The statement is simple and has come from the lips of uneducated and scholar, Oriental and Occidental, wealthy and disenfranchised, African and European, male and female, adult and child—and it is the most important confession a human being in this age can make. It is a sentence that has come in the security of being surrounded by friend and family. But it is also a declaration that has been made in the midst of foes, hungry for the speaker’s death.
It is a statement that moves heaven to joy and stirs hell to anger and hate.
It is simply this: Christianos eimi. Christianus sum. I am a Christian.
Oh, I am very biased: but I can conceive of no greater statement of identity that I could make. My whole being, what I am and what I have is bound up with these three English words (or two Greek or Latin words!).
On these words hang the whole future of the one who speaks them. And with the millions in the Church Triumphant and the Church Militant I am happy to let my soul rest there as well.