Me.
I’m not quite sure what you’re getting at with your questions, i.e. in the bible we are encouraged not to be self-sufficient because Christ’s blood is sufficient for us. Self sufficiency is a form of worldliness. I was a very worldly atheist, and have become less attached to the world as a christian. But that means less self sufficient.
My pastor recently gave a sermon on the difference between faith and mores. People raised in christian or supposedly christian homes are more likely to turn out christian just like people raised in moslem homes are more likely to be moslem. That’s the mores aspect. I have met quite a few “christians” with the mores aspect tied down but they’re more worldly than I was as an atheist.
and driftdiver: Not to quibble but everyone has to be born again regardless of their upbringing.
Christ's main message was that we love God with all our might, love Him as we love ourselves. Love is key. I take that to mean that we had better love ourselves, the same way He loved us. His other main message was to do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
If you were a slave, what would you have others do unto you? LET YOU GO. So in the Christian West, slavery is outlawed. In Islam, slavery is legal in a variety of venues, where nine-year-old girls are marriageable.
Since I'm a sensible person and know that every living creature has to pass judgment regularly in order to survive, I take it that when Jesus said judge not lest you be judged, he means that when you judge others, you had better be answerable to the same standards.
When government presumes to overthrow Christian values and insist on its own with regard to how we treat each other in a "free" society -- well, we're seeing the fruits. But the civilized West, the "First world," as opposed to third-world nations, got there by following the Christian ethic.
John Chapter 3, we must all become “born again”. Some of those “Christians” undoubtedly unfortunately are not..