Expert: Thurman C. Petty, Jr. - 12/27/2011

Question
Hello Thurman C. Petty, Jr.,

I have a couple of questions I would like to ask you. I think God is telling me to ask you, but we shall see.

Let me explain a bit. I got saved when I was 4, but then I drifted for years and years until God got a hold of me when I turned 18. Since then He has been drawing me to Himself more and more. I am noticing changes in me that could only have been done by His hand. It is really a wonderful relationship. I am starting to really love my Father.

However as I walk with Him, I have run into a bit of confusion. I read various commentaries and articles on certain verses. Everybody seems to have their own view on it, and many of those views fit. It gets confusing to know which is the most accurate view.  It sounds like you have a few or so years of discernment under your belt so I would like to ask you for you take on these two questions:

1. Just what is required to enter heaven?

Now obviously mankind can do nothing for salvation. He is lost in his own sin and can do nothing to save himself. If we could do anything, Jesus would not have had to die. He does all the work of it. However it is here on which I run into problems - on the subject of saving faith. The kind of faith that gets one into heaven.

One camp says that to believe in your heart that Jesus died and rose again and to confess the Lord Jesus with your mouth is all you need. Once you believe, nothing can make you lose salvation. Sanctification, obedience and all that will follow as a natural consequence as you grow thankful to God for what He has done.

A second camp however says that having faith is only the start. They say that to be saved, that is to inherit the Kingdom of God, one MUST (through faith some versions add) obey the will of the Father. You MUST love God and you MUST be in complete and total submission to His Lordship. You MUST seek Him with all your heart. You also MUST want to be saved from yourself [your sin], wanting to be avoid hell is not enough. Wanting to be justified is not enough. You MUST turn away from your all your sins RIGHT NOW AND NEVER GO BACK OR IT IS OVER PERIOD. You MUST love the brethren! You MUST want to be totally sanctified, not just partially. You MUST be completely dead to self at all times. You MUST keep God's Holy Day! If you fall back into your old ways, it's over - even if you repent. You MUST live a holy life. You MUST MUST MUST STRIVE AND AGONIZE for the narrow gate WITH ALL or you will not be saved! If as a Christian you lie, do a theft or experience some envy you can forget inheriting the kingdom of God. If you drift away from God, He will remove His Holy Spirit from you and IT IS ALL OVER. YOU MUST BE COMPLETELY HIS AT ALL TIMES OR IT IS ALL OVER! (Please forgive the dramatic capitalization - I am trying to show how passionate the various writers were about this).

The second camp has me a bit - and sometimes very - scared. I fall short of that list a lot of the time. I want to do all that camp 2 says (because as far as I know all of it has back up verses and it pleases God). But I know I fall short of that list - and there are probably times that I have fallen short without consciously realizing it. I repent of what I can remember and what God brings to mind, but it is not humanly possible to repent of the 1000's of times I have fallen short of that list. It would take my entire lifetime I think and then some. But since I fall short of that list, and since I know I can't keep that entire list perfectly all the time...does that mean that heaven is lost to me forever?

2. I want to please God completely - I want to deny myself completely and I want Him to be the absolute Lord of my life. After all, He is my Creator and I was created to serve and worship Him! Furthermore, He DIED for little old me, so how could I NOT want to do such?! This is my desire. However sometimes I find myself slipping. For instance, I might tell a lie. I receive conviction and then I repent. Then maybe a week or so later I find myself slipping into the same dumb sin AGAIN. It is a bad habit left over from my renegade days and it is taking a bit longer for Him to cleanse me of it. Does this disqualify me from salvation? That kind of stubborn sin problem?  

There is also times where Satan will plant doubt in me concerning my salvation. I will go through a period where I really wonder if I have truly believed and repented. I think there is no way I can meet his standard and so there is no hope for me. If I really am saved I shouldn't still be struggling with sin X. Or I think I don't have enough faith. I find this happens usually right after I get an extra dose of Holy Spirit fire and have been worshiping and thanking God more deeply than usual. But then God gets through the fear and reassures me and I move on. Do times of doubt disqualify me from salvation?

Thanks,
Tressa

Answer
Dear Tressa,

I’m so glad you wrote me. You’ve presented me with a wonderful testimony the likes of which I seldom hear anymore. In fact, though I have a very close relationship with Jesus too, I crave the experience you describe even more. God is blessing you, Tressa.

You said: “I am noticing changes in me that could only have been done by His hand. It is really a wonderful relationship. I am starting to really love my Father.”

Again, you describe your experience in this way: “I want to please God completely - I want to deny myself completely and I want Him to be the absolute Lord of my life. After all, He is my Creator and I was created to serve and worship Him! Furthermore, He DIED for little old me, so how could I NOT want to do such?! This is my desire.” (Reading this sends chills up and down my spine. I thrill at the thought of having a relationship with God like yours!)

