WHO GETS ETERNAL LIFE

"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever BELIEVES in him shall not perish but have eternal life." - John 3:16



I'm almost certain that these words are some of the most common and well known in all of the Bible. Why do so many people know John 3:16? I think it's because we as humans have this terrible fear of dying, and eternal life provides us an amazing solution to the problem. We love the idea that in order to "receive" this eternal life, all we have to do is believe in God's son. This isn't a bad deal really because Jesus is a super moral guy, really loving, supposedly died on a cross and set a really good example. On top of all that, most everybody likes the guy and believing in him keeps us out of hell, if there even is such a place. No one knows for sure, but better to be safe than sorry right? Believing in Jesus seems to be relatively painless and doesn't cost a whole lot. You have to go to church every now and then sure, and you can't cuss or drink too much, but other than that, it's a pretty good gig.

With that line of thinking, who wouldn't want to be a Christian? The real question is though, what does "believing" in Jesus really mean. Jesus answered this for us before he died? Let's look at what he said:

MATTHEW 7:21-23
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day (the day of judgment), ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘Depart from me, I never knew you!"

It says here that just knowing Jesus' name or knowing about him is not good enough to get a person into heaven. But he even goes further to say that people who do moral, kind and nice things won't be allowed in either. That doesn't sound right. Jesus says that only those who "do the will of the Father" will be allowed in. So that begs the question, what's the will of the father? Check out this verse:

JOHN 6:29
Jesus answered, "The work (or will) of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent."

Okay, great, so we're back to this idea of believing again. We've established in the previous verse that just saying you believe or doing things to prove you believe is not good enough to enter heaven. If this is the case, what does it mean to really believe? Let's look at another verse:

JOHN14:15
“If you love me, you will obey my commandments."

So it sounds like believing has something to do with loving God. Notice that Jesus doesn't say we should follow his commands in order to prove our love, instead he says that our obedience is a byproduct of it. Love comes first in this verse. Love for God must always come first and the obedience will follow. But where does love for God come from?

It comes from understanding that God is powerful, perfect and just and that every man at their core is dirty, selfish and disobedient. Man shows his dirtiness all the time, either blatantly on the outside or more subtly on the inside. Either way, if you look closely, you'll quickly begin to see how broken and wicked all people really are. To summarize, a perfect God created the world, put man in it and gave him the ability to choose how to live. Each one of us has chosen to live wickedly and selfishly and are deserving of punishment at the hands of a just and perfect God. Now to you, your faults might not seem especially wicked but remember that you are comparing yourself to a imperfect, human standard and not a perfect, Godly one. It's always easy to look around and find somebody whose worse off than you are, but that's not the point. The real question is how we size up against the holiness and perfection of God. Compared to God's perfection, the things you and I have done make us look like rapists and murderers, deserving of death. But the amazing thing is that instead of the harsh penalty we should all receive, God, out of his love, has sent his son to take the death penalty we deserved. And as we know, by believing in Jesus, God allows us to be forgiven of what we've done so that we can spend eternity with him. Understanding this reality, the reality of our brokenness and God's amazing forgiveness is where crazy love for God comes from.

So it seems that believing in Jesus is not just acknowledging his existence or trying to do good things to make him happy, it's loving him. Loving him by keeping him commands. I don't feel that it's ever my business to try and determine who really believes in God and who doesn't but I will say that you can tell a lot by the way a person lives. There is a very distinct difference between a really, really good person who only knows about God and a second person who knows they've been forgiven by God. The second individual does things in life not to look good but out of a grateful heart and a desire to please and love the God who has given them so much. Is there anything more valuable than God's forgiveness that frees us from the guilt of our dirty past in this life and gives us an incredible promise for eternal life in the future? There not, but this brings us to a huge problem.

If millions of individuals around the world claim to be "saved" by the blood of Jesus, how come so very few of us are living like saved people. How come most of us skate through life loving God's forgiveness and the security of salvation, but fail to love God himself or care at all about his commandments? God will be the final judge one day I know, but I'm gonna go ahead and say that if a person is not burdened by the commands of God, they probably do not really believe. If Jesus came back today to take his followers away, I'm sad to say that there would be many "Christians" who were left behind. We each need to examine our lives and the belief we claim to have in Jesus closely. Following him is not an easy thing, it's actually very costly, and will cost a person everything.

"Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." - Matthew 10:36-28

How is your love for Jesus right now? Is it casual and convenient or have you counted the cost and committed to love him, obey him and follow him no matter what? If you want to know what God's commandments are, Matthew 22:37-39 spells it out best.

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself."

Loving God and other people this way is an extremely high calling and not for the faint at heart. It's not easy and will look different for every person. We must remember Paul's words in Ephesians 2:10 which says, "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." God has prepared different plans for each of us and so following and obeying will look different for every person. What things has God asked you to do today?

Whatever it is, I hope that your belief in Christ and what he has done for you on the cross will be motivation to love and serve him not halfheartedly, but wholeheartedly. Will you listen, obey and follow him with everything you are today?