word of God, If you are unsure pm me, and I'll research
some good churches in your area.

God bless you, and I hope to be welcoming you to the family of God. 

Some Christians tell me I have to be baptized to be saved, are they deceived?

Baptism is important, but not needed to be saved. There was a bad guy who died on a cross next to Jesus, he saw that Jesus is the Son of God - Jesus told him that he would be with Jesus in heaven. He did not have time to get baptized, or anything else. Baptism is a work, and the bible says that we are saved by grace alone, not by works.

So the two points I told you are all that you need.

I would like to hear your take on this here that that is written in the bible the account where Jesus said to Nicodemus " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. "

How would you fit it in to what you believe about salvation seeing how this directly contradicts the thief on the cross account?

Jesus is clearly speaking of our physical birth(of water) and our spiritual birth(of the spirit).
Thats why He says 'Born again'.

If you are " born again " that would mean you have alreay once before been born.
Born again would mean a second time.  Explain how, when and where you were previously born before as you have said you were again born a physical birth(of water) and a spiritual birth(of the spirit). If what you have claimed is true.

We are born physically, and if we become a believer, we are then born again, this time spiritually when the Holy Spirit comes and lives in us.

[Faithbuilders]

The first time that we are born is from water, (not baptism as some think) but from the fluid inside the mother. But because of Adams sin, for when he sinned his spirit died - and from that point on, mankind has been born from the womb with a dead spirit. But when you make Jesus Lord of your life, your spirit is born on the inside of you. That is when you are saved, or born again.