Issues That Can Keep People Out Of Heaven

Issues That Can Keep People Out Of Heaven
‘Jesus said, “Unless one is born-again they cannot see the Kingdom of God … I assure you most solemnly
(seriously), unless one is born of water and of the Holy Spirit they cannot enter the Kingdom of God. What is born of the flesh is flesh; what is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Marvel not (do not be surprised or astonished) at My telling you, you must all be born anew from above’” (John 3:3 to 7). ‘Stand firm in the faith, for it is through many tribulations (afflictions, pressures, hardships, persecution, trials) we must enter the Kingdom of God’ (Acts 14:22). ‘Blessed are those who obey His commandments. They have the right to the tree of life and may enter through the gates into the city’ (Revelation 22:14).
Jesus said, “Enter (the Kingdom of God) through the narrow gate, for wide (open) is the gate that leads to
destruction (hell), and many are those who are entering (into hell) through it. But the gate (to heaven) is
narrow and the way that leads to eternal life is straitened (restricted), and few are those who find it” (Matthew 7:13 & 14). In this verse, Jesus was inferring there are far more people going to hell than to heaven. ‘Many’ people are going to hell, and only a ‘few’ find their way to heaven. There are many issues confronting people in the world today and the deception of some teachings can keep people away from God and thus out of heaven. When people reject God and are involved in wickedness, sometimes He will send a delusion. ‘Therefore God sends them an error so they might believe a lie … because they took pleasure in
unrighteousness’ (2 Thessalonians 2:11 & 12).
The whole Bible is the Word of God, written down as He inspired His prophets (2 Timothy 3:16 & 17),
therefore we must obey all His commandments. In the Old Testament the Jews and the few Gentiles who
accepted God, had to sacrifice animals for forgiveness of sin. Jesus changed all that when He became our
ultimate Sacrificial Lamb. Jesus came and laid down for mankind a new set of rules for entering heaven. The
way to get into heaven is to believe in God, accept Jesus is the Son of God and is our Saviour and the Rock
of our salvation. We need to repent, be baptised in water by full emersion, be filled with the Holy Spirit, serve the Lord and we must believe the truth of the whole Bible. All sin will be forgiven if people repent. If people do not repent and continue to live in their sin, they could miss out on the Kingdom of God. Being a Christian is more than being a holy person on earth; it is God’s plan for humans for eternity. If we refuse to accept God’s plan of salvation, we will be separated from Him forever. There is no other way of salvation. We will list a few issues that could result in people loosing their salvation:
Sexual immorality of all persuasions … God created sex for marriage and all sex outside of marriage is sin
and all those who practice such things are worthy of eternal death (Romans 1:24 to 32).
Unbelief … If we do not believe God sent His Son Jesus, then we cannot be saved and therefore, cannot get
into heaven. ‘They were not able to enter in because of unbelief’ (Hebrews 3:19).
Smoking, alcoholism and illegal drugs can keep people so bound by the addiction they have enormous
difficulty finding God. If they do become Christian and keep ingesting drugs, the addiction can have a
detrimental effect on their walk with the Lord. It is not possible to grow as a Christian when we are giving in
to sin. ‘Be not drunk with wine for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Holy Spirit’ (Ephesians 5:18). We need to glorify God in our bodies (2 Corinthians 5:10) – so if it does not glorify God – for your own sake, you need to give it up. Jesus said we must deny ourselves (Matthew 16:24).
Another issue that can keep people out of God’s will and therefore His Kingdom is rebellion and
stubbornness. Some people find submitting to God’s will extremely difficult and they want to ‘do their own
thing’, and thus it can cause them to miss out on going to heaven. They really do not want to hand over their
will to God, and as a Christian we must have the attitude like Jesus did, “Not my will Lord, but Yours be
done” (Luke 22:42).
Rock music is sometimes so evil it takes an evil heart to appreciate it. If we want to grow as a Christian we
will need to get all secular music out of our life. There is no secular music that glorifies God, therefore as a
Christian we should not fill our mind with it. Secular music lyrics are usually negative and can bring a
negative atmosphere, and therefore induce depression, rebellion and sometimes even thoughts of suicide.
There is a host of various types of good Christian music that can be enjoyed by all Christians wanting to
edify themselves by hearing the Word of God in song. So-called ‘Christian’ rock music is not Christian at all.
