We know that the necessary belief to enter Christianity is a belief in "the Lord Jesus Christ" with all that includes. Thus, an obvious essential belief for Christianity is a belief in God. At the outset, that is sufficient. But there are, within that belief, some further necessary components that must be included in order for it to be called "Christianity" and not something else.
First and perhaps most obvious, we must remember that God is one. God repeatedly reminds us that He is the only one (Deut 4:35, 39; 1 Kings 8:60; Isa 45:5, 6, 16, 18, 22; Mark 12:32). Fundamental to Christianity is monotheism. He is the only one. He isn't like any other. Any claim to the contrary is a claim to the contrary, a denial of this foundational claim about the God of Christianity.
The Bible claims that "what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For His invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse" (Rom 1:19-20). God is visible in His creation. And the Bible is clear that God has a clearly overarching characteristic in His divine nature: holiness.
The Bible claims for God a unique version of this attribute. Not once but twice the Bible claims that God is not just holy, but He is "holy, holy, holy" (Isa 6:3; Rev 4:8). This repetition isn't merely stylistic. It is a Hebraism that raises the power of the term from simply "holy" to "holy, holier, holiest" or, perhaps in an English version, "holy, holy, holy!" It defines God in very special ways. This "holy" means that He is above all evil. He isn't touched by it. He is set apart from sin. But beyond that, He is set apart from everything. He is ... not "us". He is separate. There is no one like God (Exo 15:11; 2 Sam 7:22; Micah 7:18). We are in His image, but He is not like us (Psa 50:21). Any attempt, then, to bring God down to our size is a mistake, a failure to grasp the holiness of God. This holiness of God is basic to Christianity. Any God offered in the arena of beliefs that is not holy, that is not pure, that is not set apart from sin, that is not above and beyond humanity is not the God of Christianity.
Another theme running throughout the Bible is the trinitarian nature of God. God is one, but He is one in three persons -- the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. By "persons" we mean more like "faces" rather than three gods. We are not tritheists -- three gods -- nor are we modalists. Modalists argue that God exists in three forms, one at a time. In the Old Testament He was YHWH, Jehovah. In the Gospels He was Jesus. Today He is the Holy Spirit. This is error (and incapable of being maintained either by Scripture or by reason). God is a Trinity, three Persons of one essence. The Bible has massive amounts of references to God as Trinity (without using the word). Father, Son, and Spirit are coexisting (existing at the same time), coequal, distinct, but not separate. God as Triune is basic to Christianity. What I'm saying here is that the belief in the Trinity is essential to Christianity; a full understanding of that Trinity is not. Remember, God is holy, holy, holy, which means, among other things, set apart in ways we cannot fathom. The finite cannot fully grasp the infinite. So belief in His nature as three in one is essential, but a full understanding of that nature is not.
There are many more basic attributes of God that are clear in Scripture and necessary in our agreement about the God we hold as the one God of Christianity. He is Sovereign and Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent. He is love and He is good -- perfect. God is transcendent -- above all -- and imminent -- present with us. He is spirit, not simply physical like us. He is self-existent (something no created thing can claim). He is immutable (a necessary attribute given His omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence); He cannot change.
In summary, then, absolutely essential to Christianity is the belief in God. He is one and only. A "god among many" may be a popular belief among various religions, even some claiming to be "Christian", but this is not compatible with Scripture nor with Christianity. He is Holy. Not merely "holy" -- separate from sin -- but "Holy, Holy, Holy", set apart, above all, not like us. He is a Triune God, of one essence and three Persons -- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit -- who coexist, are coequal, are distinct but not separate. And He maintains attributes, some of which we humans can reflect like love and goodness and some which only He possesses like Omniscience and Immutability. This God is one of a kind. This God is found in Christianity alone. This God is essential, without which you don't have Christianity at all.
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