How Does Someone Go to Heaven?

Can someone be sure that they will go to Heaven when they die? If so, how does one get a ticket into paradise? Many people wonder how they can obtain the promise of "eternal life" that Jesus describes in the Gospels (John 3). 

In this episode, we describe what the Bible means by Heaven and how you can be sure that you will go there when your time on Earth is done.

Plus, in our Comment on the Culture segment, we discuss the 4 Day Pride Festival at the Dead Sea in Israel, the Bible and homosexuality, and a Chick-fila worker who finds $10,000 in the bathroom.  

PS - New episodes on Thursdays.

Transcript

Today we're going to talk about, we're going to answer this question, how can someone go to heaven? How do they go to heaven? How is heaven even a real place? And is there even a God that supposedly resides in this place called heaven or this paradise? And so we're going to answer those questions today. This could, we could get on a rabbit trail really quick with different topics. We're going to try to stay focused on the topic today. And how can someone go to heaven? We're going to answer that in just a moment. But first, for our comment on the culture segment of the show, usually we do this. What we do is we bring something that's happening in our culture today and we look at it through the lens of scripture. Okay. Again, I always get this warning. Okay. Don't look at something in script or don't look at something in the world that's on the news headlines and let it discourage you or let it bring you away from Christ. Okay, because here's what happens. You know, even conservative news is news and most of news is negative news. And so if you want to rid yourself of becoming a spiritual Eeyore, oh, everything is bad, everything's terrible, then I would, I would highly suggest you don't, You don't regularly and at high volumes digest much of the daily news. But sometimes, especially with online and we're answering, we're really having conversations with other students, other people that message us online, questions about their faith, questions about the Bible. And sometimes things come up and things that are happening in our culture come up and we have to say, okay, Let's wave the red flag here, or let's respond in a biblical way. So again, every time we look at something that happens in our culture, we don't want to just say, oh, well, that's terrible. Look at the darkness, being darkness, as if we're surprised that lost people do lost things. We can't do that. We've got to respond biblically. We've got to look at what scripture says. And something that is very disturbing that's happening here recently, that's happening in a few weeks, is a four-day Pride festival. Four-day Pride Festival. You say, what's the big deal about that? This is a Pride Festival that's happening in Israel. And out of all the places for a Pride Festival to happen, it is at the Dead Sea. Does that ring a bell at all to you? If you know anything about biblical Sodom and Gomorrah, this is the surrounding area of the biblical site, the ancient site of Sodom and Gomorrah working in Genesis 19. God destroyed. a city for their sin. And because there was no righteous in the land, there was no righteous there. And God, let me just go on record and say that God was perfectly just. This was in short, in a way from God's perspective, it was an act of mercy, of stopping men that will continue in sin, generations that would have been affected. had he let that sin continue. That's a hard pill to swallow. Let's just be honest. But this is the decision that the Lord made in Genesis 19. And here we see happening this summer, a four-day Pride festival at the Dead Sea, which I think it's really ironic that it's not only at the Dead Sea where Sodom and Gomorrah was. It's not only the dead, called literally the Dead Sea. Pride goes before destruction and a halt the spirit. before a fall. And it made me really think, this is where it gave me pause, okay? I've been asked before on campus, what's your take on homosexuality? Is homosexuality a sin? Just ensure, understand that scripturally, homosexuality is a sin. It's wrong. And homosexuality in the eyes of God is a perversion of what he ordained at creation. We see this in scripture. I'm going to get to in just a second, though, how to talk to people who claim to be gay. Because here's what I face a lot of times with students. We've had over almost 700 conversations with students, one-on-one conversations with students on campus, over 700 this past year at UNC Chapel Hill and NC State. And in those conversations, I have had so many people, I can't really count off the top of my head, probably it'd be over a dozen students who overtly were just, okay, I'm of a homosexual lifestyle and your Christian faith is, you're ruining my vibe. And they come with that kind of attitude in some cases, some of them very respectful conversations and say, hey, I identify as this. And so how do I as an evangelist handle that? because I could do one of two things. Like I could take a club and say, listen, hey, dude, you're living a wrong lifestyle. This is sin. And I do, I believe it's sin. Absolutely. I'm going to show you from scripture in just a moment why I believe it's so. But how do I handle that? Do I take the club of the sin and I say, hey, you're a homosexual and what your lifestyle is not pleasing to God and you need to turn. In that moment as an evangelist, and I'm trying to win them to Jesus Christ. Honestly, it depends. How do I witness to homosexuals or someone who claims to be gay? It depends on the person, to be honest with you. Because I've talked to students in the past, young people in the past, who they're an atheist. I had a