Rick Warren - How to Be Certain You’re Going to Heaven—Part Two

Are Heaven and Hell real places?

And what are they like? Today?

On Pastor Rick's Daily Hope, the Bible Teaching Ministry of

Rick Warren, we continue his series called Eternal Realities, Heaven

and Hell. In these lessons, Rick shares what the Bible

says about heaven and Hell and how you can be

absolutely certain you'll go to heaven. Well, let's jump right

in with part two of a message called how to

be certain You're going to Heaven.

No one will ever love you the way God does. Now,

this has to become the foundation of your life. You

want to know why you got so much stress in

your life and no stability. It's because you've got a

shaky foundation. Why you have so much stress in your

life instead of a sense of satisfaction and a sense

of significance and a sense of success and stability. It's

because you're building your life on something that can change.

I hate to tell you this, but everything in life changes. Everything.

Relationships change, job change, fame change. One minute you're a hero,

the next minute you're a zero. The way you look changes,

and not all and everything that changes, not all those

changes are good. Would you agree with that? Anybody want

to give a testimony right now. Yeah, yeah, okay, there's

only one thing in life that won't ever change. You

know what it is, God's love for you. It's never

ever going to change. And so if you want stability

in your life, you build it on the rock foundation

of God's love for you, so that then you know,

no matter what happens. I know, God has not stopped

loving me. He's going to love me no matter what

happens in my life. And that gives you the stability

because it is the only thing in life that doesn't change.

It has to become the cornerstone, the chief foundational corners

don't of your life. That's what produces a stable, significant,

satisfying life. Build it on the rock of God's love. Now,

some of you, maybe things are going a little shaky

in your life right now. What do you do when

you're all shook up? I just thought i'd throw that in,

Thank you very much. What do you do when you're

all shook up? Well, look at what the Bible says

to do. It says, here, come to Christ, who is

the living foundation of rock, the cornerstone on which God

builds you know. Two thousand and six years ago, on

the Easter weekend when Jesus Christ died and rose again

on Easter Sunday. The Romans were so worried that somebody

might steal the body of Jesus Christ and claim that

he had resurrected, so they did a series of precautions.

Because first what they did is they put him in

this tomb. It was like a cave, and they rolled

this huge stone in front of it. It took tons

of men to move in front of it. And then

they permanently sealed it with the Roman seal so it

could never be broken. And then they posted guards outside

of his tomb, the only time in history they posted

living guards to keep a dead man in the tomb.

But they did well. As you know the story, Easter

Sunday morning, the angels show up at the earthquake, Light come,

Lightning comes down. The guys are fall back in a faint.

The stone is broken, the seal is broken. The tomb,

the stone is rolled back. Now why was that was

it so Jesus could come out? No, he'd already left.

The stone was rolled away not so Jesus could come out,

but so that the skeptics could go in and see

that he wasn't there. And that stone, the stone of

the cornerstone of light, is the stone of God's love.

You build your life on you, You're gonna have stability.

Here's the first step, Devin, I got to recognize God's love.

Nobody's ever gonna love me as much as God does.

Recognize his love. Here's the second step. I've got to

receive God's gift. That's the second part of the verse.

God so loved the world. I recognize his love that

he gave. There's the gift, his only begotten son. Did

you know God has a gift for you. You know that's

why we give gifts a Christmas time, because God gave

the first Christmas gift. He came to earth. If God

had wanted to communicate to ants, you would have become

an ant. If he wanted to communicate the cows, you

would have become a cow. But God wanted to communicate

the human beings. So he became one of us, and

he came into this world just like we all do,

as a baby. Why because he wanted to scare us. No,

he wanted to save us. Nobody's afraid of a baby,

And so he comes as a baby just like everybody

else did. Now, notice God so loved the world that

he gave his only begotten son. No, it doesn't say

he sent a good good man. It doesn't say he

sent an angel, doesn't say he sent a prophet, doesn't

say he sent a moral leader, an ethical leader. It

says he sent his son. He cared enough to send

the very best. God came to earth in human form,

and his name was Jesus Christ. And that's why all

of history is to split into AD and BC. Every

time you write a date, what's the reference point? Jesus Christ?

Because God came to earth and it split history into

AD and to BC. Now why did he come to earth? Well,

look at what the Bible says. Look at this next

verse Romans. Look of Romans Chapter three. Out of sheer generosity,

God put us in rights standing with himself, a pure gift.

In other words, I can't earn this. It's just a gift.

It's called grace. Did you know what grace is? Grace

is when God gives you what you need, not what

you deserve. If we all got what we deserved, none

of us would be here. I sure wouldn't be here.

But God doesn't give us what we need. It deserve.

He gives us what we need, he says, out of

sheer generosity. God put us in rights standing with himself,

a pure gift. He got us out of the mess

we're in and restored us to where He always wanted

us to be. And he did it by means of

Jesus Christ. He sacrificed Jesus on the altar of the

world to clear that world a sin. So why did

Jesus have to die? Look at the next verse. The

Bible tells us when we were unable to help ourselves

at that moment of our need, Christ died for us,

although we were living against God. Now, let's just go

back to the basics again. Okay, this is a football.

