The Christian Life Lived Out

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Churched vs Saved

The Difference Between Going to Church and Belonging to Christ

Imagine someone you had never met telling the world that they were in love with you—that they knew you, that you knew them, and that they were essentially married to you.

It sounds crazy. How could someone claim such a relationship with a person they have never actually met?

Yet this is how many professing Christians approach their relationship with Christ.

During my years in and around Christianity, I have encountered many people like this. I call them “churched.”

The churched are people who have spent much of their lives around Christianity. They have heard all the Bible stories. They know the Christian language and have learned the phrases and expressions Christians use. They have attended church groups, Bible studies, Sunday school, and countless services. Some were raised in church, going from the nursery to children’s ministry, then youth group, and eventually into adult services.

They know the stories. They know the language. They have heard the sermons. They may have read the Bible. They may know what Christians are supposed to believe and how Christians are supposed to behave.

Just like in marriage, there are many people who are married but are not truly married. On paper, they are married. They may follow the rituals and go through the motions of marriage, but they lack the true marks of what marriage is meant to be.

They go through the motions because, well, that is what you are supposed to do, right?

But something vital is missing. And just like marriage, the churched can lack many of these same things.

Have You Met Jesus?

First, you must ask yourself: Have you met someone who changed your desires? Someone who made you no longer want to live for yourself, for this world and the things of this world, but instead to live for that person?

Someone who has changed you, but not only changed you—continues to change you for the better.

Someone you realize will come with a cost to be with, and that it will take work, but you are gladly willing to pay that cost and put in that work.

You may fail at these things. You may fall short. But the desire is still there. This is what your heart truly wants.

This is a sign of a true marriage, and it is also a sign that you have truly met Jesus Christ.

“If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” (Luke 9:23)

Love

Second, to meet Jesus is to meet love, for Jesus is love.

Do you feel that love from Jesus—a love that brings peace and bears fruit within you? Is the love between you and Jesus the kind of love that makes you know you are with Him for life?

Even when your heart wanders, does His love draw you back to Him?

That kind of love is what bonds a marriage, and that kind of love is what holds you in the hands of Jesus for eternity.

“We love Him because He first loved us.” (1 John 4:19)

Broken

When a person does their spouse wrong, there should be a deep conviction that causes them to despise what they have done and seek their spouse’s forgiveness.

As a Christian, when we sin, there should also be a conviction that causes us to despise the sin we have committed. Like a pig returning to its own vomit, we recognize the ugliness of what we have done.

We become broken over our sin, convicted in our hearts, and seek the Lord’s forgiveness.

“A broken and a contrite heart—These, O God, You will not despise.” (Psalm 51:17)

No Longer of This World

The churched tend to live in a bubble where they do not actually live by true faith. Sure, they may be surrounded by Christians, but once they step outside of that Christian bubble, they often become just like the world they claim they are not of.

They still desire the things of the world in much the same way the world does.

The real Christian has found a treasure in Jesus and now sees that the shine and attraction the world once had no longer appeals to them.

“Do not love the world or the things in the world.” (1 John 2:15)

Tests and Trials of Trueness

Marriages have to face many trials that will test their bond; it is the marriage that not only overcomes when things get hard but also grows, proving it’s true. Our relationship with Christ will bring many trials and tests, but those who overcome will prove they are truly His.

“The genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire.” (1 Peter 1:7)

So many marriages end because of trials, revealing that the love and commitment needed to overcome them were not there. A marriage with Christ is not one where you want to discover, in the end, that you were never truly united with Him.

Our relationship with Christ is like a marriage—a union. Christ is the Groom, and we are the bride. But that union must be real.

The Bible tells us to examine ourselves to see whether Christ is in us. This means examining whether the Holy Spirit is truly in us. The Holy Spirit loves God and brings us into union with the Father and the Son, and through Him, we become part of that relationship. This is the marriage of salvation.

“Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?” (2 Corinthians 13:5)

We must examine ourselves to know that this is true and that we are truly in this union with Christ.

It would be horrible to spend your life being churched, living in and around the Christian world, only to discover in the end that you were never truly His—to hear Christ say, “Depart from Me, I never knew you.” (Matthew 7:23)