“You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.”
- Matthew 7:15-20
Maybe you’ve heard what Christians believe at some point.
“Jesus Christ died and rose for your sins so you could have salvation; everlasting life. Only through Him can you enter the gates of heaven, so turn away and repent your sins, pick up your cross, and follow Him.”
“The Bible is a redemption story, from Genesis to Revelation, beginning to end. It is God’s redemption story for man.”
“Jesus will be back one day to eradicate sin, conquer evil, and take us home.”
Sin? Salvation? Jesus is coming back??
Answers like these, while true, probably leave you with more questions than answers, so you take it upon yourself to learn about it.
There’s only one problem: where do you start?
You decide attend a church and talk to them. Searching online, you find there’s the Catholic Church, Old Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Lutherans, Baptist, Pentecostal, Mormon, Nondenominational…
The list doesn’t seem to end. Which do you pick? Which one is the “correct” one to answer your questions?
You just want to know “What is a Christian?“.
This article answers that exact question. We focus on the essential beliefs every person has to hold true in order to claim Christian faith.
What are the essentials?
There’s an old dictum agreed upon within Christianity:
In essentials unity; in nonessentials, liberty; and in all things, charity.
- St. Augustine
“In essentials, unity”.
What are the essentials?
There are 14 essentials of Christian faith, also known as “doctrines”. A doctrine is a principle or body of principles in a branch of knowledge or system of belief.
The 14 Essentials of Faith are:
- God’s Unity
- God’s Tri-unity
- Christ’s deity
- Christ’s humanity
- Human Depravity
- Christ’s virgin birth
- Christ’s sinlessness
- Christ’s atoning death
- Christ’s bodily resurrection
- Necessity of grave
- Necessity of Faith
- Christ’s bodily ascension
- Christ’s priestly intercession
- Christ’s bodily second coming
What makes a doctrine essential?
Before we can justify why each doctrine is essential, we need to define what makes a doctrine essential.
An essential doctrine is one connected with our salvation.
1 Corinthians 15:1-8 Romans 1:16
Laid out by the apostle Paul in Romans 1-8 after speaking about our condemnation (Romans 1-3), Paul defines three stages that make salvation possible:
- Justification: salvation from past sins. (Romans 3-5)
- Sanctification: salvation from present sin. (Romans 6-7)
- Glorification: salvation from the future presence of sin. (Romans 8)
If an essential doctrine is one connected to the Gospel, and there are three stages of salvation in the Gospel, then essential doctrines are ones that make those three stages of salvation possible.