It is a deception by the devil to get people ‘hooked’ so they will not listen to truly edifying music that does
glorify God. If the music you listen to does not glorify God – for your own sake, do not listen to it. We need to listen to Psalms, hymns and Spiritual songs that make melody in our hearts (Ephesians 5:19). In other
words, we need to listen to music that glorifies God and edifies us.
‘The Holy Spirit says expressly, in later times some will fall away from the faith paying attention to seducing
spirits and doctrines of demons’ (1 Timothy 4:1). ‘The time will come when people will not listen to sound
doctrine, but having itching ears will heap up for themselves teachers after their own desires and will turn
away their ears from the Truth and turn aside to untruths’ (2 Timothy 4:3 & 4). Some major issues that keep
people’s interest on worldly things and off God’s chosen way for mankind are evolution, pseudo ‘Christian’
religions, the occult, false religions such as Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Sikh-ism, Scientology, Jehovah’s
Witnesses, Mormonism, Raeleans, witchcraft/warlocks, Wicca, the occult, Satanism, Reiki, Yoga, idolatry,
Jainism, Confucianism, Zen, Freemasonry, order of the skull and bones, Fabianism, Rosicrucians, astrology,
teacup reading, compilers and readers of horoscopes, ‘Christian’ science, special interest and minority
groups that have hijacked reality. The New Age movement would have brought many people to the brink of a lost eternity. Believing in a so-called new age or the ‘Age of Aquarius’ is denying the Sovereignty of God. We can never be gods and will never be gods. We are created beings, made by God for His purposes and plans for eternity. Meditations other than meditating on the Bible is going the wrong way and those who practice all of the above need to repent of their sin or they will perish. They cannot enter the Kingdom of God. All of these beliefs are doctrines that demons teach. All of these false religions and beliefs lead away from God, and thus away from heaven. It is a sad fact, but to comprehend the scripture regarding the wide and narrow gates, is to understand that only a few will find their way to heaven and most people will end up in hell, and after the final judgement – the lake of fire. Anybody who believes in any of these things are headed for eternity without God unless they repent of believing in these untruths and turn to God the Father.
Have a look at the website (not our website, but another) called ‘The Great Global Warming Hoax’ for more details about how the whole world is being deceived by a few unbelievers in the scientific world and people in the media with their own evil agenda. The world heats and cools in its own regular cycles and has done since creation. It is normal and not to be feared. Missing out on heaven is far more of a problem than warm weather! Evolution is another lie from the devil and is completely contrary to scripture. The first two chapters of Genesis tells us all about the creation story. It is a true story because the Bible is a book of truth, written by Jewish men who were inspired by God. There is no room for compromise. The Bible is the truth and evolution is a lie. For more information about creation, browse the website called ‘Answers in Genesis’. See answersingenesis.org
The fairly modern phenomenon regarding UFO’s is deceiving thousands of people. The Old and New
Testaments in the Bible talk about other creations other than the human race and animals on earth, but
mankind is the one and only creation to ever be given a Saviour. There are divine armies that are invisible to
our sense of sight, who come to earth when the Lord asks them to. Angels are the Lord’s messengers to
minister to His people (Hebrews 1:14) and sometimes Christians do see them, but only when the Lord
chooses to open their spiritual eyes so they can see them (2 Kings 6:17). Some people have had angels visit
them (Luke 1:11; 1:26), some people see angels in dreams (Matthew 1:20; 2:19), sometimes angels eat
meals with people without the people knowing they are with angels (Hebrews 13:2). Born-again Christians
can and do speak in the languages of angels (1 Corinthians 13:1) but we cannot focus our attention on
angels, we need to focus our attention on Jesus. More scriptures that describe other creations in heaven can
be found in the books of Ezekiel and Revelation. We see there are things in heaven and on earth, things
seen and unseen, thrones, dominions, rulers, authorities (Colossians 1:16), and wicked things in heavenly
places (Ephesians 6:12). There are evil beings that are lurking around on the earth and in the air (Ephesians
2:2). They can do things to delude people who refuse to acknowledge the Truth (2 Thessalonians 2:9 to 10).
Those evil beings will end up in eternal fire (2 Peter 2:4). Do not allow yourself to head for destruction, but
accept Jesus as your Saviour without delay.
The Apostle Paul was taken up into the third heaven and heard things that he could not describe (2
Corinthians 12:2 to 4), so we know there is at least three levels of heaven. All other creations that do not live
in the third heaven and above, do not have a way of salvation and are doomed if they sin (Jude 1:6).
