THE BIBLE
Can we trust a book written 2000 years ago?

EYEWITNESS
Did the writers of the New Testament get their picture of Jesus right?

GOD - MAN
Is Jesus really God?

RESURRECTION
Did Jesus really rise from the dead?

RELIGIONS
With so many religions, why Christianity?

SUFFERING
If there is a God, why is there so much suffering?

TRINITY
Understanding the Trinity.

SCIENCE
The complementary nature of Science & Christianity.

FORGIVENESS
What it is and why it matters?

GUIDANCE
How does God guide?

REPENTANCE
What it is and why you can't get to heaven without it.

BORN AGAIN
What does it mean to be converted and born again?

SAVING FAITH
The kind of faith that will get you to heaven

ASSURANCE
Can I know for sure that I am going to heaven?

TRUTH
What is truth and does it matter?

MORALITY
Does it matter how we live? A Christian view of morality.

THE CHURCH
God's vision for his family, the Church. A call to the churches of the new millennium.

PURPOSE
How can I find a great purpose for living?

IDENTITY
Who am I; Finding my true identity as a human being and as a child of God.

SELF-ESTEEM
How can I feel good about my self? The Christian basis for proper sel-esteem.

LIFE AFTER DEATHChristianity's Hope & Challenge.

THE CROSS
Why did Jesus Die? What the Bible says about the Cross.

Grace
The importance of grace in the New Testament.

Truths on which we base our certainty of heaven

How can we have this kind of certainty? The Puritan minister, Richard Baxter, said on his deathbed, "I bless God I have a well-grounded assurance of my eternal happiness, and a great peace and comfort within." Some people think they are going to heaven, but the basis on which they make that assumption is not well-grounded. I remember the English cricketer, David Sheppard, now bishop of Liverpool, tell how his sister heard someone on a bus say, "I know I am a Christian. I have a letter from the Archbishop." That assurance is hardly well-grounded! I suggest there are three truths on which we should base our hope if we are to have confidence in the face of death. Each of these truths is related particularly to the activity of one of the members of the divine Trinity - Father, Son and Holy Spirit.*

*I have explored further the nature of God as three Persons - Father, Son and Holy Spirit - in Understanding the Trinity.

1. The work of God the Son

First, it is vital to grasp that our acceptance by God does not depend on our being able to make ourselves good enough for him. That is an impossibility. We all come a long way short of his standards. Our acceptance can only be dependent on what Jesus has done on our behalf by paying the penalty for our sins on the cross, and our receiving his forgiveness. "God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).

It is interesting that the words Jesus cried out while hanging on the cross, "It is finished", could be translated, "It is paid." One of the uses of the Greek word used here in the New Testament was that of paying a debt in the market place. Hudson Taylor, the founder of the China Inland Mission, discovered this truth when a lad of 17. He was brought up in a third-generation Christian home, his grandfather having been converted to Christ on his wedding day during the Methodist revival that spread across England under the preaching of John Wesley. Hudson, though surrounded by Christian influence, had made no personal commitment to Christ himself. One day, while browsing in his father's library, he picked up a Christian tract and began to read it. In his own words he describes what happened:

I...was struck with the phrase "the finished work of Christ."...Immediately the words "It is finished" suggested themselves to my mind. What was finished? And I at once replied, "A full and perfect atonement and satisfaction for sin. The debt was paid for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." Then came the further thought, "If the whole work was finished and the whole debt paid, what is there left for me to do?" And with this dawned the joyful conviction, as light was flashed into my soul by the Holy Spirit, that there was nothing in the world to be done but to fall down on one's knees, and accepting this Saviour and His salvation praise Him for evermore.

The Bible is very clear on the matter of our not being able to get to heaven on the basis of our own goodness. "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast" (Ephesians 2:8,9). A place in God's family is not something to be earned. It is a gift to be received. This means that for someone to say, "I know I am going to heaven", when rightly understood, is not being presumptuous. It is not boasting that I am worthy of it. It is boasting of the saving power of Jesus Christ. It is putting him on the pedestal, not me - and that is honouring him. He can save even someone like me!

As I first trust Jesus to forgive my sins and give me the gift of eternal life, so I may also trust him to keep me faithful to him until death. A useful illustration of this comes from the life of Lord Radstock, an English nobleman of the last century. He was a committed Christian and gifted speaker. Because of his connections with nobility, he had access to many of the royal families of Europe. He would often hold informal meetings in royal sitting rooms and share his faith in Christ. Among those to whom he witnessed were the Czar and Czarina of Russia.

On one occasion, after speaking at a meeting in Woolwich, he nearly missed his train home. He just had time to jump on board as the guard blew the whistle. A young army officer had followed him onto the platform and, running up to the carriage window, said to him, "Sir, I heard you speak tonight; but tell me, how can a fellow keep straight and upright?" The train had started and there was no time for a long reply, so Radstock took out his pencil and laid it on the palm of his hand. "Can that pencil stand upright?" "No." Then he grasped the pencil in his hand and held it in an upright position. "Ah, but you are holding it now." "Yes," replied Radstock, "and your life is like that pencil - helpless. But Christ is the hand that can hold you." And the last the young officer saw of Radstock on that occasion was the outstretched hand holding that pencil as the train rounded a curve and was lost to sight. Twenty-five years later the same officer met Lord Radstock in India and told him that all those years ago, on that railway platform, he had trusted his life to Christ. Christ had upheld him and kept him ever since.

Peter says that we "through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time" (1 Peter 1:5). Jesus said of those who are his, "No one can snatch them out of my hand" (John 10:28). If we do the trusting, he will do the keeping.

