Here's a question:
If i am saved by accepting Jesus Christ as my savior, and that he died on the cross for my sins.... why try not to commit sins? Why not just go around and sin anytime i feel like it?
I'm still saved right? I'll still go to heaven right? Isn't that what the Bible says?
Becuase tonite I'm going to sex outside of marriage with 3 women and then I'm going to lie about it, then i'm going to wish i could have sex with my neighbor's wife and own his house. After wards I'm going to eat fig newtons until i pass out or start seeing tracers. then i'm going ot have a meditation party and make contact with spirits, then I'm ging to a Mormon church and drink coffee in front of all of them and then I'll call some one father who is not my father in heaven and then play in repeptitive verses until my tounge stops from muscle failure. then i'm going to buy meth from a gay massage therapist and snort it off my wife's ass while she has gay sex with another woman.
BUT don't worry: I'M STILL SAVED!
ever look up the definition of grace? IIRC, grace has a big role in salvation.
Just b/c one
didn't sleep w three underage girls, then do some meth and repeat, doesn't mean that one has magically become deserving of salvation . . . the bible isn't big on degree (if you lust in your mind, you might as well have screwed the objects of your lust) . . . I guess the idea is that if you miss it by an inch, you might as well have missed it by a mile. a concept that most people have difficulty with . . .
but, yeah, grace has no relation to works. There's that parable in the New Testament about the vineyard owner who goes out in the morning and hires a bunch of white guys, and then goes out about an hour before quitting time and hires a bunch of illegal Mexicans . . . at quitting time, he pays them both the same. This parable is really interesting b/c it brings the notion of "works" into consideration.
Note: some liberties might have been taken in my retelling, but the gist is the same. The "Prodigal son" has pretty much the same theme.
So yeah, Mr. Hitler might be in heaven if he truly repented and accepted Christ before death, whereas Dr. Schweitzer might not be if he hadn't.
DOesn't go down easy.
I guess the important qualification is that God judges the heart. in other words, he decides whether you have truly repented or not. Perhaps doing what Hitler did requires a hardness of heart that makes it impossible to repent? The bible does have examples of men whose hearts were too hardened to repent.
Perhaps if one continues to retain a propensity to sin w/o qualms, one has not truly repented?