What Kind of Believer Are You?

Rapping up my studies in the Book of Matthew I noticed scripture teaches us of three types of believers.

There is of course Jesus’ true disciples. These were the believers who truly loved Him and committed their entire lives to Jesus’ teachings and instructions. Even after His crucifixion they dedicated their lives to warning and informing everyone regarding what Jesus taught them (Matt. 4:18-22, Matt. 9:9, Matt. 28:19-20), and stood boldly against all falsehood and deceit (2 Peter 2, 1 Tim 1:3, 1 Tim 6:4-5, 2 Cor. 11:4, 2 Tim 4:3-4, Jude 1:3) even unto death.

Then there were people like Pilate and his wife. Not fully believers of Jesus’ cause, but somehow they knew He was innocent, righteous (Matt. 27:19) and that His betrayal was caused due to the evil jealousy of the Religious Leaders (Matt. 27:18). Although they believed who Jesus Christ was, it never made any impact or changes on their lifestyles.

And then there are the Religious. These believers go through stages of their superficial Christianity. In the beginning we see them excited and joyful knowing Jesus had the power to heal them and perform many miracles (Matt. 4:24,25) and because of this they were awestruck and glorified God (Matt. 9:6-8). In fact, Luke gives an account of how a whole crowd of His “disciples” “…began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen (shouting)“Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” (Luke 19:37,38) But even after the Sermon on the Mount which we see throughout chapters 5 to 7, and even more healings and miracles, we find Jesus rebuking these so-called believers and “…began to denounce the cities in which most of His miracles were done, because THEY DID NOT REPENT.” (Matt. 11:20-24)

“No True Repentance” is another stage of these superficial religious believers, they loved the miracles, the healings, the prayers, and the emotions they experienced regarding Jesus Christ, but when it came to Sin and Repentance they did not take it into consideration and disregarded it entirely.

Another stage of these religious believers is they start to build an offensiveness towards His Word. John gives an account of a time when the words of Jesus were too hard to digest and many of His disciples decided to leave Him and refused to walk with Him any longer (John 6:41-66), Matthew states a time when the Religious believers overheard Christ talking and were “offended” with what He said (Matt. 15:12) Luke recalls these religious believers were filled with rage and hostility because of Christ and His words (Luke 6:11, Luke 11:53) These religious believers are probably who Jesus referred to regarding the Parable of the Sower. Like the seeds that was sown amongst the rocks and thorns, these religious believers initially were filled with Joy, then refused to repent, and ultimately fell-away because of their offensiveness toward His Words.

And in this last stage we find these religious believers turning completely against Jesus Christ. When Jesus cleared the temple, He said: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” (John 2:13-22) Ironically we find these same people who Jesus was speaking to at the temple mocking Him at His crucifixion: “You who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save Yourself!” (Matt. 27:40) The same religious people who Jesus sat with and taught every day in the temple (Matt. 26:55) also turned against Him and mocked Him saying: “He saved others ; He cannot save Himself. He is the King of Israel ; let Him now come down from the cross, and we will believe in Him. HE TRUSTS IN GOD ; LET GOD RESCUE Him now, IF HE DELIGHTS IN HIM; for He said, ‘I am the Son of God.’ ” (Matt. 27:42,43)

As you see these people weren’t unbelievers, they were right there rejoicing when He came, joyfully praising Him when He performed His many miracles, sitting there listening to His teachings, and yet at His death they were right there to mock and ridicule Him.

In the end  we all want to profess ourselves to be true believers of Jesus Christ and His teachings. But as scripture illustrates we do find different types of believers, question is: “What kind of believer are you?”

Are you the type of believer like Pilate and his wife, who knew of Jesus Christ and knew He was righteous, yet made no change in your lifestyle? Or are you just superficial in your beliefs, yearning for miracles and excitement, always wanting to feel joyful, but when it comes to Sin and Repentance you run and hide and when it comes to All-Scripture you become offended? And although you may not blatantly ridicule and mock Christ like those at His crucifixion, when you refuse to speak everything He taught and inform people of everything He instructed, in a way you are mocking Him when you discredit His words for the sake of comfort and offending others (Mark 8:38, Luke 9:26, John 14:15, Luke 6:46, Matt. 7:26, 27), and when you place “your” version of Jesus over the true Jesus of Scripture, you ridicule Him by believing and worshiping an entirely “different Jesus” (2 Cor. 11:4)

I pray we can all strive to be like His “True Disciples” who deeply loved Him and His Words, dedicated their lives to His teachings and instructions, who boldly proclaimed His truths no matter what the consequences would bring, and stood like a rock against all falsehood and deceit.

In Christ,
Marc