Sapphos, some here will tell you that all you have to do to go to Heaven is to believe in God.
This simply isn't true. The Bible tells us that even the Devil and his angels believe in God and tremble at the name of Jesus.
The Bible tells us over and over that God gave us intellect and expects us to use it but, at the same time, it also tells us that we're not merely to believe in God, but to be born again and reconciled to Him.
We do this through repentance and faith in Christ. By this, we die to sin and are raised to new life in Christ and we are forgiven and reconciled to God to become His children.
Think of it this way. Let's say that you and I are on an airplane and the captain makes an announcement over the loudspeaker and says, "we've lost our engines and we're going to crash! There's a parachute under your seat. You must hurry."
So you, Sapphos, immediately jump up and put on your parachute and put it on. As you reach between your legs to tighten the harness, you see me just standing there, clutching the parachute in my arms.
"You fool!", you say, "Put on your 'chute. We only have a few seconds to jump or we're going to die!"
I simply look at you and say, "It's OK. I have faith that this parachute is going to save me".
As you stand in the door, ready to jump, you say "Don't be a fool! It can't save you unless you put it on."
"You don't understand", I answer. "I believe in the parachute".
You jump and float safely to Earth where you whisper a prayer and wait hopefully for the rest of us to land.
When I comes my turn to jump, I still haven't put the parachute on. I stand there with it clutched in my hands, believing that it will save me.
So, I jump. And immediately, the blast of air rips the parachute from my hands and you watch helplessly as I fall to my death.
I simply believed in the parachute, while you're the one who put it on.
In the same way, the Bible tells us over and over to "put on" Christ. It describes it in much the same way you would descibe putting a glove on a hand on a cold winter's day. In one passage, it even compares the characteristics of Christ to a suit of armor and encourages us to put on the armor.
What innocent odion is telling you isn't true. To go to Heaven, we must first be forgiven and to do that, we must put on Christ in the same way you put on that parachute, not to simply believe in God as I foolishly believed in the parachute, but never put it on.
I sincerely hope that you'll examine yourself to see if you've kept God's commandments. The Bible says that none of us have. I believe that if you'll be honest with yourself, you'll remember times in your life that you might have told a lie, or taken something that belonged to someone else, or used God's name in vain, or disrespected your parents.
Those things are sin and any of them makes us an enemy of God.
I strongly encourage you not to let another day go past without repenting and putting your faith in Christ. You just never know how many more days you have.