girl, this has been about a month or a few weeks ago, Someone comes, she said, I identify as a part of the LGBTQ community plus community. And in that moment, she is she honestly she was a girl who grew up in church who was hurt by church, which by the way, that's a lot of times what happens is they're they're hurt. And people understand this. People form simple habits out of their pain. It's oftentimes simple habits are medication to pain. And it was the case for this young lady I was speaking with. And she had been burned by Christianity in the past. And she said, hey, I identify, I'm gay. She said, I identify with LGBTQ plus. And as an evangelist, did I hone in on that? No. This was a girl who claimed to grow up Christian, who's now an atheist, who's been hurt by Christianity. Am I going to bring up her sinful choices in that moment, trying to win her back to God, trying to ultimately win her back to Jesus. No, I'm not. Now if she takes a conversation there, I'm in a loving and graceful way, am I going to take her to the truth? Yes. And let the truth, I always tell students this, I'm okay with offending you. I'd just rather the truth offend you. Not my rhetoric, not the way I say it. not my demeanor, not my attitude towards you. So the truth, it's okay if it offends. And if the conversation goes that way, then I will. give them the truth of the word of God that, hey, homosexuality is a sin. It's wrong. You need to repent and turn back to Jesus. His life for you is so much better than you can write for you. He can write a better script than you can. But in that conversation, just as an evangelist trying to win them back to Christ, I'm not going to belabor their sin. in that moment, like this specific homosexual lifestyle. I'm not going to belabor that because I want to win them back to Christ. Now they know, especially in this scenario, this girl has grown up Christian. She knows what the scripture says and she knows what she's been taught. And so she knows that there's something about it that I've been told it's wrong. And so there's a conscience there. There's a, there's the scripture speaking to her from when she was a young girl growing up in church. So understand God can work those things out. And do I believe in repentance, salvation? Yes, we're going to talk about that in just a second. Absolutely. But am I going to belabor her, lifestyle? in that moment trying to win her to Christ. No. And in fact, she said it. She was just talking to me. She was being very open and honest. And she said, listen, I'm gay. And I grew up in a Christian church and I was hurt. And she kept talking, giving her testimony. And I didn't even stop. I didn't address it. I didn't go. I went straight to her heart because I understand. And here's what you I think you got to understand as an evangelist or as someone who's just being a gospel witness for Christ, when you're speaking to someone, who identifies as gay or homosexual, and you're trying to win them to Christ, not only you need to use a lot of grace and a lot of love, and you need to speak the truth. You need to do so in love. But you be careful of using the scripture as a club and understand that the lifestyle that they've chosen is a symptom of their heart. So belaboring that specific sin in their life. In this instance, was not what I was going, what the Holy Spirit told me to do. The Holy Spirit said, don't address that. Let her continue to talk. Let her give her testimony. And I just continued to give her Jesus and the love of Christ. And I told her, I looked in her eyes and I said, listen, what happened to you when you were hurt at church? God never intended for that. Jesus, that was not his way. And so And that spoke volumes to her. And you know what? She's, the door was, we left the conversation. The door was, I believe, still open for another conversation in the future. So just kind of encouragement. This made me, this headline made me think about the, is homosexuality a sin? Yes, it is. I'll show you from scripture in a second. But when you're talking to someone and you're witnessing to others of this lifestyle, Understand it's a symptom of what's going on in their heart. I said, do everything you can to give them the truest picture, the best picture of true love, which is the Lord Jesus Christ and the gospel. No greater love hath no man than this than a man laid down his life for his friends. You preach Jesus, you give them Christ, you give them what true love looks like, and they will know that the lifestyle they're choosing is short of what God's best for them is. And so, but just to give you some scriptural basis, Romans 1 and verse number 21, because that when they knew God, they glorified him not as God neither were thankful, but gave but became vain in their imaginations, their foolish heart was darkened, professing themselves to be wise, they became as fools, changed the glory of uncorruptible, understand this verse right here, uncorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man, to birds, four-footed beasts, creeping things. Oh, the next verse, wherefore God also gave them up, gave them up to the uncleanness through the lust or desires you could say desires of their own heart to and this phrase caught me dishonor their own bodies between themselves understand this about sexual sin why is there such a ramification for sexual sin is because it's a sin against the body God out of all the things that God created you are the only thing God created in his image and that is a high privilege that is a high a beautiful thing And so God takes what you do with your body very, very seriously. And it goes on to say, who changed the truth of God into a lie, worshiped and served the creature more than the