The Christian Culture Center’s mission is to help increase the impact of Christ in culture. In this first blog post, it’s appropriate to ask “What is a Christian culture?” We have to know what it is before we can attempt to achieve it, right?
First, let’s define culture. There are a number of diverse definitions, but in the end, culture is simply the characteristics pertaining to a group of people in a specific area or region. Birds of a feather flock together, and people generally follow the same rule. People usually associate with and congregate around others of their same race, their same religion, and their same geographic region. These things, race, language, religion and geographic location are the main characteristics that define that area’s culture.
What you experience when you go somewhere is the culture of that area. To me, it all boils down to the physical manifestation of who those people really are, which is evidenced by what those people do and make. What people do and make is the product of their culture, the evidence of who those people are. And so culture in itself is the spiritual and physical nature of a group of specific grouping of people.
So what constitutes a Christian culture? If you do a quick Internet search, you’ll find volumes of work disecting what a Christian culture is. Those are very valuable in our quest to understand the subject better, but I’m going to simplify it here in this post. A Christian culture is the manifestation of what a group of Christians do and make in a given geographical area. Christian culture is evidenced when people live as Jesus Christ wants them to live, regardless of geographic location. There are certain characteristics that are always evident in any Christian culture.
Evidence of a Christian Culture
- The people believe in the living Lord Jesus Christ
- They evidence a lifestyle God approves of
Those are the two main ingredients of a Christian culture. Everything else is of little importance. People believe in Jesus, the Son of the living God and they live how God wants them to live. Jesus Christ and his lifestyle and teachings are the central core belief system and so we can call a Christian culture a Christ-centered culture. What people believe determines who those people are, which determine how they live, which in turn determines what they do and make. Christians live a Christ-centered life and the things they do and make are also Christ-centered.
So how does that look? How does that play out in real life?
Let me give you a picture of what that looks like. Love rules. That’s the bottom line. The two great commandments are to love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and to love your neighbour as much as you love yourself. When this is practiced, a Christian culture is evidenced. The people don’t steal from one another, don’t take advantage of one another and they forgive one another. They help each other instead of hoarding everything to themselves. Love rules as it did when Christian culture prevailed in sections of the book of Acts.
In another article, I’ll discuss what Christian culture looks like in the book of Acts; it is truly an objective to reach in every area of our world today. For now, I hope I’ve explained what Christian culture is so that we can seek to replicate it everywhere we live.