Welcome to Christianity

I once heard a comedian speak about Jesus freaks. He painted a picture of a woman in an ABC cardigan with a cross necklace introducing herself and opening a conversation with “Hi there! I’d like to talk to you about Jesus.”
Awkward pause.
He went on to describe various scenarios with the same Christian attempting to make “Jesus conversation” with a number of people, even a priest who threw his hands up to keep her at arms length and said, “Whoa freak! Let’s keep work at work, huh?!”
Then there is the ever popular Church Lady from Saturday Night Live. Calling people out on their sins, alleged or not. Keeping track of church attendance and generally just going on and on about her superiority to others because of her Christian-ness.
If we can be completely honest here, isn’t that how the world views us? By us, I mean Christians. Specifically those that express their faith in any way, at any level really. Just a bunch of “holier than thou” goody two shoes passing judgment on everyone else. These conservative freaks all seem to be part of this great competition of who can be a better person…or appear to be a better person on the outside at least. Another view of someone who is strong in his or her faith, or who has found strength or freedom in Christ may just be someone who needs a spiritual-something to fill a void. A void caused by a bad childhood, addiction, depression etc. Maybe it’s just someone who needs an outside motivation to be a good person.
For the sake of argument, let’s say a non-Christian has had a good childhood, ends up being fairly successful in life and all their worldly needs have been filled, for the most part anyway. It’s easy to brush your hands together and say, “Fair enough. I can control my world and I’ve done a pretty good job. I don’t need this spiritual mumbo jumbo. You probably do, because you are more messed up than I am. So…good luck with that.” So here we are, basking in the glow of Christ’s love while this person is pitying us for needing Christ. They are convinced that they are too smart and educated to believe such bull-hockey.
It brings up a couple questions to say the least. Who needs Jesus? What does that even mean, “needing Jesus”? What is all the fuss about? Can someone just spell this thing out in terms the rest of us understand? We are going to explore what it means to be saved by Jesus Christ, what He has called us to do, and how to do it. We may even figure out some of the language these bible beaters are using along the way. Welcome to Christianity: Born Again 101.