Three simple, honest questions can guide anyone weighing the claims of Christ toward a real, life-changing decision to follow Him.
Becoming a Christian starts with three honest questions, not a complicated checklist.
Editor’s note – We’re running this piece because it does something too many gospel presentations skip: it names the actual fork in the road before asking anyone to cross it. The author writes as someone who has stood on both sides of that fork himself, wrestling through addiction before surrendering to grace, and he lays out the decision in three plain, honest questions rather than a formula. Whether you’re weighing faith in Christ for the first time or just want language for a conversation with a friend who is, this framework is worth your time.
Perhaps you find the figure of Jesus compelling but you’re not sure about committing to the Christian faith. You’re not alone.
After all, there are so many other options, and Christianity makes exclusive claims of truth that seem offensive to many modern ears.
Am I really going to pick this up? (AI)
How can you be sure that Christianity is correct?
I have good news for you. It might not be an easy decision, but it’s also not a complicated one. Here’s how to make a disciplined and logically informed decision to follow Jesus (or not) in just three steps.
Step 1: What is the Biggest Problem With Humanity? (choose 1 of 2 options)
All worldviews eventually coalesce into two basic answers to this fundamental question.
Option 1: The main issue with humanity is a lack of knowledge
Option 2: The main issue with humanity is a problem inside the human heart
When you look at the broad sweep of history from the past to the modern day, what do you think is the chief problem that plagues us?
a lack of knowledge or an illness within the human heart? (AI)
There are many smart and gifted people who have different answers.
The historian, science fiction writer, and social reformer H. G. Wells (1866–1946) was squarely in the first group.¹
He put it succinctly in The Outline of History in this way:
“Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe. [H.G. Wells, Book IX, The Outline of History]
The historian, author, and dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was in the second group.
He makes this clear in The Gulag Archipelago.
The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either — but right through every human heart — and through all human hearts. [Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago]
Wells vs. Solzhenitsyn (AI)
Both men were thoughtful and talented. Wells was nominated for 4 Nobel Prizes in Literature. Solzhenitsyn won the Nobel Prize in 1970.
They can’t both be correct.
The Christian view is that there is something wrong that knowledge alone can never heal. We were made in the image of a perfect God and were made for relationship with Him. But our human ancestors were separated from God when they chose to trust the serpent instead of Him.
And in the resulting rupture, we can either be reconciled to Him or we can try to fill the void with other means. Until our hearts ultimately find rest in God, there is a battle going on inside.
the battle within us (AI)
Dostoevsky was another author who has a similar view as Solzhenitsyn. Here’s Dmitri Karamazov articulating the struggle.
“The awful thing is that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there and the battlefield is the heart of man. [Dmitri Karamazov, The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevsky]
This Christian view is a hard one for the human ego. It means we can never save ourselves. Yet it’s bracingly realistic. It helps us understand how some of the smartest and most successful people are among those listed in the Epstein files.
It says we have hearts that are fundamentally sick.
It says we need a salvation that comes from outside ourselves. That we will constantly deceive ourselves until we are cured of our sickness.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? [Jeremiah 17:9]
Editor’s note – Notice that this isn’t an abstract theological debate for the author. He’s naming a real diagnosis: the human heart, not merely the human mind, is the site of our deepest trouble. Scripture has been saying this since Jeremiah, and no amount of information solves a sickness of the will.
Not everyone believes this.
So if you believe the fundamental human problem is a lack of knowledge you may find one of the following religious or philosophical systems compelling instead of following Christ:
Gnosticism — the Gnostic worldview is based on the idea that humans suffer from a lack of knowledge and must realize the divine spark within them
Secular humanism and rationalism — It is a lack of education and ignorance that leads to human suffering. Fixing the former helps with the latter.
Eastern religions: Hinduism and Buddhism teach that the root of all suffering is avidya, ignorance. We suffer because we do not understand true reality. Humans can escape the cycle of suffering by achieving enlightenment. Confucianism, in a similar manner, teaches that humans are good by nature but lacking in knowledge. Training and moral education are required to remedy the problem
end the cycle of suffering by defeating ignorance (AI)
Witchcraft and New Age spirituality fit here as well.
Christianity, on the other hand, says our problem is sin and separation from God.
In support of the Christian view is data that suggests increased knowledge has not always been beneficial to humans. In fact, we see a rapid rise of anxiety, depression, and loneliness linked to technologies that flood us with information like the internet, social media, smartphones, AI, and the 24 / 7 news cycle.
But of course, I’m not neutral on this question. And neither are you. But we’re all making a choice on the issue, whether we consciously realize it or not.
So, do you believe you can save yourself through knowledge or do you need outside help for the conflict raging in your heart?
Step 2: Who is Jesus? (choose 1 of 3 options)
Still here?
Since you suspect there is something wrong inside the human heart that knowledge alone can never fix, you’re in the realm of the Abrahamic religions.
