Based on the gospel of grace that the New Testament teaches, being good does not count if we want to get to heaven. Good works are unacceptable as a means to pay our way to the Kingdom of God, because if we can gain entry to heaven by our own good works, Christ died for nothing. If there was any other way by which fallen sons of man can gain entry into heaven, it was utterly foolish for the King of kings to set aside His glory to die senselessly on the cross.
Being good is a product of being saved or being qualified to get to heaven. In other words, we are good because we are on our way to heaven, not the other way around. Our good works are a result of our personal relationship with our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Who promised heaven to us. God is a good God, and being so, His children are admonished to uphold goodness, holiness, purity, love, kindness. But these are not in any way His way of getting us to heaven, because He has paid the price already at Calvary. Acts of goodness are merely expressions of our being saved.
There is one problem with this salvation by works doctrine, or the belief that we can get to heaven by being good. Earning one's salvation gives way to pride because man, in his fallen state, can easily boast before God that he gets into heaven by his own merits. This is unthinkable, if we consider how far we have all fallen short of God's glory. If the Lord indeed accepts our works as payment for our passage to heaven, then, paradise will soon be populated by men with unregenerate hearts that extol their own goodness rather than God's. This is utterly unbelievable in the light of Jesus' declaration: I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father but by Me.
This doctrine also gives rise to more questions whose answers we will never ever know. If being good can get us to heaven, how good do we need to be in order to qualify? Who sets the level of goodness we all should attain to? What is the operational definition of good, for purposes of determining who can get to heaven? These are just examples of the questions we need to answer before this doctrine of salvation by works can be reasonably accepted or believed.
Jesus has done the work at the cross already so that we are acceptable to Him unconditionally. Isn't that more believable and easier for us all? Why do we need to complicate matters by insisting that man should work for his own salvation?
Christianity is based on the truth that man is sinful and is separated from God. Though God loves man, the latter's sinfulness cannot dwell with God's holiness. Even if God is a loving and forgiving God, He is also a just Judge. He cannot deny His being just in favor of His being loving. He does not deserve to be the Judge of the world if He does not uphold His own just-ness. And God's law is such that without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. God's justice demands that a price has to be paid in order for Him to be able to forgive.
The only problem is that, there is no one worthy to be the Lamb of God to be offered on the altar as a propitiation for our sins EXCEPT the Son of God Himself. This goes without saying that even if a man is willing to be crucified to get to heaven, his own sacrifice is not acceptable, it cannot appease an angry, just God. So Jesus had to be the One to die. God's justice and love both found their expression through Jesus' death, for man to be accepted before God again. Through the price that Jesus paid, we have been justified from our sins and are now unconditionally accepted by the Father, if we are willing to accept and own Jesus as our own Savior and Lord.
Therefore, it is not possible for man to get to heaven on the basis of his own works, good deeds, or being good. It is all dependent on the grace of God for man, because nothing else than the sacrifice of Jesus is acceptable in God's sight. Nothing just comes up to the standards that God has set for the propitiation for man's sins.
There are some verses in the New Testament that, when taken out of context, seem to indicate that good works can earn us a right to go to heaven. James 2:15-18, for example: Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds." Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.
As you can see in the preceding verses, James has the faith already, which he says, he proves by the actions that he does like caring for his less fortunate brothers. His faith, which affords him a right to get to heaven, is there already, and is according to him, manifested by the things that he does. Indeed, faith is a living and vibrant relationship with the Father expressed through good works that attest to the fact that God is alive and at work in the heart of the saints.
That is why saved people, or those on their way to heaven, are expected to be good, because they already carry with them the likeness of Christ, Who took their place when He died for them, so that He could live in them and through them. So, being good is not set aside in favor of the doctrine of salvation by grace. In fact, being good and good works by men are upheld in this doctrine because they are the very manifestations, the expressions of this living relationship man has with his Savior.
No one can explain salvation by grace better than the Apostle Paul himself, who wrote in Ephesians 2:8-11: For it is by grace you have been saved, through faithand this not from yourselves, it is the gift of Godnot by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Nowhere in the Bible was it ever mentioned that we can get to heaven through any other way but by grace.