Will Your Good Works Get You to Heaven?—Are You Sure?
Yesterday as I was coming home from seminary I met a young man who was mocking me as I was reading my Bible next to him on the bus. You never really know who you’ll meet or what they have to say on the LA metro. But anyway, I could tell he was mocking me and laughing at me as I was reading my Bible next to him. So finally he leaned over to me and said: “Are you a Mormon?” I answered: “No, I’m a Christian who believes the Bible to be true.” He laughed to himself again in a jeering sort of way. Then I said: “What about you? Are you a Christian?” He said: Well, I’m Catholic…so I’m both—Christian and Catholic.” I nodded.
Then he said: “What do you do?” I told him: “I’m a pastor of a church down the road and we preach that the Bible is true that no one can work his way to heaven. But that the good news of the Bible is that Jesus Christ has earned everything that we could never earn and He died in our place if we believe in Him.” Unimpressed, he looked away and began to mock yet again. (Ironically, because he said just a few minutes ago that he was a Christian and a Catholic!) He then leaned over to me and said: “I believe that too.” Then I said to him: “So if you’re a Christian, do you know where you’re going to go when you die?” He said without hesitating for a moment, “Oh yes, I’m 99.9% sure I’m going to heaven when I die.” I said with a smile: “That’s great—how do you know that?” He said, “Well, I’ve never really done anything bad and I’m actually a very good person.” I said: “You don’t believe that!” Shocked and with a ridiculing tone he said, “Why don’t I believe that?” “Because you just told me you’re a pretty good person and that’s why you’re so confident that you’re going to heaven.” I said: “The Bible doesn’t allow for that. The Bible says you must be perfect if you want to get to heaven—and that’s why Jesus had to come.” Sorely unimpressed with our conversation and where it was headed, he got up, mid-conversation, and walked off the bus at the next stop without even responding or saying bye. As he departed, he had his familiar mocking smile painted on his face.
I thought to myself, what a sad state for that young man. We must be faithful to preach the gospel even if people mock, ridicule, and jeer. For that man did not really mock me, he mocked Jesus Christ. And that man would have been much better off had he mocked me, but because he mocked Jesus Christ, I fear for that man. I pray that Jesus Christ would so radically grip his heart and irresistibly and overwhelmingly conquer his hard-hearted spirit and impart regeneration so that he won’t stand before the Judge on that final day and hear: “Depart from me you worker of lawlessness into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” Reader, be warned!