Certainly some can move around the first and second heavens (the upper atmosphere) as the scriptures tell
us, and they appear to be able to ‘do wondrous things’ (Matthew 24:24), but they cannot touch nor hurt a
Christian who is covered and justified by the redemptive blood of Jesus. UFO’s are real, and they are also
really evil. The so-called UFO sightings will increase as evil on the earth increases, but they will never, ever
take over the earth. God will not let that happen. All they can do is deceive, delude and frighten people.
Some foolish people like to believe – and they actually pretend – UFO’s are more than they really are. To
embrace UFO’s, is to embrace evil. Science fiction regarding the universe is almost always utterly evil. One
only has to look at the ‘faces’ of the so-called ‘aliens’ in the movies to see that. The current Mir space station that is being regularly added to, is not of God and one day He will destroy it because He created the earth to be inhabited, not space (Isaiah 45:18). If UFO’s frighten you then perhaps you need to accept Jesus as your Saviour. Only He can save us and protect us from all the evil that will be coming on the whole earth. Jesus said not to allow ourselves to be misled (Matthew 24:4; Mark 13:22).
How can we be saved? How can we live without fear? How can we enter heaven? The one and only way to
enter heaven when we die is by becoming a Christian and accepting Jesus as our personal Messiah and
Saviour. Absolutely nobody can enter heaven except first we repent of our sins and false beliefs and accept
God’s provision for salvation. The Bible says God has provided the one and only way of eternal life. Jesus
said, “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life and nobody comes to the Father except by Me” (John 14:6).
‘Those who believe in the Son of God has Jesus’ testimony within them. They who do not believe God, has
made Him out to be a liar because they have not believed the evidence that God has given regarding His
Son. This is the testimony: God gave us eternal life and this Life is in His Son. They who have the Son, has
that Life. They who do not have the Son of God, do not have that Life’ (1 John 5:10 to 12).
If you are involved in any of the false religions mentioned above, or if you are involved in any belief other
than Christianity, then you need to repent, turn away from the false beliefs and ask the Lord God our Father
and His Son Jesus into your life. That is the one and only way to get into heaven. To believe in a false
religion is to disbelieve the truth. You believe in a doctrine taught by demons, spoken by the father of lies,
the devil (John 8:44). Even a ‘religious’ person can be kept out of heaven by trusting in their religion, rather
than trusting in Jesus. We can read in all the four Gospels how the religious people of Jesus’ time (the
scribes, Sadducees and Pharisees) mocked Him, were hostile to Him, and we can also read Jesus’ anger
towards their strong religious beliefs. Jesus said our righteousness must be more than that of the religious
people or we will never enter heaven (Matthew 5:20). Jesus said ‘woe to them’ for their sin was keeping
them and others out of heaven (Matthew 23:13 to 29).
Another false ‘god’ that can keep people out of heaven is sport. Have you noticed how the fans stand, raise
their arms in the air then bow en masse to the sports team? That is idolatry. The people are worshipping the
‘god’ of sport. We cannot serve two masters. Either they will serve the sports team or they will serve God. If
they are worshipping the ‘god’ of sport by raising their hands and bowing, then it is impossible for them to be
worshipping the Lord God at the same time. They all need to repent and turn to God. Playing sport is not a
sin. In fact it is good for our health and is good for enhancing self-discipline. It is the worship of sport that is
wrong and it is the love of sport that is wrong. We need to love the Lord with all our hearts, all our soul, all
our minds and all our strength (Mark 12:30). We can enjoy sport, but we must love the Lord.
Wealth can also keep people out of heaven. Jesus said, “How difficult is it for those who are wealthy and
trust in riches to enter the Kingdom of God? It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for
a rich man to enter the Kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 19:23 & 24; Mark 10:23 to 25; Luke 18:24 & 25). In order to get into heaven, we need to trust in the Lord and not in our wealth. It is not wrong to be wealthy but is wrong to trust solely in our wealth because we can loose it in an instant. It is not money that is the root of evil; it is the love of money that is the root of many evils and some have been led astray from the faith in their greed’ (1 Timothy 6:10). Besides this, it is God who gives us the power to get wealth in the first place.
‘Beware lest you say in your heart, my power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth. You
shall earnestly remember the Lord your God, for it is He Who gives you the power to get wealth’
(Deuteronomy 8:17 & 18). The Lord gives people the power to gain wealth but we, as God’s stewards on
earth, have to use it wisely. Remember, all the money in the world belongs to God and He gives it to
whomever He wills. What we do with it is what counts, not how much we have or do not have.
