Most people today, Christian or not, think they’ll go to heaven when they die. They may not be sure about God’s existence, or about whether Jesus rose from the dead, or even if there is such a place as heaven. But the average American is relatively optimistic about his odds.
Very few of us, though, would admit that we’re cut out for heaven based on sheer goodness. Most of us think we’ll make the cut based on some deal we make with God. You know what I mean. God, get me this job and I promise I’ll be generous … Let this girl go out with me and I’ll go back to church … Get me a good grade on this test and I promise I’ll stop cussing. Deep down, we know we aren’t going to ever be perfect. So we hold out hope that God is willing to cut some deals. And if we give him the right amount of obedience, then he’ll reward us with heaven.
But there is no deal we can make ever with God. And here’s why:
1. We are all dead in our ability to please God.
When the Apostle Paul talked about our inability to “make deals” with God, he used an important case study—Abraham (Rom 4). God promised Abraham that he would be the “father of many nations” when he and his wife Sarah were nearly 100 years old. Both by virtue of age and by virtue of infertility, this couple was unable to have kids. As far as their lineage was concerned, they were dead.
We have just as much capacity to please God as an octogenarian does getting pregnant—that is, none.
We tend to think of ourselves as generally good people, who—if we tried just a bit harder—could probably get a passing grade on God’s final. But take a brief look at God’s measure of goodness, the 10 Commandments:
Commandment 1: You shall have no other gods before me. Do I love and cherish God more than anything else in my life? Is he the most valuable to me?
Commandment 2: You shall make no images of me. Am I satisfied with God as he is, or am I constantly wishing that I could make him into something else?
Commandment 3: Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain. Do I always treat God’s name with reverence? Have I ever said something about God that wasn’t true?
Commandment 4: Honor your parents. Am I always submissive to the authorities God has put in my life? My parents? The police? My boss?
That’s just the first 4. How are you doing so far? Be honest.
I don’t need to go through the other six to tell you how you and I would fare. Even the commandments that we might think we “pass” – like adultery – turn out to be failures when we consider that Jesus said our thoughts are as important as our actions. When I get to the end of that list, I’m 0 for 10. And when you’re 0 for 10 on the final exam, you aren’t passing the class.
Jesus said that unless our righteousness matched the righteousness of the Father, we could never enter heaven. Let’s stop deluding ourselves. We aren’t good enough. We’re dead.
2. We don’t have anything to offer to God.
The second big problem with cutting deals with God is the assumption that we have something he wants. We don’t.
Think about how foolish our negotiations must sound to God. “God, how about some extra prayers? How about some church attendance? What if I memorized some more Bible verses?” As if God is up in heaven rubbing his hands, saying, “Wait, really? You’ll go to church more? Now that’s an offer I can’t refuse! How lucky am I!”
We don’t have anything that can put God in our debt. There isn’t anything we have that he looks at longingly, just waiting for us to offer it to him because he lacks it. We’re talking about the Creator of the universe here. What could we possibly offer him that would force his hand?
Don’t get me wrong: God wants obedience from us. But obedience is never a bargaining chip that makes God “pay up.” If our obedience obligated God to give us anything, then the whole system of salvation would come undone. Which leads me to…
3. God alone will get the glory.
Perhaps the greatest verse in the entire Bible is Romans 4:5: “To the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited righteousness.” Credited. That means that our faith results in righteousness, but not because we earned it. It’s a gift that God gives us while we are still sinful. And he does that so that we’ll forever realize that salvation belongs to him alone.
If any of us were justified by our obedience, then we might have something to boast about. But God would never, ever let that happen. If he did, we’d be strutting around heaven, talking about all the great stuff we did to earn our spot there. But the book of Revelation says that everyone in heaven wears one name on their foreheads—not their own name, but the name of Jesus. It’s a reminder from here to eternity that it wasn’t our name that got us in; it was his.
So if you ask someone in heaven why they’re there, you’re going to get the same answer every time—Jesus. No one gets to heaven by amassing an awesome reputation. No one gets to God by being good enough. We get there by grace; and God gets the glory. The only kind of people who go to heaven are those who know they don’t belong there.
For more, be sure to listen to the entire message here.
