Knowing you will make it to Heaven

[Bookcat]

Is 1 John 5:13 true? Yes certainly. We profess that it is Sacred Scripture the Word of God. And yes that is a reason John wrote (as he says there).

But do I know that I will “remain” in eternal life?

I do not know. For I could choose to no longer “walk in the Spirit” but turn away from God and depart this life not being “in life”.

But I hope that I will remain living in Christ and leave this word in eternal life…

And if I should fall …I would turn to the Good Shepherd …

Eternal life is not simply what happens “after” this life but now. One has “true life” now in Christ. The early Christians referred to themselves as “the living”.

We walk by Faith not by sight (2 Cor 5:7)

and are saved in hope (see Romans 8:24)…and have the “certitude of hope”!

Our hope and trust is in the Lord Jesus Christ! The Good Shepherd!

While we as Paul says “work out our salvation in fear and trembling” – we still have great confidence! Christ is our Hope (see 1 Timothy 1) We live in joy.

"Moreover, our radical belonging to Christ and the fact that “we are in him” must imbue in us an attitude of total trust and immense joy. In short, we must indeed exclaim with St Paul: “If God is for us, who is against us?” (Rom 8: 31). And the reply is that nothing and no one “will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8: 39). Our Christian life, therefore, stands on the soundest and safest rock one can imagine. And from it we draw all our energy, precisely as the Apostle wrote: “I can do all things in him who strengthens me” (Phil 4: 13).

Therefore, let us face our life with its joys and sorrows supported by these great sentiments that Paul offers to us. By having an experience of them we will realize how true are the words the Apostle himself wrote: “I know whom I have believed, and I am sure that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me”; in other words, until the Day (II Tm 1: 12) of our definitive meeting with Christ the Judge, Saviour of the world and our Saviour. "

~Pope Benedict XVI

(fromvatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2006/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20061108_en.html)

 

[Saxon]

I am a freshman in college and a non-denominational Protestant group of guys live in the dorm below me. They tell me about how they know they will make it to Heaven based off of the verse 1 John 5:13, “I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.”

I know they are wrong with this belief and that it’s horribly out of context, but does anyone have a list of verses that contradict the notion that one can “know” they are going to Heaven? I tell them that essentially they are judging themselves, but they disagree. I have told them about the errors of Sola Scriptura, which they strictly follow. They are strong opposers of the Church and its teaching, so all I am looking for are Bible verses.

Thank you in advance.

If you look at the verse and read it for what it says, it does say that you can know that you have eternal life. This is no guarantee that you will go to heaven unless you die while you know that you have eternal life.

There is a popular, but false teaching that once you are saved you are always saved. You can know that you have eternal life (See 1John 5:13) but if somewhere in your life you depart from the living God (See Hebrews 3:12) you also depart from eternal life that is in Christ.(See 1John 5:11)

1John 5:13 These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

Hebrews 3:12 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.

1John 5:11 And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.

 

[Steveabrous]

I feel sometimes many Catholics, in an effort to defend against Protestant errors of once saved always saved and so on, tend to over-compensate and tend to promote a works salvations that is not entirely correct either. We should have a level of assurance that God absolutely loves us and does everything He can to ensure that we get to Heaven, and He is not fickle nor waiting for us to screw things up so that He can have a reason to send us to Hell. We as Catholics should enjoy our Faith and not be walking around all paranoid with a feeling of guilt and being condemned all the time. We should have a sense of joy and thankfulness that we have a Savior that has made a way to salvation for us, and that we have the Church as the greatest road map to Heaven!

Our life in Christ should be like one of a marriage, that is, full of devotion, commitment, faithfulness, zeal, holiness, excitement, etc.

Amen!! A lot of evangelical christians are leaving the once saved always saved belief, since scripture clearly teaches against it.