Reincarnation is another issue that keeps people from accepting God. They think if they ‘blow it’ in this life
then they may succeed in the next – so they think there is no need for salvation. That thought is very wrong.
Some religions believe they might be reincarnated as rats or insects! They would have to be very far away
from God for Him to allow them to be so deluded, because He wants to save them. There is no reincarnation
– there is no second chance – we must be born-again in this life – we only have one chance, and one
chance only. ‘It is appointed for all men (and women) once to die, and after that comes their judgement’
(Hebrews 9:27).
Illness is another issue that keeps people out of heaven. Even when faced with death, some people still
refuse to turn to God, and dead people cannot ask God into their lives when there is no more life. If you are
facing death through illness, then you need to turn to God or you will be lost. We only have one chance. If
you are a parent who has lost a young child, do not worry about their salvation. All children go straight to
heaven when they die (2 Samuel 12:23). It is only the adults who have a knowledge of sin, of good and evil,
and choose to ignore God’s cleansing power, who will be lost forever if they do not repent.
To accept Jesus and form a loving relationship with God the Father through Jesus His Son, is to know peace
and to be free from the anxieties of this world. People who do not know God, do not have peace. ‘There is no peace for the wicked’ (Isaiah 48:22; 57:21). To get to heaven, we must have a deep, personal relationship with God and we must be born-again of God as Jesus said. Remember Jesus said not to be surprised or astonished at His telling us that. We should not be surprised that we have to adhere to the way of salvation chosen by God. It was His choice to offer salvation, and His choice to do it through Jesus. Jesus was saying we are not to be surprised that His conditions for our salvation, is to be truly born-again of the Spirit of God, not just become a religious person. To be born-again is to take voluntary steps towards God. What steps?
Let’s have a look.
Step one: Believe. If we do not believe in God or Jesus or salvation, it is impossible to be born-again and
therefore impossible to get into heaven. ‘Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, you and your
household’ (Acts 16:31).
Step two: Ask God into our life. He stands waiting for us to invite Him into our life. He will never push His way in. It has to be our choice and our free will. We have to invite Him in. Read the wonderful, inviting words of Jesus in this fantastic scripture, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to them and will eat with them and they will eat with Me” (Revelation 3:20).
Step three: Repent. That means to turn away from our old life and begin a new life with God. The word
‘repent’ means more than simply turning over a new leaf. It is much more involved than that. To repent is to
change our mind for the better and heartily amend our ways, with abhorrence of our past sins. We can read
Jesus’ double call to repentance, and that tells us He was very serious about repentance. “I tell you, unless
you repent you will all perish and be lost eternally … I tell you, unless you repent you will all perish and be
lost eternally” (Luke 13:3 & 5).
Step four: Be baptised. Jesus was baptised and in obedience, we also need to be baptised. Everyone has to
be baptised. Not just some of us, but everyone. If we are not baptised we are not being obedient.
Repentance and baptism go hand in hand. ‘Repent and be baptised every one of you in the name of Jesus
our Messiah for the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit’ (Acts 2:38).
Step five: Find a church that will support your new life and attend regularly. The Lord expects us to fellowship with other believers. ‘Do not forsake assembling together as believers, but encourage one another’ (Hebrews 10:25). If for some reason you are unable to attend a church, then find someone who is born-again and ask  them to fellowship with you and guide you.
Step six: Grow in grace. As you spend time with God, praying, listening to Christian music, attending church,
reading the Bible and fellowshipping with other Christians, so you will become more like Jesus which is our
ultimate goal. ‘Grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus our Messiah’ (2 Peter 3:18).
Step seven: Serve the Lord with gladness (Psalm 100:2) and obey His every command. Jesus said, “If you
love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15).
There are many more issues that keep people out of the Kingdom of God; more than we could possibly list
here, but the main issue is unbelief. There is only one way into heaven and it is simple; believe in Jesus,
accept Him into your life and you will be saved. If you do not believe, you cannot be saved. The only answer
to all the judgement that will come on the whole earth is for people to seek God and believe in Jesus, His
Son. We do hope and pray this text will open the eyes of unsaved people so they will turn from their false
beliefs and accept Jesus and become born-again as the scriptures say. Heaven rejoices every time a sinner
repents. Jesus said, “There will be more joy in heaven over one who repents than over 99 righteous people
who have no need of repentance … I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one
sinner who repents” (Luke 15:7 & 10).
Amen and God bless you. www.bibleabookoftruth.com