creator who's blessed forever. For this God's God gave them up for the vile affections. Literally an evil, vile. It's tainted. It's corrupted. For even their women, it changed the natural use into that which is against nature. See, God instituted natural law. And Genesis, in the heart of man, he made woman for man, man for woman. And this is God's way. And likewise also the men leaving the natural use of the woman, burning their lust or their desires one toward another with men, men with men working that which is unseemly receiving in themselves the recompense of their error, which was me. Literally receiving in themselves, receiving that which is corrupted. it is wrong the filing themselves see that's the thing about homosexuality especially as a sin is that it violates not only God's natural order but it violates it devalues the body and then you have a whole movement of people who have to work really really hard to find to create their own value to create their own honor when God has already given us this beautiful, beautiful thing called a body that's made in the image of God, that's clean, that's innocent, and yet we defile it with our sin, with what we do. And this is why I believe there is such, in the Bible, it goes on to list those things. Talking about a reprobate mind in verse 28 and 29, being filled with unrighteousness, fornication, which is any sexual sin outside of marriage, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, all of those things. And Romans 131, skipping down without understanding covenant breakers without natural affection, without natural affection. Understand that this is has been in scripture throughout the narrative of scripture. It has been the product of God's or the, is been subject to God's wrath of vile affections breaking the natural law. Homosexuality is a sin. But again, when you witness to someone who is, who claims to be of that lifestyle, there is a way to communicate Christ. Show them a love that is greater than anything else that they can experience in their life. But here's some good news with all of that. This was pretty cool. I saw this week. A Chick-fil-A worker turns in, love this, $10,000 and tells owners, I did it because, yes, because Jesus would. I love this, man. This is so cool. Chick-fil-A worker, according to the New York Times, Chick-fil-A worker, 18 years old, $10,000 in the bathroom of a restaurant in North Carolina, NC represented here, and Chick-fil-A. We got North Carolina, Southern boy with serving Jesus chicken. Can't get much better than that. And then he finds almost $10,000, $9,333 cash in the bathroom. Now question, what would you do in this scenario? Let me know in the comments below. What would you do if you found 10 grand, $10,000 in the bathroom? What would you do? But then like the other question came up to me, okay, with this, worker here, who left $10,000 in the bathroom? Like, why are you carrying around? I want to know the backstory of who left this money. And I don't know about you, man, but if I've got a bag of $10,000 cash and I go to a public bathroom, why am I bringing that in there anyway? But if I go to a public bathroom with $10,000, I'm going to be, how can you leave that? I want to know, like, is the next headline supposed to be like, guy in North Carolina robs a bank and gets a Chick-fil-A sandwich after like, what's the story of this money? And apparently this guy, this teen worker, he gives it back to the original owner. And he gives it back to the original owner. And it's like, yeah, no big. Like, hey, bro, here's your 10 G's. What in the world? So you got to be, I don't know, I feel like you got to be scatterbrained to to leave $10,000 in the bathroom. I have found cash on the ground before. And there was not really, it wasn't really a scenario which I could return it back to its owner. Man, $10,000 and he did it because why? Because he said Jesus was. See, that's what you get, man. You go to Chick-fil-A, you get that Jesus chicken. You getting sanctified people serving that Jesus chicken. And so I don't even know this teen's name. But hey, kudos to you, man. Good job for doing the right thing. God that sees you in secret, what's he going to do? He's going to reward you openly. So let's get to our question of the day. What is our question of the day? It is, how does someone go to heaven? How does someone go to heaven? You know, there's, of course, when you ask that question, there's two things that you have to suppose in order to ask that question. One, that there is a God. In order there to be a heaven a place of paradise there's to be a creator of it who created heaven also created earth okay well there's a lot of supposition when you ask this question how do you go to heaven you got to suppose that there is a God right and if you don't believe that there is a God and there is no heaven and there is no afterlife then this question probably doesn't apply to you but I would get you to stop and to think but ask yourself the question is this life all that we have is it all we got are we just an accident are we here by chance or is there a divine is there something that's supernatural that outside of time space and matter that began the run cause first cause that began our universe so that in order to ask this question it supposes that there is a god I'm going to go ahead and just say you believe that there is a God. But then two, it also supposes that there's an afterlife, that there's something after this. Now, there's a lot of different doctrines about the afterlife. Are we reincarnated? Are we just changed states? Do we just change the form? You know, do we just change like what we are? Like, do we, is that Cal over there? Is that grandma? Is that Eula? and