Church Identity
What do Christians believe? Explore the New Testament's core claims about God, Jesus Christ, the resurrection, the gospel, salvation, Scripture, the church, worship, and Christian life.
One God
The New Testament inherits the biblical conviction that there is one God, the Creator and Father of all.
Christian faith is therefore not simply admiration for Jesus as a moral teacher. It belongs inside the larger biblical story of God's creation, covenant, judgment, mercy, and redemption.
Paul speaks of one God and Father of all, who is over all, through all, and in all.
Jesus Christ
The identity of Jesus stands at the center of Christianity. Peter confesses him as the Messiah, the Son of the living God.
The apostles proclaim that Jesus was crucified, raised from the dead, exalted, and made Lord and Messiah.
The Christian claim is therefore historical and theological: something happened in Jesus' life, death, and resurrection that demands allegiance.
Peter confesses Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of the living God.
Peter proclaims that God has made the crucified Jesus both Lord and Messiah.
The Resurrection
Paul summarizes the gospel by speaking of Christ's death for sins, burial, resurrection on the third day, and appearances to witnesses.
He goes so far as to say that if Christ has not been raised, Christian faith is futile.
That makes the resurrection one of the clearest non-negotiable claims in apostolic Christianity.
Paul summarizes the gospel as Christ dying for sins, being buried, and being raised on the third day.
The Gospel and Salvation
The New Testament presents salvation as an act of God's grace accomplished through Christ.
People are called to respond with faith, repentance, confession, baptism, and continued allegiance to Jesus.
Christians disagree about how some of these elements relate to justification and the precise moment of salvation, but the New Testament itself repeatedly places them inside the apostolic proclamation and conversion accounts.
Peter calls his hearers to repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins.
Paul connects baptism into Christ with participation in his death and new life.
The Holy Spirit
The New Testament presents the Spirit as God's presence in believers and as active in the apostolic church.
Who Changed the Church? distinguishes the continuing indwelling Spirit from miraculous revelatory gifts that Wood argues belonged to the laying of the apostolic foundation.
That distinction means the book does not claim the Holy Spirit stopped working; it argues that particular foundational manifestations had a temporary purpose.
The Church
The New Testament describes the church as Christ's body and Christ as its head.
Local congregations gather for teaching, fellowship, prayer, the Lord's Supper, mutual care, worship, discipline, and mission.
Paul's language of one body, one faith, and one baptism also raises the difficult question of how later Christian division should be understood.
Paul describes one body, one Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father.
Scripture and Apostolic Teaching
Acts places apostolic teaching at the center of the first Christian community.
Later New Testament writings tell Christians to remain in the teaching they received and warn against different gospels and doctrines.
Who Changed the Church? makes this the controlling test for later Christian development: later traditions must be measured against the apostolic foundation rather than allowed to redefine it.
The first believers devote themselves to the apostles' teaching, fellowship, breaking of bread, and prayers.
Jude speaks of the faith as having been delivered once for all to the saints.
Christian Life
The New Testament connects doctrine and life. Christians are called to holiness, love, truthfulness, sexual purity, generosity, forgiveness, endurance, and care for others.
A confession of faith that never affects conduct is repeatedly challenged by Jesus, Paul, James, Peter, and John.
Christianity in the apostolic writings is therefore both something believed and a life lived under Christ's lordship.
Why It Matters
Christians believe in one God, Jesus Christ as Lord and risen Messiah, the gospel of his death and resurrection, salvation through him, the Holy Spirit, the church as Christ's body, resurrection and eternal life, and the authority of the apostolic message. Modern Christians disagree about many doctrines, which is exactly why Who Changed the Church? asks readers to compare later systems with the foundation the apostles actually left.