This unfortunate phrase is heard so often and believed by so many. Somewhere along the way, someone started telling people that if they’re “good,” then they go to Heaven when they die. It’s a really nice thought that if you treat people nicely or donate to the animal shelter, then God surely won’t punish you for the bad things you do.

Comparing To Others Is Toxic

It’s human nature to compare ourselves to others. We like to compare our deeds to those of John or Sarah next door, or we like to voice to those around us or on social media, “Hey, I’m good. I do good things. Look at all the good I do”. While good in our eyes, we often overlook the bad things we do because chances are, we’re not murderers, racists, rapists, and such. So we don’t think we do bad things. But every one of us does bad things. The Bible calls it sin.

What’s The Measuring Stick?

Who sets the moral compass, what bar tells us if what we do is good or not? Unfortunately, there are many bars set by many people, but there is one bar that is true, and that is God’s Word. We see in the Bible that our hearts are full of all kinds of evil (Ecclesiastes 9:3), that we can’t trust ourselves to be moral guides (Romans 1:21). So who can we trust? It’s actually really simple: we can trust God. He gave us the Moral Law, the Ten Commandments (see Exodus 20), which He wrote on the hearts of all mankind, as our conscience (Romans 2:15). This is the bar that we measure against to see if we are good. It’s not a rule book to hold us down but one to protect us. Think of the things God is telling us not to do. They can lead to some pretty bad situations in life or even destroy life.

Are We Good?

If we compare ourselves to the Ten Commandments, we can start to see that we are not so good after all. All it takes is something that seems harmless, like a single lie, stealing music files, or lusting after someone (Matthew 5:28), to break God’s Law — He expects His law to be kept to perfection. The unfortunate part is we are unable to do so. We are in a fallen state, and everyone commits sin (Romans 3:23), many times over. It’s not just murderers, racists, or rapists who are sinners. The Bible tells us we’re not good in the eyes of God. We fail to match His glorious standards. Since He is just and holy, He cannot just let us sin and be unpunished for it. Sin means to miss the mark, and we miss the mark in our rebellion to our Creator.

There's a Price to Pay

Because we don’t and can’t keep God’s Law, we’re destined for punishment. That punishment is death and an eternity away from Him in a place of unimaginable torment and sorrow. There is nothing we can do ourselves to change that; we’re incapable of living a sin-free life. We can’t give more money to a church or a preacher, feed more homeless, or clean up the Earth, in order to pay our punishment. All the good things we do for others, we should not stop doing, but we must understand that they will not earn us a ticket to Heaven (Isaiah 64:6).

God Paid The Price

God, knowing we could not save ourselves, gave us the ultimate gift, the final sacrifice for sin, Jesus. He paid the price on the cross for all our sins. He was buried and on the third day, God raised Him from the dead, defeating the punishment of death (1 Corinthians 15:1-4). He offers His salvation to you as a free gift if you put your full trust in Him alone.

You Can’t Trust Yourself, But You Can Trust Jesus

God doesn’t want anyone to perish in their sin (2 Peter 3:9). However, He didn’t create mindless beings; He gives us free will. We can choose if we want to put our full trust in Jesus Christ or not. So what I’m saying is trusting yourself to be a “good” person will not and cannot get you into Heaven under any circumstances. The Bible makes this very clear. Our salvation comes by God's grace, through our faith, alone (Ephesians 2:8-9). There are many “good” people who rejected Jesus Christ and have died, now spending their eternity in torment. Out of all the sins you’ll ever commit in your life, rejecting Christ is the one that will surely send you to eternal destruction — because without Him, you can’t be forgiven (Acts 4:11-12). But repenting and putting your full trust in Jesus for salvation will guarantee you new life in Him and make the good deeds into something even more — work for God’s Kingdom.

Want to know more? Learn more about Jesus and what He did.