Real Christian Testimonies is a sampling of brief biographies of Christians in and around Burbank, California and beyond.  Burbank is a rather ordinary small city in San Fernando Valley near Los Angeles. The area is well diversified in a number of ways and is definitely not especially religious.

The people presented attend a variety of unaffiliated churches throughout the United States.  Most of them do not know each other.

With all the discussion about religion and Christianity in the news it seemed appropriate to present examples of real Christians, in the Bible sense, and to distinguish between these and cultural Christians who seem to be everywhere.  Therefore this website.  Here are practical though perhaps not perfectly precise definitions of three common types of Christians:

Cultural Christian.  A person raised in an area where many of the people say they are Christians.  This type of person often has not read the Bible, is not particularly interested in knowing Jesus Christ, and probably does not attend a church regularly.  Many people in Burbank are this type of Christian.  Most people who say they are Christians fall into this category.  They may be fine upstanding citizens, but they are not true Christians and will not get to heaven.

Religious Christian.  These people usually attend church regularly, read the Bible, and freely state they are Christian.  However, these usually do not fully believe what the Bible says.  Here are two common things they often don’t believe that the Bible clearly teaches – God will eternally punish unsaved sinners, and Jesus is the very only way man can get to heaven.  These people tend to hope that their good deeds outweigh their bad deeds and so they will be saved.  These may be nice people but will not get to heaven and do not have a personal relationship with God.

True Christian.  This person believes the Bible and has staked his life on what it says about Jesus as the only Savior and is fully aware he/she is a sinner and in dire need of the Savior.  These have chosen to turn from their past wrong ways and to now follow God’s ways (repentance).  As a result God has given them a new heart to do good and leads them in life even as He promised in the Bible.  Other than that they are ordinary people.  Will get to heaven.