What Must I Do To Be Saved?

Over the past couple of weeks, I've come to a conclusion:  it is much easier to witness to the lost man on the street than the religious man who thinks he's saved.  How do I know the religious man isn't saved?  I don't.  No one can know except that person and God, but on two separate occasions over the past couple of weeks, I've heard salvation testimonies that made me wonder what, exactly, these people believed in for salvation.

The first story was from a Catholic man who was explaining to me about his conversion to Christianity, but to be honest, I didn't have a clue what he was talking about.  He spoke of meeting God through meditation and later meeting Jesus even though he had always known about and believed in Him.  Huh?  No one has always known and accepted Jesus.  It is a choice, and after talking with this gentleman, I'm not sure he understood that.

The second was a story of religious ritual, and from the time of the ritual, supposedly, this woman was indwelt with the Spirit of God.  That was it!  That was the entire salvation testimony I received from her, so my question again is, what, exactly, is the woman trusting in to save her?  The ritual?  The religion?  Those who performed the ritual?

Please understand, I cannot judge the heart, and it may very well be that these two individuals are saved and on their way to heaven.  All I can say is that their testimonies certainly didn't convince me of that.  This has bothered me for days now, and I wondered how many other people out there are walking around with the belief that they're saved when they don't understand what it means to be saved.  So, the Lord burdened my heart to write this post today, and I urge you, even if you know the Lord as your personal Savior, to please read it so that you can be sure you're trusting in the right thing to save you.

We are all sinners and therefore are not worthy to enter into Heaven.  Heaven is a holy place, and sin is not allowed.  But God loved us so much and wanted us to be with Him for eternity, so He sent His Son, Jesus, to die on the cross for our sins.  He paid the price and, with His blood, purchased our ticket to Heaven.  However, we must accept that payment, admitting that we can't get to Heaven on our own and that we need Jesus as our Savior.  Salvation is just that.  It is believing that Jesus died for our sins and rose again the third day so that we could be with Him forever in Heaven.  In that belief, we accept His payment for our sins and invite Him to be the Lord of our lives.  In other words, we surrender our lives to Him since He bought and paid for them with His blood.  That's it!  There is no ritual or religious mumbo jumbo.  Salvation is a conscious decision to accept Jesus and His sacrifice for our sins.  And once this is done, it's done.  It cannot be undone.  You're saved forever!

I have written several other posts on salvation, and if you are not confident that you're believing in Jesus for your salvation, I plead with you to read through the following posts.  If you still have questions, please contact me.  I would be happy to help you understand.  The main thing to keep in mind is that salvation is not about religion; it's about a relationship with Christ.

1 - Glimpsing Grace;  2 - Focusing on Faith;  3 - Not of Works;  4 - What About Baptism?
5 - Who Can Be Saved?;  6 - Will I Still Sin After I'm Saved?;  7 - Can I Lose My Salvation?;
8 - Now What?

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. - John 3:16