What Should I Do Now That I’ve Believed?

You’ve crossed the most important threshold of your life. Here’s what comes next.

The first church left us a pattern

Right after the first great sermon of the Christian church — Peter’s address at Pentecost, where three thousand people believed in a single day — Luke records what those brand-new believers did next. It’s one verse, and it contains the entire shape of the Christian life:

Four things: teaching, fellowship, breaking of bread, and prayer. Not a programme someone invented — it’s what the earliest believers actually did, immediately, because they understood that faith is not a private decision you make and then file away. It’s a life that begins.

Everything below flows from these four pillars. They’re not a checklist to complete — they’re a rhythm to enter.

1. Get to know God — because he is personal

The most important thing that has changed is not a set of rules you now follow — it’s a relationship you have entered. There is a vast difference between knowing about God and knowing God. You can know about someone from reading their biography; knowing them means you talk to them, listen to them, and spend time with them. Jesus himself defined eternal life not as a destination but as a relationship:

And the primary way God has chosen to make himself known is through his word — the Bible. This is where you hear his voice, learn his character, and begin to understand what he is like. Paul told Timothy:

If you’ve never read the Bible before, don’t start at Genesis and try to power through — start with the Gospel of John or the Gospel of Mark. Read a chapter a day. Don’t worry about understanding everything immediately; let it become familiar first, and understanding will follow.

As a new believer, you’ll quickly discover that the Bible comes in many translations. Here’s a simple guide: the Good News Translation (GNT) is the easiest to read and especially good for children and beginners; the NIV is a good balance of readability and accuracy; and the ESV is what we quote on this website — it stays closer to the original languages while remaining clear. Any of these is a solid starting point.

You can read the Bible online at BibleGateway.com, which lets you compare translations side by side. Or download the free YouVersion Bible App on your phone — it has thousands of translations, audio Bibles, and reading plans:

Download for iOS (iPhone/iPad)  •  Download for Android

(See How Do I Read the Bible? for practical guidance on where to start and how to study.)

2. You have a new identity in Christ

Something real has happened to you. You are not the same person you were before:

This new identity doesn’t mean you’ll never struggle again. It means something has fundamentally shifted at the deepest level of who you are. And one of the most striking evidences of this is that your desires will begin to change. You will find yourself hating what God hates and loving what God loves — not perfectly, not overnight, but genuinely:

This is the work of the Holy Spirit in you. Over time, you will discover a growing joy in walking closer with God — a desire to please him, not out of fear but out of love. You will also find that certain things begin to feel wrong that didn’t before. That’s not guilt — it’s the Spirit reshaping your heart. Your new identity means you will want to avoid things that grieve or displease God, because he is a holy God:

One of the most valuable habits you can develop as a new believer is a daily quiet time — a regular, unhurried space where you read God’s word, meditate on it, talk to him in prayer, and let his words speak back to you. It doesn’t need to be long. It doesn’t need to be complicated. But it needs to be real, and it needs to be regular. This is how the relationship grows.

(See How Do I Pray? for a fuller guide on building this habit.)

3. Tell someone

If you have repented and placed your faith in Jesus — (if you haven’t yet but want to, see How Do I Become a Christian?) — the next step is to tell someone. Faith in Jesus was never designed to be a private arrangement between you and God. From the very beginning, confession — saying it out loud — was part of the package:

This doesn’t mean you need to stand on a street corner with a megaphone. It means telling someone — a friend, a family member, a pastor — that you’ve decided to follow Jesus. Saying it out loud does something. It makes the decision real and accountable. It invites others into your journey. And it’s the first step toward the public declaration of baptism.

4. Prioritise baptism

Baptism was the very first instruction the early church gave to new believers. When Peter’s hearers at Pentecost asked “What shall we do?”, his answer was immediate:

And here is something remarkable: Jesus himself chose to be baptised, even though he had no sin to repent of. When John the Baptist tried to stop him, Jesus insisted:

Jesus identified with us by being baptised. If you now belong to Christ, you follow Christ’s example. Baptism doesn’t save you — faith does. But baptism is your first public act of obedience as a believer: an outward declaration of an inward reality. It’s how you say to the world, and to the church, “I belong to Christ now.”

Jesus placed baptism at the very centre of making new disciples:

If you haven’t been baptised since believing, talk to a pastor about it. Don’t overthink it — just do it.

(See Why Should I Be Baptised? for the fuller picture.)

5. Join a church

This is where many new believers hesitate. Maybe you’ve had a bad experience with organised religion. Maybe church feels awkward or unfamiliar. But the New Testament doesn’t present faith as something you do alone — it presents it as something you do in a body:

Church isn’t a building or an event — it’s a community of believers who teach, correct, encourage, and carry each other through life. You need people who will challenge you when you drift, celebrate with you when you grow, and sit with you when you struggle. Faith without community is faith without accountability, and that’s a dangerous place to be.

Find a church that teaches the Bible faithfully, where you can hear God’s word preached, participate in the sacraments, and be known by name. If you’re in the Kuala Lumpur area, you’re welcome at Hope Evangelical Free Church in Wangsa Maju.

(See Why Do I Need to Go to Church? for more.)

6. Go deeper with Bible study

Reading the Bible on your own is essential. But studying it with others takes your understanding to another level. When you sit with a group of people and work through a passage together — asking what it says, what it means, and how it applies — you see things you would never catch alone.

If you’re looking for a structured way to go deeper, Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) is an excellent place to start. For more than 60 years, BSF has offered free, in-depth Bible study with trained group leaders for men, women, students, and children of all denominations. You can join an in-person group near you or participate online with people from around the world. It’s a serious commitment — and that’s precisely what makes it valuable.

This is a process, not an event

Becoming a Christian happens in a moment. Growing as one takes a lifetime. And the one who started the work in you has committed to finishing it:

Peter, writing near the end of his life, left new believers with a single, simple instruction that captures everything on this page:

Grow. That’s the word. Not perform, not impress, not achieve — grow. And growth happens through the ordinary, repeated rhythms of teaching, fellowship, bread, and prayer that the very first believers gave their lives to.

Hard questions