r/redletterchristians

772 archived posts · Oct 2012 – Dec 2025

Red Letter Christians

What this subreddit is about is discussing, brainstorming, and doing the things that Jesus speaks of in the bible. We call it red letter Christians because in many of the older bibles the words of Jesus are in red. Some of the things discussed here are Jesus's take on helping the poor,war, being more green, community, politics, money, etc.

Created Oct 7, 2012

1.1KMembers (last snapshot)

772Archived posts

###About Us We are an open, international community that strives to follow the most radical teachings of Christ with compassion and love. The genesis of the movement:

"The goal of Red Letter Christians is simple: To take Jesus seriously by endeavoring to live out His radical, counter-cultural teachings as set forth in Scripture, and especially embracing the lifestyle prescribed in the Sermon on the Mount.

Ironically, it was a secular Jewish country-and-western disc jockey in Nashville, Tennessee who first suggested that title. During a radio interview with my friend Jim Wallis, that deejay declared, “You’re one of those Red-Letter Christians – you know, the ones who are really into all those New Testament verses that are in red letters!” When Jim said, “That’s right!” he answered for all of us. By calling ourselves Red Letter Christians, we refer to the fact that in many Bibles the words of Jesus are printed in red. What we are asserting, therefore, is that we have committed ourselves first and foremost to doing what Jesus said.

The message of those red-lettered Bible verses is radical, to say the least. If you don’t believe me, just take a few minutes to read Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7). In it, Jesus calls us away from the consumerist values that dominate contemporary America (or, Western society in general). Instead, he calls us to meet the needs of the poor. He also calls us to be merciful, which has strong implications in terms of war and capital punishment. After all, when Jesus tells us to love our enemies, he probably means we shouldn’t kill them."

Tony Campolo

Check out RedLetterChristians.org for more information on what it means to be a "Red Letter Christian"!

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