there's people that believe that. But I would suggest to you that reincarnation, I don't want to get into all of that right now, but understand, I believe that there is an afterlife and I believe it's because the intrinsic value that you have that's far above any animal or plant on earth. It's the value of life that you obtain as a human being that indicates a soul. And if there is a God, if there is a soul, then I think there is an afterlife. We're made in the image of God. We are eternal. Some people believe that we're annihilated. Once we die, if we go to hell, we go to hell for a short time and then we're annihilated if we're not redeemed. And I don't believe God's going to destroy something that he created in his image. We have a whole episode on that and I can link that in the description later on. but that we did on hell and the doctrine of hell, the different views of hell and what's the Bible say. But how do you go to heaven? Well, understand that if there is a God and if there is an afterlife, then we want the best of what the afterlife has to offer, right? Because eternity is a lot longer than time, right? However long you have to live on earth, 75 years, 80 years, 90 years, whatever. If you're Chris Crohn, you think you're going to live to 150, 200 years, whatever. whatever, okay? If I'm going to only live for a certain amount of time and eternity is forever, then I want the best. I want whatever heaven is, I want a version of it. And so assuming there is a God, assuming there's an afterlife, how does someone go to heaven? Well, again, let's look at scripture. What is heaven? What is heaven? Well, John 14 gives us that answer. says this, in my father's house are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you and I go to prepare a place for you. If I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself that here's the key phrase about heaven, is that where I am, there you may be also. Where I am, there you may be also. Say, brother Tyler, where is heaven? Okay, heaven is the eternal abode of God. And the redeemed. That's what heaven is. Heaven is described as a new Jerusalem and other passages of the Bible. It's described as new Jerusalem. It is the place where all of those that the blood has been applied to their account. Their sins have been forgiven. They have been washed, clean, made clean, justified by the blood, by the sacrifice of Christ. Those are the ones that have access into a place, eternal place, called heaven, new Jerusalem, the kingdom of God. This is where God rules and reigns. Kingdoms have different phases in them. We have, without getting all into eschatology, but we have the millennial reign of Christ, new Jerusalem comes and descends down on earth. Christ sets up his millennial reign for 1000 years. We rule and reign with him, and then he creates a new heaven and a new earth. and that's where we stay with God. But how can we, really the question is, how can someone go to heaven? Heaven's a great place, but heaven, I love what one preacher says, he says, heaven's just another place if God's not there. It's just another city. It's a celestial one. Hey, city made of gold, that's pretty awesome. But heaven is just another place if God is not there. And so heaven really is where God is. It's eternal fellowship with God from a heart who says, hey, I choose this. We talked about it when we talked about the doctrine of hell, but God's not going to force you into his presence for all of eternity when you go your whole life rejecting God. and saying, no, I don't have anything to do with God. And then you die. And then God says, hey, I know you didn't believe in me or didn't really care for me at all. And we had no communication and you denied my existence, but you're going to have to spend eternity with me in heaven. God's not going to do that. Right? There's a choice. And there's two choices, two places that someone goes when they die. That's either hell, an eternal lake of fire, or that is heaven. And Jesus makes that clear in John 14. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians, this is another great passage to bring up when talking about the subject of heaven. But in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 6, the Bible says, therefore, We are always confident knowing that whilst we are at home in the body, we are present or absent from the Lord, right when we're in this body. This is a natural body. The natural body will die. It will decay, but there's a part of us that will live forever. This is the eternal soul of God in which he gives us all. For we walk by faith, not by sight. 2 Corinthians 5, 8. Right here, we are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. So the Bible clearly teaches us, okay, to be absent from the body, from this body, is to be present with God. It's to be with God. And we see this in the case of the thief next to Christ. He says, today you're going to be with me in paradise. How awesome is that? And we'll get back to that thief in just a moment because of this simple fact. So when people, when they talk about how can you go to heaven, we know there is a heaven. Jesus said so. He goes to prepare a place for us. To be absent from the body is present with the Lord. I don't believe that our spirits die and they roam around the earth. And people that claim to see ghosts and that kind of thing, I think that's really demonic activity, not someone's soul. I can get to that in another in another episode maybe but so we understand that heaven's real interesting after from the body is present with the Lord so then how are we saved well before I get to there how we're saved let me tell you how we're not saved okay save from what save from eternal damnation in a place called