And that’s specifically the reason Satan causes you so much trouble—especially after you’ve experienced an “extra dose of Holy Spirit fire and have been worshiping and thanking God more deeply than usual.”

“...obviously mankind can do nothing for salvation. He is lost in his own sin and can do nothing to save himself. If we could do anything, Jesus would not have had to die. He does all the work of it.” Precisely!

And it is because we have been raised in a world filled with sin and wrong thinking that we get into trouble here. We want to do something for our salvation. Our egos insist that we get some of the credit. When the Bible teaches that “Jesus does it all,” our nature sputters: “But...but...can’t I do something?” We really love Jesus, but we don’t want Him to get all the credit. We want to strut about the New Jerusalem shouting: “Sure, He died on the cross for me, and I’m grateful for that. But that really wasn’t enough: look at what I did to finish what He started!”

That’s what we get from lists and concepts that make up #2. Many of the things on the list are essential for the Christian to understand Jesus more fully, and to grow in our relationship with Him. But we cannot add to or detract from Jesus’ sacrifice for our salvation by doing or not doing these things.

You ask, “what is required to enter heaven? The Bible is quite clear in both the Old and New Testaments:

John 14:15  "If you love Me, keep My commandments.

John 15:10  If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love.

Which commandments?

Most Bible believing Christians understand that Jesus lived and existed as God before He was born as a baby in Bethlehem. (Phil. 2:5-8) We also believe that Jesus was deeply involved in the creation of the earth. Paul explains that Jesus was with the Israelites throughout their wilderness wanderings (1 Cor 10:1-4). As the leader of God’s people, Jesus was the One who gave them the 10 commandments as well (Ex. 20:1-17).

So what is required to enter heaven? Love Jesus “...with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.” (Deut. 6:5), and keep His commandments.

How? Through the blood of the Lamb. We cannot keep the commandments on our own, as you said eloquently in your question. As Jesus said: “Without Me, you can do nothing.” (John 15:5).

I don’t understand everything about this kind of relationship. But I can tell from what Jesus and His disciples said, all the good that we do has been done through the strength of Jesus working in and through us. Actually there is no other way to be saved except what is described in Revelation: “Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely.” (Rev. 22:14)

In the book Steps to Christ by Ellen G. White we find a beautiful explanation of righteousness by faith:

“The condition of eternal life is now just what it always has been—just what it was in Paradise before the fall of our first parents—perfect obedience to the law of God, perfect righteousness. If eternal life were granted on any condition short of this, then the happiness of the whole universe would be imperiled. The way would be open for sin, with all its train of woe and misery, to be immortalized.

“It was possible for Adam, before the fall, to form a righteous character by obedience to God’s law. But he failed to do this, and because of his sin our natures are fallen and we cannot make ourselves righteous. Since we are sinful, unholy, we cannot perfectly obey the holy law. We have no righteousness of our own with which to meet the claims of the law of God. But Christ has made a way of escape for us. He lived on earth amid trials and temptations such as we have to meet. He lived a sinless life. He died for us, and now He offers to take our sins and give us His righteousness. If you give yourself to Him, and accept Him as your Savior, then, sinful as your life may have been, for His sake you are accounted righteous. Christ’s character stands in place of your character, and you are accepted before God just as if you had not sinned.

“More than this, Christ changes the heart. He abides in your heart by faith. You are to maintain this connection with Christ by faith and the continual surrender of your will to Him; and so long as you do this, He will work in you to will and to do according to His good pleasure. So you may say, "The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Galatians 2:20. So Jesus said to His disciples, "It is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you." Matthew 10:20. Then with Christ working in you, you will manifest the same spirit and do the same good works --works of righteousness, obedience.

“So we have nothing in ourselves of which to boast. We have no ground for self-exaltation. Our only ground of hope is in the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and in that wrought by His Spirit working in and through us.”
 (Ellen G. White, Steps to Christ (Pacific Press Publishing Association, 1892; 2002), 62, 63.)

I invite you to visit my web site, www.PettyPress.com, where I present 43 Bible study guides on important themes of Scripture. Each one will give you a glimpse of Jesus and/or how you can become more like Him through the work of the Holy Spirit in your life.

Another resource is Bibleinfo.com. They have an FAQ of over 300 Bible questions, and personal help on questions not in the FAQ is also available.

I am teaching the basic beliefs of Scripture to a number of people via e-mail. It seems to be working all right. So if you like, I could do the same for you. Just drop me a line at my personal e-mail address—below.

Stay close to Jesus,

Thurman C. Petty, Jr.
pettypress@gmail.com