God will never force anyone to go to heaven against their will

With regard to putting our faith in Christ, it’s important to recognize from a Biblical frame-of-reference the difference between ‘belief that’ and ‘belief in.’

James 2:18-20 says, “Now someone may argue, “Some people have faith; others have good deeds.” But I say, “How can you show me your faith if you don’t have good deeds? I will show you my faith by my good deeds.” You say you have faith, for you believe that there is one God. Good for you! Even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror. How foolish! Can’t you see that faith without good deeds is useless?”

Belief ‘that’ God exists is merely an intellectual inclination, which is not the same as putting our trust ‘in’ Jesus! It’s a major distinction surrounding whether we believe that Jesus is who the Scripture says He is, compared to whether we willfully believe in Him by surrendering our lives unto Him wholly & completely.

The Bible says that even the demons believe that God exists, however they choose not to trust ‘in’ Him. Similarly, I could have believed 33 1/2 years ago that I thought the beautiful young woman that I was dating at the time would be a good life-partner … but that couldn’t become a reality unless I decided to trust ‘in’ her by agreeing to enter into holy matrimony together. I have not had a moment of regret as the Lord truly knit our hearts together before we got married while we were both doing volunteer outreach for a Christ-centered ministry at the time. I am so blessed as our mutual trust we have between each other only continues to grow, increase, and flourish.

Providing evidence that Christianity is true and that heaven is a real place, from an intellectual perspective (or reason) is necessary and tremendously important. However, belief ‘in’ is a step of faith or trust in Jesus that we must all make in order to experience salvation! True Christians have both … belief THAT and belief IN.