Christianity is the world’s most popular faith, especially among the poor and vulnerable. But popularity does not equal safety—in fact, Christianity may be the most dangerous religion of all. Jesus himself seemed aware of this danger. That is why he often spoke in parables: to protect the naïve from stumbling into faith without preparation (Mark 4:10–12). He had no interest in gathering uninformed followers.
The common idea that Jesus came to make everyone a Christian is misleading. Many people leap into Christianity without understanding its true cost or weighing its consequences. God’s primary aim is to rescue the soul, not to secure the comfort of the physical person, as advanced by those obsessed with the prosperity gospel.
With questionable prophets and evangelists multiplying, Christianity can easily become a refuge for the uninformed. Over time, one of Satan’s most effective tools for deception has been Christianity itself—more than any other system. Countless individuals spend their lives worshipping something they do not truly understand. Following Christ has always attracted crowds, largely because of His power to heal. But excitement over miracles does not necessarily lead to genuine spiritual transformation.
Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them, he said:
“If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple. And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.
Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Won’t you first sit down and estimate the cost to see if you have enough money to complete it? For if you lay the foundation and are not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule you, saying, ‘This person began to build and wasn’t able to finish.’
“Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace. In the same way, those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.” (Luke 14:25–33, NIV)
Jesus was not trying to build a massive following. Missing that point is a grave mistake. His teaching about hating your parents—or even your own life—is not easy to grasp; it requires deep reflection. Overlooking this demand is more dangerous than not believing in him at all, because the cost of following him can feel as extreme as giving up your life.
Crowds often followed Jesus seeking solutions to their physical problems, but his words rarely matched what they hoped to hear. Healing their loved ones was the easiest way to draw a crowd—yet that was never his purpose. He repeatedly emphasized counting the cost before deciding to follow him.
Life requires food, clothing, and shelter, but Jesus focused on spiritual needs. People then, like people now, confuse healing the body with healing the soul. Jesus came to fix spiritual brokenness. Mixing physical issues with spiritual ones misses the point entirely. Even when he healed the sick, he did so out of love—not as a demand for loyalty. Still, many followed him, hoping for relief from life’s struggles.
Pursuing spiritual blessings requires a willingness to give up all physical comforts; you cannot hold onto both. This is what Jesus meant by denying yourself when choosing to follow him. Physical needs become important only as sacrifices that help reach spiritual goals. Spiritual salvation frees a person from dependence on the physical, which is why Jesus told his disciples that faith as small as a mustard seed could make anything possible.
Such a person no longer belongs to this world, though still living in it, and gains unlimited power. The danger lies in abusing that spiritual power when aiming at enhancing the physical. That is why, in love, God withholds spiritual freedom until a person is ready to surrender everything. And that is also why Jesus taught in parables.
The disciples came to him and asked, “Why do you speak to the people in parables?” He replied, “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them. Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have, will be taken from them. This is why I speak to them in parables: ‘Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand.’” (Matthew 13:10–14, NIV)
This raises a troubling possibility: that those who have committed terrible crimes might end up better off than those who carelessly promote Christianity. Even individuals involved in the Gukurahundi atrocities could appear to stand in a better position than those who mindlessly push Christianity without understanding it. Why did Jesus speak in parables? Some think he was trying to connect with ordinary people. Others believe he was being deliberately selective. His concern was that the naïve should not blindly fall into faith, expecting the opposite of what it truly demands.
Jesus did not let everyone fully understand his purpose because he was safeguarding their spiritual well-being, which often contradicts physical well-being. Becoming a Christian means letting go of the physical self. But many new believers try to cling to it instead, contradicting the very goal of discipleship. They concentrate on this life rather than eternal life, and those focused on survival often struggle to grasp eternal matters.
“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted to the heavens? No, you will go down to Hades. For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day. But I tell you that it will be more bearable for Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.” (Matthew 11:21–24, NIV)
Jesus used the example of the Sodomites—widely considered the worst sinners—to show that those who met him but failed to understand were in an even worse position. This is where the real challenge of Christianity emerges. There is nothing wrong with receiving Jesus’ blessings without committing to follow him; his healings were never conditional. He simply told people to go and sin no more, without demanding discipleship.