hell what salvation is not salvation is not church membership salvation is not church membership it's not becoming a part of a movement not identifying with the Baptist or the Catholic or the Methodist or any other denomination you want to fill in, the non-denominational denomination, right? Any other denomination you want to throw in there, okay? Identifying with that, becoming a member of a church doesn't do anything. Just like if I become a member of Planet Fitness, I don't automatically lose 10 pounds. I'm not fit because I'm a member. And that's kind of a silly, weak illustration, but you get my point. Just because you're a member of a church does it mean that you are saved and that you are redeemed. And so church membership doesn't do it. Baptism doesn't do it. This is huge. I think a lot of what I saw, especially last fall after Charlie Kirk passed away, tragically was murdered. A lot of people were turning to Christ and this was so awesome how God, all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are called according to his purpose. God can take something so tragic and he can make something amazing out of it and he can speak to hearts and I'm grateful for that. And something that I saw with students, man, such a hunger and eagerness to know Jesus and to and to know God to get in the Bible, which was awesome, but I believe there was a great deceptiveness with it, with many students coming up at the table saying, hey man, I just got baptized. And we had to, and we're like, hey, that's awesome, man, you just got baptized. You know, that's so amazing. Hey, understand this about baptism. Remember faith, it's by faith alone in Jesus Christ, for by grace are you saved through faith. not of yourself. It's the gift of God. Baptism's awesome, but baptism is just the stamp, man. It's just the stamp, the outward manifestation of an inward decision. That's when eternal life happens. That's when you trust Christ. We'll get back to that in just a second. But understand, salvation, going to heaven, is not through baptism alone. If I dunk myself in the water without putting my faith in Christ, Okay, that does nothing for me but get me wet. I just went swimming. Okay, I was baptized at a Lutheran church when I was a baby. I was sprinkled on the head and that did nothing for my eternal soul. Absolutely nothing. So understand it wasn't until later, I was given the gospel of Jesus Christ, putting my faith and trust in Christ. Then I got baptized. It's called believer's baptism. Scripture teaches us believer's baptism. It's a believer who trusts Christ. Acts chapter 8. In fact, I'm going to go there. Acts chapter 8, this is important. Philip in the Ethiopian eunuch, he's like, okay, what do I need to do to get saved? You know the story he comes up with, man, I'm reading the book of Isaiah, I don't really understand it. Philip's like, hey, I can help you out. He preaches Jesus to him. The guy wants to get saved. And he's like, okay, so how do I do this? Verse, there it is, verse 37. And Philip said, if thou believest with all thine heart thou mayest. May us what? Right here, get baptized. What doth enter you to be baptized? Well, if you believe with all your heart, thou mayest, he said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. So understand that salvation, going to heaven is not just getting baptized or becoming a member of a church. It's not by our good works. A lot of people believe that, here's the two biggest objections that I faced on campus talking with students about Jesus. It's the two objections. It's about Christ or the cross. They have a problem with God or a problem with salvation by two things, or Christianity really, is Christ and the cross. Either Christ was not God, this is their claim, Christ was not God, or the cross is not enough. Some people believe in a God, believe in the Creator God, believe in Jesus, believe he was God, believe he died for the sins of world, and they believe he rose again. But they believe that the cross is not enough for salvation. They believe that Jesus did all of that and that Jesus literally is God. He's not just the Son of God, he's God the Son. They believe that, but yet they still believe that the cross is not enough. So understand this about salvation. Salvation is not by your good works. It's not by putting your faith and trust in Christ and having to do something else and having to, do say this many Hail Marys or and having to obey all the sacraments. And usually I press on this when I talk to a lot of my Catholic friends and really good, really awesome students. And many of them born again, they've trusted Christ. But we understand that, and I try to get them to understand that it's not through keeping of the sacraments that you obtain your salvation or retain your salvation. Keep it. It's through putting your faith and trust in Christ. And those things are outward manifestation, taking of the Lord's Supper and baptism and witnessing. And all of that is an outward manifestation of what an inward change that already took place. So I understand that. about salvation. It's not by our good works. Salvation is not by praying. This is a big one. A lot of people believe that in order to go to heaven, you got to say a prayer. Okay. It's a lot of this comes from like easy believism, hey, repeat after me. And you got to be careful of that, especially with working with young people. You got to be careful of saying, hey, repeat after me. And our children have all three. They've made professions of faith at a very young age. But me and my wife did not press them on that. They listened to a dad who preaches the gospel all the time and a pastor who preaches the word of God all the time, Sunday school teachers. And to