by Cinda Smaagaard

Created on: December 12, 2010

You cannot get into Heaven by being good, but neither can you enter Hell by simply being bad.  If we are to use the Bible as our source of direction, one can easily see that Abraham (who lied about his wife being his sister), Moses (who killed one of the taskmasters), David (who took Bathsheba in adultery and had her husband killed) would all be doomed to purdition if not for the Grace of God.

God gave everyone "free will" and by doing so, God must have anticipated that we as fallible human beings would eventually exercize that right to be wrong at some point in time.  It did not take Adam and Eve too long before they fell victim to the seven deadly sins including pride and lust with the help of an interloper.  Everyone has the capacity to do the right thing or the wrong thing and in order to learn over time what those are, we are all bound to make mistakes.  It is commendable that God gave all of us an inner conscience and guide book to follow, but God also made us creatures who make decisions apparently ruled mainly by emotions.  This means that despite our better selves and intellect, we will often choose wrongly and then suffer the consequences.

Heaven and Hell are not merely places as outlined in the Bible.  Many would agree that we can experience a sort of heaven and hell on this side of the great divide and it is not always caused by anything that we do, say or act out.  Even if someone wished to be as Holy as a Saint, they would simply have St. Peter (who cut off the ear of a soldier) and St. Paul (who was responsible for the persecution of many Christians) for comparison.  No one is perfect.

This is why God designed a remedy of sorts by way of Jesus as an atonement for our sins.  His dying on the cross was a sacrifice to be made once and for all so that many who otherwise would not be saved could come into the Kingdom of Heaven.  We see this by the acknowledgement of the thief who was dying alongside Jesus, who simply asked the Lord to remember him when Christ got to the pearly gates.  Jesus told the thief, "tonight you shall be with me in Paradise."  It took the simple act of faith of the sinner, to acknowledge Christ as Lord to have the ability to forgive sins upon this earth and make confession.  Only God alone would or could give that kind of atonement and assurance of salvation into Heaven.  Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life, as he said.

Does this mean that Christians

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