But for those who choose to follow him, Jesus warned that true discipleship means letting go of everything tied to this life—even one’s own life (Luke 14:25–33). For those grieving the dead, this is a reminder: Christ’s followers have already moved beyond the concerns of this world into eternity. They are not drawn to what captivates the world. Instead, like Jesus, they stand apart—often misunderstood or unpopular. As Paul wrote, they become a new creation.
“So from now on, we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation… We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.” (2 Corinthians 5:16–21, NIV)
Paul compares the Ephesian church to Christ, who gave himself up for crucifixion. Like anyone embracing Christianity, these believers should recognize that following Christ means a life of sacrifice—just as He showed by example. This places them among those Jesus called his brothers, set apart from those described simply as hospitable (Matthew 25:40).
“Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone.” (Ephesians 2:19–21, NIV)
True followers of Jesus cannot be tied to this world, just as He was not. They do not fear death, just as Jesus and his disciples did not. Before his ascension, the disciples were as ordinary as anyone else; after receiving the Holy Spirit, they were transformed. Only then were they empowered to act differently.
The evil of this world is seen in its obsession with eating, drinking, and seeking physical comfort. Life in the flesh is centered on the present, despite knowing that death is inevitable. A true Christian is less concerned about the wicked committing evil and more focused on doing God’s will and submitting fully to him.
Today, Christianity often feels comfortable—except for those who speak the truth. Many embrace it for physical blessings, praying for prosperity and health rather than for strength to serve God. Those who preach truth are hated because they challenge false teachers in their comfort. Jesus warned against such complacent religionists.
“Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. And so I tell you, every kind of sin and slander can be forgiven, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.” (Matthew 12:30–32, NIV)
What makes Christianity seem more serious than other dishonorable sins is easy to grasp. Ordinary sinners live only for a short time, but those who blaspheme against the Holy Spirit, as Jesus hinted, risk losing their chance at eternal life—a truly grave matter. A physical person lives, causes trouble, and dies, fading from memory.
A Christian, as God’s child and a recipient of the Holy Spirit, faces the risk of not living up to that calling. This happens when someone embraces a new way of life but later falls back into sin, unable to distinguish between living for God and living for the world. Peter warned about such individuals:
“If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and are overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning. It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than to have known it and then to turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed on to them. Of them, the proverbs are true: ‘A dog returns to its vomit,’ and ‘A sow that is washed returns to her wallowing in the mud.’” (2 Peter 2:20–22, NIV)
Jesus also warned of this danger when speaking to the Pharisees, who considered themselves religious. In a way, the Pharisees were better off because they lacked the Holy Spirit and could not tell the difference between the spiritual and the physical. The ability to separate the two is crucial, and that understanding becomes clear only to those genuinely committed to Christ. This is where many failures in Christianity originate—a warning strongly echoed in the Book of Hebrews:
“If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.” (Hebrews 10:26–27, NIV)
Grace is available to everyone, no matter how serious their sins, as long as they have not yet received the Holy Spirit. The real risk comes when someone rushes into Christianity without first considering the cost, as highlighted in Luke 14:25–33. One way to truly value the Christian calling is through humility, as James advises: “Humble yourself before the Lord, and he will lift you up” (James 4:10). This shows that there is much more to Christianity than simply following the crowd. You can’t really call yourself humble if you’re still hanging on to the demands of physical nature.
The toughest thing is that many Christians seem to find it inconvenient to evaluate information. Many stagnant Christian organizations lean on dogma and display arrogance at the same time. It is often only the humble who are willing to question and examine everything, as Paul advised: “Do not treat prophecies with contempt but test them all; hold on to what is good, reject every kind of evil” (1 Thessalonians 5:21, NIV). Too many find comfort in physical ease, believing it means they are safe in God’s eyes—when in reality, the opposite is true.
Andrew Masuku is the author of Dimensions of a New Civilisation, laying down standards for uplifting Zimbabwe from the current state of economic depression into a model for other nations worldwide. A decaying tree provides an opportunity for a blossoming sprout. Written from a Christian perspective, the book is a product of inspiration, relieving those who have witnessed the strings of unworkable solutions, leading to the current economic and social decay. Most Zimbabweans should find the book to be a long-awaited providential oasis of hope, in a simple conversational tone.
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