them, it was something God was working on their heart. And we saw evidence of that and we didn't force them or make them make a decision for Christ because we didn't want something to happen prematurely. And We didn't, we wanted that to be of God. So you got to be super careful of just saying, hey, repeat after me. Just because you said a prayer or even just you prayed and talked to God doesn't mean that you're on your way to heaven. Here's a big one, but salvation is not, going to heaven is not a belief that God exists. A belief that God exists. Understand that the devils believe in God. They believe that God exists. But their eternal destination is not heaven. In fact, they're exiled from heaven for all of eternity and to never return. And so a belief that God exists is not what takes you to, oh, I believe in God. Well, that's great. That's awesome. That's a great first step. But believing a God doesn't take you to heaven. It doesn't, it does not give you eternal life. It does not justify your sins in light of a holy God. So I understand that. That's not, and here's a big one. Here's a big one. I feel like sometimes I say this, I'll go to a Christian school chapel or I will preach at a church and I'll say this and people are like, oh, it gives them pause. And I think it should give us pause that salvation going to heaven does not come by a belief that Jesus existed. A lot of people are like, oh, I believe in God. I believe in Jesus. Well, that's awesome, dude. But believing that Jesus existed, there's a lot of secular atheists that believe Jesus existed. In fact, it is extremely difficult to refute Jesus's existence. We have more written about Christ and more discussion about one historical figure than any other historical figure that's ever existed. That is Christ Jesus of Nazareth. So I rarely meet anyone on campus who denies that Jesus existed there's just way too there's an overwhelming amount of evidence way too much evidence that Jesus existed but understand this about salvation salvation is not believing that Christ exists or that he came to earth that he made disciples or that he started Christianity no believing in his claim Salvation comes through believing in his claim and believing in what he said, not just that he merely existed and walked on planet Earth. And so how can you be sure that you're going to heaven, by the way? Sorry, I got something on my throat. How can someone be sure? By the way, you can be sure that you're going to heaven. You can be. The Bible says so. A lot of people are like, well, there's no way to really know. God's the ultimate judge. And they're right. God is the ultimate judge. God is the ultimate judge whether someone is saved, redeemed or not. They're completely right. But understand this, that there's a spiritual, I'm working kind of in the background. I'm working on what I believe is going to be a book later on, but on Christian agnosticism and how we have, even as believers, we believe the lies of the culture of culture relativism. And we believe the culture in subjectivism of where we are truth is subjective. Like, it's objective because it's rooted in God, but it's subjective because it's like based on what I feel. And we live our Christian life like we believe in God, we believe in Christ, but then we live like an agnostic to where it's all up to us. It's all up to our good works. And then sometimes where it's like, well, there's just a lot of things we can't know, so let's just not know anything. Right? But I want you to know when it comes to salvation, you can know that you're going to heaven. Praise God. The Bible says in Romans 10, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shall believe in thine heart, believe it in a heart that God hath raised him from the dead, there it is, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth in righteousness and with the mouth confession is made in salvation. For the scripture saith, whoso believeth on him shall not be ashamed. verily verily I say unto you he that believeth on me hath everlasting life you can know without a shadow of a doubt that you're on your way to heaven the Bible talks about in Hebrews a full assurance Hebrews 6 and we desire that every one of you do the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end Hebrews 10 Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience. Don't let that word sprinkled there. I think that's talking about water baptism. Okay. But sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. This is the blood of Jesus Christ. This is the new covenant. This is what it's speaking of. But we have full assurance. We can know. that we have eternal life. We don't have to give in to the agnostic philosophy of the world that we just can't know because God is too big and we are too small. No, we can know. And so here comes the real deal. How can you go to heaven? Well, Jesus said it this way in John 3, you must be born again. You must be born again. John chapter 3, I'm going to go there to show you how right now, wherever you're listening from, and I'm praying that God uses this video in the future, not only to those listening now, but to those in the future, that God will use this video to hopefully bring some clarity to how they can go to heaven, how they can know God. The Bible says in John 3, Verse 3, Jesus, he was saying to Nicodemus, a very religious man, a man with a lot of questions. He was saying, verily, verily, truly, truly, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he can't see the kingdom of God. And he can't be where God is. Jesus said in another place, he said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father. Where's the Father? He's in heaven. No man comes to the Father, but by me. He