The Basics of the Christian Walk

Now that I am saved, what do I do next? That is a very common question for people who have just recently got saved. I recently read that 50% of all people who get saved drop out within the first year or two.

I believe that the number one reason why new Christians drop out is because they do not know what to really do next and they do not get the proper teaching and coaching from either other Christians that they are associated with or the Church that they have joined does not have any type of progressive teaching system in place to lead them on their new journey.

The apostle Paul says you have to "work out your salvation with fear and trembling." Salvation is just the beginning. God has a purpose and a mission for each person's life - if only people knew how to find it.

Here is what I call the basics. These are the areas that each new Christian has to be gradually led into if he or she is really going to walk the real walk with the Lord. I'll list them in the proper order and then I will comment on each one.

• Full Surrender.
• Become Spirit-Filled.
• Establish Faith and Trust in God.
• Walk in all of God's Ways.
• Obey all of God's Commandments.
• Develop a Personal Relationship with God.
• Seek after the Knowledge of God
• Establish relationships with other Christians
• Join a Good Spirit-Filled Church

Here are my thoughts on each of the above.

1. Full Surrender

The first thing each Christian has to do after they get saved is to completely surrender their entire lives over to God the Father. Jesus has to become LORD over your life, not just your Savior. If you want to find what God's call is on your life and what He wants to do with your life, then you have to be willing to completely surrender every aspect of your life over to Him. It's your all for His all.

When I say surrender your entire life over to God the Father, I mean everything. You can hold nothing back. If you do not fully surrender everything over to God, you will handcuff God and prevent Him from working full force in your life. You have to become saved and surrendered. Most Christians become saved, but not surrendered, and this is why very little happens after they first get saved.

I will give you all the Scripture verses in another article that will show you why God wants this full surrender from each one of us and the argument as to why each Christian needs to do this. For now, I just want to highlight the basics for reference purposes.

2. Become Spirit-Filled

The second step after a person makes a full surrender to God the Father is they need to become Spirit-filled. They need to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. You cannot walk this walk without the power of the Holy Spirit operating in your life. It is the Holy Spirit's job to "guide you into all truth" and "to to teach you all things." He cannot properly do all of this unless He is released from your spirit to come up into your soul. Again, I will touch in much more detail on how to receive this gift for those who do not have it in another article.

3. Establish Faith and Trust in God

Once you completely surrender your entire life over to God the Father and receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, the next step is to establish Faith and Trust in God. The only thing that will bring you into God's realm is faith and belief. Nothing else will!

The beautiful thing about this is God is only looking for a small amount of faith to get started. The Bible says that faith the size of a mustard seed will move a mountain. Your faith can grow, but God does not expect it to grow overnight. All He asks is that you give Him just a little bit to work with and He will more than prove Himself to you that you can completely and totally rely and trust Him to guide you on your new journey with Him.

4. Walk in All of God's Ways

The Bible says we now have to learn how to walk in all the ways of the Lord. The Bible is the number one source where you learn what God's ways are. I will be listing what these "ways" are in other articles. These are the "rules of the game. If you want to play baseball, the first thing you have to learn is the rules of the game. You cannot step out onto the playing field unless you know what those rules are. It is the same with God's playing field. If you do not learn what the rules are, the devil and his demons will come in on you for serious attacks and try to take you out. God says in the Bible that His people will perish for lack of knowledge.

It is a matter of life and death to learn what God's ways are if you want to live out the allotted amount of time that you still have leftdown here on this earth. People's lives are shortened due to stupidity and not knowing the ways of God.

5. Obey All of God's Commandments

In the Bible, God specifically lays out what He does not want you doing. The Bible says that God sets out before each one of us a choice. You can either choose God and His ways and live - or choose your own way and die. There is only one way to live your life and that is God's way, not your way! God specifically lays out certain sins that He wants you to stay out of. I will be touching on exactly what some of these are in other articles.

The Bible says you have to develop a healthy "Fear of the Lord." This means developing a reverent and healthy respect for God, His ways and His commandments. This healthy fear of the Lord will help keep you out of serious sin that could end up ruining your life.

6. Develop a Personal Relationship With God

The number one reason I believe God created man and woman was for intimate fellowship. God wants to establish a deep, personal and intimate love relationship with each person He has created.

I believe God actually longs for this. It's not that God needs us humans to exist, but for some strange reason and even to the amazement of the angels in heaven, God seems to have some type of special love and longing for us humans and wants more than anything to connect and establish this personal love relationship with each one of us.

Again, I will go in much more detail on this in additional articles, as this is a whole subject in of itself. I will give you all the Scripture verses to prove this point and show you how to really enter into this kind of personal relationship with God the Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.

7. Seek After the Knowledge of God

God places an extremely high value on the pursuit of knowledge. God expects you to grow in the knowledge of Him, His Son and His Holy Spirit. The main sources of "God Knowledge" are:

A. The Bible - This is absolutely the number one source of spiritual knowledge available to man down here on earth. Each Christian needs to spend some type of regular, quality time in the Bible in order to learn more about God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, God's ways, what He expects of us, what He can do for us, how to live a victorious and overcoming life in Him, etc.

B. Other Books - God has anointed many of His teachers to be able to teach from His Word. There are many good quality books in the Christian bookstores that Christians can "feed off" of in addition to the Bible.

C. Tapes and CD's - There are also many good teaching cassette tapes and CD's from anointed teachers that Christians can also feed off of.

D. TV/Radio - Many of God's anointed teachers also have TV and/or radio ministries where you can watch and/or hear them teach from God's word.

If you'll notice on the above 4 sources of knowledge, God does give you a wide variety of options to choose from in order to learn and grow from the knowledge that He wants you to have about Him.

8. Establish Relationships With Other Christians

Once you enter in on this walk with the Lord, you will need to establish some kind of contact and friendships with other Christians. God will start to do some real incredible things in your life and you will go nuts if you do not have someone else to share your walk with. God will lead you to the people that He wants you to be connected to. You have to have other Christians to feed with and to share your walk with.

9. Church

Join a good Spirit-filled church. I would personally recommend that each new born again Christian ask God which church He would like for them to join. There are different levels of the anointing in all the different churches and God knows best which one would be best suited for your spiritual development and growth. God will make sure He gets through to each person as to which church He would like for them to join.

Conclusion

I will go into much more detail on items 1-8 in upcoming articles as they are all subjects in themselves. I just wanted to make a short list of what I feel the basics are in becoming "active in God".

Article written by Michael Bradley of Bible Knowledge Ministries. Their Bible Knowledge and Commentary website currently has over 100 Bible articles. All articles on the site are free.