People hate discussing religion either because they know that everyone else in the world believes differently or because they just do not know half as much as a theologian does and are therefore scared of being judged by their views on the matter. Admittedly, I cringe every time the subject on religion or faith in general pops up randomly at any conversation be it among friends or in the office because truth be told, if all of you have diverse beliefs, religion and faith can be a never ending debate that will leave each of you either enlightened, offended, or just plain pissed.
I’m not just talking about discussions revolving around the different religions of the world. At least those kinds of talks offer a wide range of open-mindedness. I’ve noticed that it’s when we discuss Christianity where some people I know and I do not really see eye to eye—90% of the time. The arguments often flare up on the subject of salvation—a simple word which has often been misunderstood by a good number of people.
The basic belief that we’ve been taught about as children when it comes to salvation is that if we do a laundry list of things and sacrifice and suffer to end in the name of our Lord, come hell or high water, we will be saved. At least that’s the way we see salvation in a nutshell. But you know people can still overanalyze and overcomplicate things and I seriously would not want to elaborate on it even more.
But honestly, the concept of being saved is very simple, so simple that it’s really just too good to be true. It’s too good to be true that our finite human minds have difficulty grasping something like it considering that it’s something that comes from someone so big, so powerful, and perceivably unreachable.
I’ve always believed that being saved after the world explodes into smithereens and after we’re all blasted to kingdom come only takes one thing on our end: unwavering faith. It’s a no-frills approach, a no-nonsense requirement that’s stated clearly in Ephesians 2:8: For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.
Because it is a gift, it is given freely and it is ours for as long as we accept it. We show gratitude and acceptance of this gift through believing that there is only one mighty and loving God who deserves all our praise and all our love. We don’t need to jump off a cliff or buy stuff just to enter the Pearly Gates. We’ve already been given a free pass and we’ve already been provided a bridge to get from point A to point B.
God already gave up his only son, Jesus Christ just to cleanse us from our sins and eliminate that thick barrier of bad deeds that’s been keeping us away from our Lord. It’s sin that has built a wall between man and God and it’s sin that’s broken our relationship with God in the past. Now that it’s been restored, we do not need to do anything more but to believe and to accept Christ in our hearts, to open the door, let Him in, and begin a lasting relationship with our Lord. Everything else follows.
Going to heaven doesn’t require a lot of money. It only requires a lot of faith.