also said this, he said, I am the door. salvation's not in something something I do it is in someone it is trusting in Christ and his gospel what he said is trusting his word go back to Adam and Eve in the garden what brought man and God what separated the two it was distrusting God's word it was disobedience And Jesus is the great reconciler of that. He said, unless you must be born again, literally, you've got to be born regenerated, literally re-gened, made anew. The Bible calls this a new creature. Old things have passed away. The old, all things are become new. And then Nicodemus is like, okay, I don't understand this. He's like, how can I be born again? He's like, how can I be born again? He's like, I'm old. Do I enter into my mother's womb and be born a second time? And Jesus is saying, that which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the spirit is spirit. You must have both. He's like, you must be born in the flesh. You already, boom, you got that one. You're born of the flesh. Okay, you came out of your mother's womb. You have an eternal soul. You must be born of the spirit. Your spirit, your soul must be purified, regene. This is the part of you that must be born again. Marvel not, he said, that I say unto you, must be born again. He's like, you look at the wind and you don't see the wind, but you see the effects of it. And you'll know someone that they're a believer, that they're regenerated, that they are born again by seeing the effects of the wind of the spirit within them. So you must be born again. Well, he goes on with this conversation with Nicodemus. Nicodemus keeps asking questions. He's like, hey, this doesn't make sense. How can I be born again? I'm old. He goes back to Moses. He talks about the law, the fulfillment of that. was all pointing to, that was all pointing to Christ. See, everything in the Old Testament was pointing to the cross. And everything today, we look back to the cross. Those that were saved in the Old Testament looked forward to the Messiah coming to Christ, redeeming the world of their sin. And we look back to the cross some 2,000 years later, and we say, Christ has done that. He has done that for you. He's done that for me. This is how someone obtains salvation, eternal life, the Bible calls it, and how someone goes to heaven. And then we had the very famous verses that sum up the gospel, I think, better than just about any other passage of scripture, where he tells Nicodemus, he says, for God so loved the world. He's so loved. One commentator said, that's the biggest word in all the Bible. He so loved the world. You live in the world while God's speaking to you. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. It's in a belief. See, God wanted you to be saved so bad. Jesus wanted you to be saved so bad that he paid the payment for your sin. He paid the payment for the fact that you are imperfect and that there's no way in your human ability that you can reconcile with God. So Jesus, the great eternal sacrifice, was the eternal solution for our eternal life. God looked out through the universe. There was nothing in the universe that God could use for a perfect holy eternal sacrifice for an eternal offense when we sin our sin is eternal offense against an eternal being so the justification for that must be an eternal punishment for eternal sacrifice Jesus Christ God's Son God the Son was came to this earth he lived a perfect life he was sinless and he died on a cross for your sins and for mine he so loved the world and he wants you to be saved so bad he wants you to reconcile with God to be made right in the eyes of God so bad and have a relationship with you that he will wrap salvation in a belief and as we looked at earlier it's not in church membership it's not in this or that not in our good works you're not going to get to heaven one day and God's gonna be like well the good The good put it on the scale, the bad put it on the scale, with the good outweighs the bad you can come. No, you cannot get to heaven on your own merit. Jesus gives us the gift of the gospel and gives us the gift of eternal life and wraps it in a belief system so that all can come. He's not willing that any should appearance, but that all should come to repentance. Christ puts the gospel on he puts the cookies on the bottom shelf so that a child can believe but an adult who lives their life rejecting God injecting God's can still find a way to God through belief through trusting that Jesus is God that he died. He was the perfect sacrifice for us. He justified our sins. It is paid in full for us. We don't have to spend forever in a place called hell paying for our own sin because Jesus did that for us on the cross. And 3 days later, he authenticated his claim that he was God and he rose again, showing you he was God. He appeared to 500 plus eyewitnesses. And I'm telling you, he came to die for you. so here we have in this passage for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son what does it say that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life Jesus wants you to be saved so brother Tyler how in the world can I go to heaven super simple A admit you are a sinner I tell people it's easy as ABC now it's not in that formula Okay? We just put it in certain formulas to kind of help people understand. Right? They have to have a basic understanding. Okay? You can't put your faith in something. You can't trust in something that you don't understand. You may not understand it fully. I still don't understand my salvation fully, how God would love me and how he would die for me and how he eradicated all of my sin, past, present, and future. I don't understand it fully. But I understand it enough like a child. I