All three believe in a single Creator who set moral laws for the universe.
As such, all have some similar ideas about something called “sin” — the problem of missing the mark set by a Holy God.
And that ties in very closely with the matter of Jesus.
Who is He really? The three Abrahamic faiths have three very different views.
Judaism: A real person who was a false prophet and a failed messiah
Islam: A great prophet, the anticipated Messiah, but not God
Christianity: The Messiah, the Son of God, and God made flesh who came to save humans from the power of sin
the three Abrahamic faiths (AI)
This is the most important question facing us.²
Who was this Jesus?
The Muslim perspective is remarkably similar to the Christian one in many ways. Islam holds that Jesus was a great prophet who was born of the Virgin Mary and who was the prophesied Messiah. Muslims even believe Jesus was sentenced to die on a Roman Cross.
But, similar to some Gnostics, they believe He was taken to Heaven before the crucifixion and that someone else was forced to take His place on the Cross.
Jews hold that Jesus was a false prophet and a failed Messiah.
Editor’s note – It’s worth noting how much the Islamic account of Jesus actually affirms – the virgin birth, the title of Messiah, even the reality of a Roman sentence to die. The disagreement that ultimately matters most is whether Jesus really went to the cross and rose, which is precisely where the Gospel accounts stake their claim.
The Christian Take
For the Christian viewpoint, the best place to go is the Gospels, the accounts with more historical copies than anything else ever written from that time period.
Christians believe Jesus was the Messiah predicted in the Hebrew Scriptures. He came in an unexpected way, as a suffering servant and not as a conquering king.
Through His incarnation, life, and suffering and death, He brought atonement and reconciliation between humans and God for all who trust in Him. And He is coming again soon as the conquering King.
You can also check out what the extrabiblical sources had to say to see how closely they align with major claims made in the Gospels.
Jesus and the Christians in the writings of Roman historians (AI)
Related reading: What ancient Roman historians had to say about Jesus
Christians believe Jesus is God Himself who offered Himself on our behalf. And because of Him, humanity’s sin problem that dates back to the Garden has been dealt with.
We are offered the chance to go back to Eden and walk in restored relationship with God. But we must surrender to the pride-destroying idea that we can never earn it on our own.
We must be willing to acknowledge our need of Jesus. To come to God not as equals but as children. And that leads to the third step and perhaps the hardest question.
Step 3: Can I Surrender to Grace? (choose yes or no)
Grace is the idea that you get something you don’t earn.
Grace is Jean Valjean stealing from Bishop Bienvenu, only to have the Bishop overlook the offense and offer even more to Valjean as a “gift.” It does not make sense and offends our sensibilities of fairness.
Grace is getting what you don’t deserve and accepting you are perpetually in the debt of what you’ve received.
This is why grace forces us to be deeply humble. It forces us into the terrifying realization that we can never do enough to get God to owe us anything.
Effort in the Christian life is absolutely necessary, but it is ultimately not to earn God’s favor but as a response to the grace He freely gives.
For people who are fearful and desire control to compensate for our fear (most of us), grace is glorious and terrifying.
Grace is beautiful and can seem terrifying (AI)
The gift is glorious because it is free. We cannot earn it, and it means the end of striving and a release of burdens.
The gift is terrifying because it means we are eternally in God’s debt. If we truly understand grace, there is no limit to what He can ask of us.
We must surrender to that reality to follow Christ.
We must recognize we aren’t ultimately the final decision-makers in our life. The perfectly holy and perfectly loving Creator God is. And we are called to obey and to follow where He leads us.
I didn’t understand then, but I do now: God doesn’t lead His children down any path that is not ultimately for His glory and our good.
Editor’s note – The author’s honesty about his own addictions is not a throwaway detail. Grace that only forgives past sin but leaves someone unchanged isn’t the grace the Bible describes – real grace reorders what a person loves and where they turn for relief.
Wrapping Up
That’s it. Just three questions to decide about following Jesus.
Recognize you have a problem. Humans corporately have a sin problem. All individual humans have a personal sin problem.
See who Jesus is and believe it. Jesus is the awaited Messiah and the Son of God who takes away the sins of the world (that includes yours).
2: Even the American Atheists agree that this question matters. Their analysis is rejected by nearly all serious scholars, but they nonetheless care enough to weigh in. Did Jesus Exist? https://atheists.org/classic-resources/did-jesus-exist/
A Word from the Editor Every honest reader eventually has to answer these same three questions, whether or not they ever put them in these words. Jesus said it plainly: “Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:39). That’s not a threat – it’s an invitation to trade a life we can’t actually secure for one that’s held by Someone who can.
Editor Comment: You anchor the whole piece in the truth that no amount of knowledge can heal a heart bent away from God, and that reminder frees readers from thinking their doubts are just an information problem. Structuring the decision as three plain questions gives seekers something they can actually walk through.
This article appeared on Medium and is reprinted with modifications and by permission.
