SALVATION EQUATION

A (Your Part)  +  B (God’s Part)  =  C (Eternal Life)


PART 8 / 12
If You Believe Jesus Died and Rose Again


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If You Believe Jesus Died

If you believe Jesus died and rose again” is a salvation doctrine found in Protestant churches today.  It goes like this … If you just believe Jesus died for your sins and rose again, you’re saved.  That’s it.  That’s the faith or belief you have to have to go to heaven.  Wow, this is a terrible lie!  No one in the Bible believed that, not Jesus, not Paul, not any of the Apostles, and yet this lie persists today.  I was even taught this doctrine growing up in different protestant churches.  But on the Sabbath morning of December 8, 2007, everything changed!  For that was the morning I awoke to a voice telling me all about God’s salvation message behind the story of the Israelite’s bondage in Egypt, deliverance through Moses, and wilderness journey to a Promise Land.  And for the first time in my life I knew I had been lied to, my whole life in church, about salvation.

I instantly knew that “believing Jesus died for our sins and rose again” was NOT what we needed to do to go to heaven.  In fact, it wasn’t needed at all!  I immediately knew the Salvation Equation (SE), and that OUR ENTIRE DUTY in obtaining eternal life was to DO Term A, which was to live by God’s 10LC, exactly as Jesus had answered in the Gospels.  (I’m going to tell you the meaning behind the Israelite’s story in the conclusion, or part 12, of this series!)  But for now, let’s talk a little more about this erroneous salvation doctrine — If you believe Jesus died for you, you’re going to heaven.

Looking at our SE, this is like saying … ALL you have to DO to go to heaven is find out about Term B (what God had to do so we might have eternal life) and then you just have to mentally believe he did His part.  This is ridiculous!  This immediately begs the question … well then what happens to the millions of people on earth who never got to hear anything about the story of Jesus?  How do they get to heaven?  Oh, don’t worry about that, they’ll tell you.  God will figure that out.  Just believe our doctrine!  How stupid.

Believe Means Obey

See, somehow the idea got started that the word “believe” in the New Testament means to believe in what Jesus DID for us, meaning died and rose again.  For example, I was taught my whole life that the word “believe” in John 3:16 meant … “if I believe Jesus died for me, I will obtain everlasting life.”  You know the verse:

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16)

See, I was always told this meant “believe he died for me”.  But this isn’t true!  The Greek word translated “believe” in John 3:16 is the same one used all over the New Testament for “believe,” and just 20 verses later in John 3:36 we see it used again.  But this time we get the opposite to “believe not” used in the same verse, and guess what the Greek word for “believeth not” means?  The word is “apeitheo,” and it means: to disobey!  In other words, the word “believe” means to OBEY.  So every time you see the phrase “believe in the son” “believe in Jesus” “believeth in him” “believe in his name,” it always means the same thing … it means to OBEY Jesus, which means to OBEY his teachings.  And we’ve already learned ALL his teachings were based on keeping the 10LC.  So, in other words, to “believe in him” means to “keep the 10LC”.

So, for example, in the book of Acts, a jailor asked Paul & Silas: “What must I do to be saved?” (Acts 16:30)  And they replied: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved!” (Acts 16:31).  Friend, this is the same Greek Word used here for “believe” that was used in John 3:16 and John 3:36.  It means to OBEY Jesus!  Paul & Silas were saying “Obey Jesus’ teachings” and you will be saved.  In other words, “keep the 10LC” and you will be saved.  See, there’s no contradiction here with Christ’s words: “If you want to obtain eternal life, keep the 10LC”.  And of course, this all agrees with the verse: “Jesus became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that OBEY him” (Hebrews 5:9).  So let it forever be known, to BELIEVE in Jesus means to OBEY him, which means to KEEP the 10LC.

Misunderstood Verses

So let’s look now at some Scriptures where it might have got started that to “believe in Jesus” means something other than to believe in what he taught.  One time Jesus told the Pharisees:

“If you do not believe that I am he, you will die in your sins” (John 8:24)

Christ’s words here go back to God’s prophecy through Moses about the coming Messiah, THE PROPHET who was to come.  Moses had said this: “The Lord your God will raise up a prophet from among you, from your fellow Israelites, like unto me, you must listen to him in everything he tells you. And it shall come to pass, that every soul, which will not heed his words, shall be destroyed” (Acts 3:22-23, Deuteronomy 18:15-19).  Do you see?  It was ALL about OBEYING the Messiah’s teachings.  That was the important thing about THE Prophet to come.  And Jesus was that prophet!  Jesus was the Messiah.  But the Pharisees HATED his teachings.  Why?  Because he preached obedience to the 10LC, and they didn’t keep them!  They were full of pride and covetousness.  They carried God’s name in vain.  They were thieves who dishonored their parents, and on and on.  And so Jesus was saying to them: if you don’t believe that I am he, the one in whom you need to obey, you will die in your sins!  So this passage is the same thing again — if you don’t keep the 10LC, you will perish.

Then there’s Paul’s words in Romans — and we here this one continually today! — as follows:

“If thou shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved” (Romans 10:9)

This sounds like if we just say with our mouth, “I believe Jesus is Lord, and that he’s risen from the grave” we’re going to heaven.  But Jesus said, “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ when you don’t DO what I say?” (Luke 6:46).  Friend, it’s like this … if you rent a house from a landlord, and his rules are no pets and no smoking in his house, you must abide by those rules because he is your Lord.  If you don’t, he will kick you out of his house, and then he will NOT be your Lord.  So this is how it is with Jesus, you must follow his rules or else he’s not your Lord!  And those rules are the 10LC.  So just confessing “Jesus is Lord” with your mouth is meaningless if you’re not living by the 10LC.  So these words from Paul are also saying the same thing, the ONLY PEOPLE who can TRULY confess Jesus is Lord, are those who have made him their Lord by living by his teachings, the 10LC.  So this verse is in perfect agreement with everything we’ve learned so far.  And it’s also in agreement with Christ’s words: “Not everyone who calls me, ‘Lord, Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only those who DO the will of my Father will enter” (Matthew 7:21).  And friend, the will of the Father is for you to love, to keep the 10LC.

Warning!

So listen, I just want you to be aware of this satanic deception, that somehow just mentally believing that “Jesus died for you and rose again” is going to get you into heaven.  It’s not!  It’s a lie!  And reciting some sinner’s prayer to that effect will be just as meaningless on Judgment Day.  Things like, “Father, I believe you sent your son Jesus to die for my sins.  And I believe he rose again.  And I confess with my mouth he is Lord.  And so right now, I declare, I am saved!”  Have you ever heard these prayers?  I have, my whole life!  And yet you know what?  They’re just a deception that takes the light off of the Biblical truth of what we REALLY must do to obtain eternal life.  The ONLY THING that’s going to count on Judgment Day is whether or not you lived your life by the 10LC or not.

So I’m just here to warn you … don’t be deceived about YOUR DUTY in obtaining eternal life for your soul.  It has always been and always will be Term A in the SE.  Repent of your sins!  Turn from doing evil to doing good!  Keep the 10LC.  Do as Paul taught: “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:12).  And don’t let anyone try and confuse you over Paul’s words in his letters.  Paul knew the truth!  And he declared it openly — Live right, and you’ll go to heaven, don’t, and you won’t!  Remember, it was Paul who said: “For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who OBEY the LAW (the 10LC) who will be declared righteous” (Romans 2:13).  So there you have it, now just go and do it.

 

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