have a childlike understanding enough to be able to put my faith and trust. And Jesus said, unless you're a child, unless you become as one of these, you can't see the kingdom of God. And so A, how do you go to heaven? A, admit you're a sinner. You got to admit the fact that you are a sinner and that there's sin in your life. There's things that you do wrong. God is holy, you are not. This is what it means to be as if for God or for all I've sinned and come short of the glory of God. There's none righteous, no, not one, the Bible says. You got to admit that. And because of our sin, the Bible says, for the wages of sin is death. It's separation from God for all of eternity. But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. So our sin, the wages of our sin, the product of our sin, because we're a sinner, we deserve hell. we deserve separation from God for all of eternity paying for our own sin and it's for all of eternity because it was against a God who is eternal the crime the sentence is only eradicated by in light of who it offended that's what determines our sentence of eternal punishment but second part of that verse as I quoted but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord so a admit you're a sinner believe that Jesus died and rose again the third day believe with all your heart that Jesus really did come he lived a perfect life he died on a cross for your sins he rose again the third day to show you that he was God he did that for you and he truly is God the eternal sacrifice for us this is the gospel message A, admit your sinner, B, believe that Christ died, and C, call upon his name to be your savior. The Bible says, whosoever, that means anybody that calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Whosoever, anybody, no matter what, how rich you are, how poor you are, how fat you are, how skinny you are, no matter where you come from, Jesus wants to save you and he loves you. This is the only way to heaven. A, admit you're sinner, B, believe that Christ died and rose again the third day, and C, call upon his name to be your savior. You can do that right now. You can literally write wherever you're listening. You can pray right now and you can receive Jesus Christ. And in that moment, you can receive him. It's not, well, receive him today and make sure you're part of a church tomorrow and part, make sure you're baptized. The thief on the cross didn't get down off the cross. and get baptized for him to be able to go be with the Lord after he died the thief on the cross didn't live a lifestyle of chastity in order to get to heaven coupled with his belief in Christ no his belief in Christ was enough that Christ was who he said he was he believed in the gospel message and it's the same for you for by grace are you saved through faith that not of yourselves is the gift of God not of works lest any man should boast. And so if you want to trust Christ as your savior, you can do that today. I just encourage you to call out to him right now. Just bow your head. Pause this video. Bow your head and say, Lord, save me. What Peter said when he was walking on the water towards Jesus, he said, Lord, he started sinking. He took his eyes off the Lord, started sinking, and he said, Lord, save me. God will hear your cry and God will save you. You can have purpose, eternal life with God today. Today is the day of salvation, the Bible says. So let's pray. I want to pray for you. Whoever's listening to this in the future, I'm praying God uses this video in your life, but I'm praying for you and I'm praying that God helps you understand what it means to be saved and that in this moment you won't let another day go by separated from God. dear Lord we love you we thank you for the day you've given and I pray God for whoever's listening to this that they would trust you today they would not put it off any longer and if Lord they're relying on their good works or their achievements to to save them to justify them I pray God that they would put all that aside and they would totally lean on you salvation going to heaven is by grace through faith alone so Lord I pray that they would do that today Bless them now, Lord. In Jesus' name we ask these things. Amen. Well, we have gone a long time, a lot longer than expected today, but this is the gospel message. It's the greatest story ever told. And so I'm praying for you. Thank you so much for listening today. And if you're listening and you want to be able to, maybe you're not able to join the live stream, Then follow us anywhere you listen to podcasts. You can listen to podcasts if you're a podcast person or on our YouTube channel at TylerARobertson.com. We'll link to our YouTube channel or Tyler A. Robertson on YouTube. You'll find us. All of our episodes are archived there. And until then, we will see you next week. Are you a Christian who struggles to share your faith with others? Well, I want you to know that you're not alone. There's so many believers that they know Jesus has called them to go and to spread the good news of the gospel. don't know where to start. This is why I started the podcast, Good Talk with Tyler. It's a weekly show where we dive into God's Word and we answer the challenging questions of our culture today. But we also give you the tools that you need as a Christian to share your faith with boldness and clarity in an age of skepticism. As an evangelist, my goal is to train other evangelists to train people to be a missionary where they are, and I want to get the gospel to as many souls as possible. So if you're a Christian who wants to share your faith with boldness and with clarity, I would love for you to join our community. If you'll go down to the link below, you could join our