2. The word of God the Father

The second basis for our confidence must be what God the Father says in the Bible about the work of his Son. It is in the Bible that God has given us a revelation of himself and his plans. We find there that not only has he clearly declared what Jesus has done on our behalf, but he has also declared that he will accept those who trust in Jesus.

There are some great promises in the New Testament on this subject. Here are three of them. John declares in his first letter, "If we don't believe what God has said about his Son, it is the same as calling God a liar. God has also said that he gave us eternal life and that this life comes to us from his Son. And so, if we have God's Son, we have this life" (1 John 5:10-12). Jesus' promise to those who open the door of their hearts to him is "I will come in" (Revelation 3:20). Again he promised, "Whoever comes to me I will never drive away" (John 6:37). In the original Greek language in which this verse was written, the "never" is emphasised. These are the words of a man of integrity!

This means that if we have sincerely come to Jesus, accepted that he died for us, asked his forgiveness, submitted to him as our Saviour and Lord, and then do not believe that he has accepted us as one of his family, we are casting doubt on his promise. John puts it more bluntly. We are making God a liar. We must learn to trust his word. He said it; I believe it; that settles it.

To rely on our up-and-down feelings is a shaky foundation on which to base the assurance of our acceptance by God. Harry Ironside, one-time pastor of the famous Moody Church in Chicago, said, "Looking into your own heart for a ground of confidence is like casting the anchor in the hold of a ship." We need something solid outside ourselves in which to put our trust.

Feelings come and feelings go,
And feelings are deceiving.
My warrant is the Word of God,
None else is worth believing.

Though all my heart should feel condemned,
For want of one sweet token,
There is One greater than my heart,
Whose word cannot be broken.

I'll trust in His unchanging words
Till soul and body sever,
For though all else shall pass away,
His Word shall stand forever.

There is a delightful story told about an old minister who had preached the gospel with clarity and power during his public ministry. When he was suffering, at times he found himself greatly disturbed by doubts and uncertainty. Mentioning the matter to his wife, she drew his attention to John 5:24 in which Jesus declares, "I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life." As he read those wonderful words again, the minister burst into a joyful laugh and said, "How strange that I should ever forget words like these, when I have preached on them myself for years."

Sometime later his wife came into the room and found him leaning over the side of the bed, holding the open Bible underneath it. She exclaimed, "Whatever are you doing?" He answered, "Satan has been after me again, and as he is the prince of darkness, I took it that he would be in the darkest place in the room, which is under the bed. I was just showing him John 5:24, and the moment he saw it he ceased to trouble me."

It is Christ's death that makes the believing sinner safe, but it is God's word that makes the trusting Christian sure.

3. The witness of God the Holy Spirit

Though feelings are not the main criteria for deciding whether or not we are the Lord's people, they do have their place in the Christian's experience. After all, peace and joy are feelings, and the New Testament has a lot to say about them. Paul says, "For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, 'Abba, Father.' The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs - heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ..." (Romans 8:15-17). In other words, when the Holy Spirit comes into our lives he gives us an inner awareness of our relationship to God. He also produces the desire to come to him with our needs as a child would to its father. One of the evidences that we have received the Holy Spirit is that we have the desire to pray and the awareness that God listens.

Lt. General William K. Harrison, former Senior Delegate of the United Nations Command Troops Team in Korea, and later Commander in Chief of the Caribbean Command, put it like this:

It is wonderful to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and I am exceedingly thankful that God has graciously led me to saving faith in Christ. God gives us who believe in Christ a daily personal experience which is convincing evidence of the reality of a new life in Christ.

There is another way also in which the Holy Spirit witnesses to his presence in our lives. Paul says, "the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control" (Galatians 5:22,23). In other words, as the sap in an apple tree will eventually produce apples, one of the evidences that the Holy Spirit is within us is that he will be working changes in our character, producing a little more love, a little more patience, a little more goodness, and so on. His ministry is to produce in us something of the character of Jesus. Am I aware that this is happening? I may have a very long way to go. Most of us do! But at least I will be aware that I am different from what I was.

This means that growth in Christian character and the outward expression of that in good works have an important place in the Christian life and should be part of the evidence that we are his people. However, this is not the means of earning acceptance with God, but rather the outflow of that acceptance and our relationship with him. This becomes particularly clear when we look at John's first letter towards the end of the New Testament.

John's first letter (1 John) - a useful summary

John is very clear about the reason he wrote this letter. It was that his readers might have certainty about their relationship to God and that God had indeed given them eternal life (1 John 5:10-13). It is interesting that John uses the word "know", or its equivalent, about 36 times in this letter. However, he uses it in three different senses. He talks about knowing the truth about God. For instance, he says we "know that he is righteous" (2:29). He also uses it in the sense of knowing God personally, as one would know a friend. The third way he uses it is in the sense of knowing, or being certain, that we know God and that he has indeed given us eternal life. He uses the word roughly a dozen times in each of these three senses. Some of the reasons he gives that we may be sure of our relationship to God are challenging. For instance, he says, "Our love for each other proves that we have gone from death to life" (3:14). He also says a lot about our obedience to God. If you want to explore the matter further I suggest you read the letter through. It is not a long one.

We could sum up what we have been saying so far like this: God the Holy Spirit bears witness in our hearts and in our behaviour to the truth of what God the Father declares about the work of God the Son in coming to die and rise again on our behalf. A long sentence, but hopefully it makes sense.

Foreward

Can I know for sure that I am going to Heaven?

The nature of our relationship with God

Christian certainty in the New Testament

Truths on which we base our certainty of heaven

Does it matter?

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