A-07: HOW DO WE GET TO HEAVEN?

CHAPTER OUTLINE:

Step A. Want God.

Step B. Accept God.

1.  Accept Him (Jesus) as God.

2.  Accept Him as Your Lord.

3.  Accept Him as Your Savior.

HOW DO WE GET TO HEAVEN?

The answer to this question is really quite simple.  God created us to have an eternal relationship with Him.  We were created by God, for God!  We get to heaven by fulfilling the reason for our existence, by achieving our purpose in life–“by accepting this relationship with God!”  This is accomplished when we accept Him as God (as existing and being above us), as Lord (as being our authority), and as Savior (as offering to forgive our sins and providing the necessary sacrifice to make this forgiveness possible). 

So how do you do this? 

STEP A: WANT GOD.  

No one ever found Him by accident! 

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:13 

STEP B: ACCEPT GOD. 

Enter into this relationship with Him–accepting Him as your God, your Lord, and your Savior. 

Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near. Isaiah 55.6 

And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Acts 2:21 

1. ACCEPT HIM (JESUS) AS GOD.

Accept that He is, that He does exist, and that He is God, Creator, Ruler. 

Who has established all the ends of the earth?  What is his name, and the name of his son? Proverbs 30:4 

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders.  And He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.  Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. . . . The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. John 1:1 3,14 

Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’  Then what shall I tell them?”  God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.  This is what you are to say to the Israelites:  I AM has sent me to you.” Exodus 3:13,14

I tell you the truth,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I am!” John 8:58

2. ACCEPT HIM AS YOUR LORD.

Accept Him as your Lord.  Give Him the position of ultimate authority in your life.  Make Him the boss!  This means that we accept what He says as truth, we do what He tells us to do, and we don’t do what He tells us not to do. 

Please note that I have listed accepting Jesus as Lord before accepting Him as Savior.  This is not to say that we actually do one before the other, but rather, to bring up an extremely important point.  We cannot accept Jesus as Savior while rejecting Him as Lord.   

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. Matthew 7:21 

As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. James 2:26 

There are, I fear, many people who think we can–many people who are going to be shocked when they end up in hell.  God tells us to repent–to turn away from our sins–and come to Him for salvation.   

Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, and that he may send the Christ, who has been appointed for you—even Jesus. Acts 3:19,21 

When we ask Jesus to become our Savior, we are asking Him to forgive our sins, our rebellion, our disobedience to His lordship.  We are asking for His forgiveness for each and every time we have failed to obey Him as Lord.  To ask Him to be our Savior without also asking Him to be our Lord is the same as saying, “Dear God, please forgive me for disobeying you while I continue to disobey you.”  

The man who says “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 1 John 2:4 

What God says about sin and salvation is: 

* We are all sinful.  We have all disobeyed God!  

. . .  for there is no one who does not sin . . . 1 Kings 8:46

. . . for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, . . . Romans 3:23

* Only sinless perfection is allowed into heaven. 

Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life. Revelation 21:27 

* There is nothing we can do to remove our sin: Good deeds are after the fact! 

All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; . . . Isaiah 64:6

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. Ephesians 2:8,9 

* God (the Son) stepped into our world–born as a human–to fix this problem for us.  

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders.  And He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.  Isaiah 9:6 

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.  Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. . . . The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. John 1:1 3,14 

* He suffered and died on the cross for our sins, taking the justly required punishment for them.

But he was pierced for our transgression, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.  We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Isaiah 53:5,6

For Christ died for sins once for all, the  righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.  He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, . . . 1 Peter 3:18

* By repenting (resigning from being our own gods in favor of His authority),

Repent! Turn away from all your offenses; then sin will not be your downfall.  Rid yourself of all the offenses you have committed, and get a new heart and a new spirit. Ezekiel 18:30,3l

Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, and that he may send the Christ, who has been appointed for you—even Jesus.  Acts 3:19,20

and trusting Him and His power to save us, we are forgiven for our sins and are made righteous and pure.   

Abraham believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness. Genesis 15:6

Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household. Acts 16:31

* In this condition, we will get into heaven and live forever. 

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

* There is no other way to be forgiven and to live forever in heaven.   

He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life 1 John 5:12 

I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6 

3. ACCEPT HIM AS YOUR SAVIOR. 

Accept His death as the full payment for your sins–the only available and only needed payment.  Please understand that accepting is more than just acknowledging, saying, or even believing that something is true.  It is an action–a decision that we make, a step that we take.  Simply acknowledging that Jesus is Lord and Savior doesn’t make you a Christian any more than acknowledging that Hitler was ruler of Germany would have made you a Nazi.  To better explain this point, please allow me to share the following vision which God gave me specifically for this purpose.  Through it we can see what it truly means to put faith in something to save us.   

During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.”  After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them. Acts 16:9-10 

What God showed me was a very long, very narrow room.  At one end was a door and at the opposite end was a window.  There were no other entrances or exits.  Sitting in the very center of this room, facing the window, was a chair.  That chair is where each one of us sits.  It is the throne of our life.  It is where we sit as our own gods–as the rulers of our own lives.  God then showed me that the room was on fire.  The whole end of the room where the door was located was engulfed in flames and the fire was growing.  At the other end was the window (salvation).  All the person in the chair had to do was to get up, go over to the window, and climb out; but he had to do it.  Merely believing that the window was the way to salvation wasn’t enough.  Simply saying it wouldn’t save him either.  The person had to get out of the chair and go through the window.

So it is with Jesus:  He is the window, and we must leave our thrones and go to Him.  We must give up the authority of our lives, humble ourselves, and accept Him–as God, as Lord, as Savior.  That’s all we have to do!  We don’t have to work our way to heaven.  We don’t have to be good enough to get to heaven.  Nobody is good enough to get to heaven!   

All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; . . .  Isaiah 64:6

. . . for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, . . . Romans 3:23 

(People who try to be good so they can go to heaven, go to hell!)

There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.       Proverbs 14:12 

All we have to do is accept the free gift of salvation.  As a matter of fact, the Bible tells us that anything which we try to offer God for our salvation–anything we feel makes us worthy–is pride, and pride is simply another sin. 

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can  boast. Ephesians 2:8,9 

Before leaving this subject, there is one more part of the vision that I need to mention: The room was filling with smoke, and the window was getting hard to see.  If you have not personally accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, the fires of hell are lapping at your back.  If you don’t move now, you may never find the window.