Let's go through the basics of life this morning. I

don't want anybody misunderstandings. Basic number one. Nobody's perfect. Everybody

want to agree with that. I've spoken to hundreds of

thousands of people all around the world. I've never met

a single person in my life who claim to be perfect,

not one. I don't measure up to my own expectations,

much less God's perfect standard. Neither do you. So we've

all made mistakes, we've all blown it. We all things have,

things we regret, we wish we could do over. The

Bible says it like this, all of sined, We've all

done it. We've all sinned. Now. God is not just

a loving god, he's a just God. That means he

wants to be fair. And when somebody breaks the law,

there's got to be a penalty for it. Hey, we

do this in America. You break man's laws, you pay

man's penalty. You break God's laws, you pay God's penalty.

You go out here and your speed down the freeway,

you're gonna get a ticket. You go shoot somebody, You're

gonna go to jail. When you break God's laws, you

pay God's penalty. The Bible says all of sin, and

it says the wages of sin is death. That means

I deserve to be punished for the things I've done

wrong in my life. That's the bad news. Here's the

good news. Everything you've ever done wrong in life, it's

already been paid for. WHOA, everything you've ever done wrong

in life has already been paid for. That's what Jesus

Christ did on the cross. He took my sin and

your In fact, all the sins you haven't even committed

yet the things you're gonna do wrong next week, next month,

next year, stuff you haven't even thought up yet, all

those creative ways of sinning you don't even know about yet,

they've already been paid for. That is called the good news.

That's what the gospel is. It means it's already been

taken care of, already paid for. On the back of

your outline is one of the most amazing verses in

the entire Bible. I call it the Great Exchange verse,

and it says this God took the sinless Christ. Jesus

had never sinned, he was perfect, he was God. God

took the sinless Christ and poured him all our sins,

all the stuff we've done wrong. Then in exchange, here's

the Great Exchange. He pours God's goodness into us. What

a deal. I like this deal? Anybody else like this deal?

God says, I'm gonna take everything the Rick Warren's done wrong,

all his meanness, all his rudeness, all his selfishness, all

the times he's lied, all the other things. I'm gonna

take everything Rick Warren's done wrong, and I'm gonna put

that on Jesus Christ. And he's gonna pay the penalty

so Rick doesn't have to pay for it. And then

I'm gonna take Jesus' goodness and put it on him

so he can get into heaven. You see, here's the thing.

Heaven is a perfect place, and you're not, and neither

am I. I stopped batting a thousand a long time ago.

No sin can get in heaven. If God let him

perfect people into heaven, he wouldn't be perfect anymore. So

somebody's got to take the penalty for it so I

can get in. On Plan B. God came up with

a Plan B. He said, I'll come to Earth and

I'll pay the penalty. That way, it's fair and it's just,

but it also shows my love. At the same time,

let me tell you, if there were any other way

for you to get into heaven besides Jesus Christ coming

and dieing for you, believe me, God wouldn't have wasted

the effort. He wouldn't have gone through all the effort

if there was any other way. This is the only

way you're gonna make it. You can't earn it because

you can't be good enough. You're not perfect. Yeah, you're

better in other people, you're probably better than me. I

have no doubt about that. God doesn't great on a curve. No,

it's perfection, and none of us measure up. So this

means that you can't earn your way to heaven. You

can't work your way to heaven, you can't buy your

way into heaven. It's just a gift. It's a free gift.

God so loved the world that he gave his only

begotten son, He gave the gift to die for us

so that I can go to heaven. That's pretty good news.

And that's called grace. I just received the gift of

God's grace. It's just free. I don't deserve it, never will.

Now look at this next verse. Since salvation is by grace,

in other words, you don't earn it, then it is

no longer by works. If it were by works, grace

would no longer be grace. Do you know the difference

between religion and salvation. I'm not talking about religion this morning.

I don't care what religion you are. Religion is man's

attempt to get to God. We're talking about salvation God,

what God did for man. You may be I don't

care what your background is. You may be Catholic. You

may be Protestant, you may be Jewish, you may be

a Muslim background. You may be Hindu or Buddhist or

Baptist or Mormon or method. This doesn't really matter to

me what religion you are, because it's not how you

get to Heaven. See, you can summarize all religions in

one word. It's the word do to Everybody has their

own different to do list. And one religion say you

do these five things, and another one says, no, you

do these ten things. Another one says no, you do

these fifteen things, and another one says no, you do

these twenty things. It's all about do do these things,

and then maybe God will like you. But the difference

between religion and salvation. Salvation is all based on the

word done. It's already done for you. It is a gift.

It's done for you. When Jesus Christ died on the cross,

he stretched out his hands and one of the last

things he said was it is finished. Now. I didn't

say I'm finished, because he wasn't. He was still alive.

He had a lot more to do. He's still alive.

I just talked to him a few minutes ago. He

said it is finished. What does that mean. It means

I've paid for all the bad things you've ever done.

I paid for all of the evil in the world.

This is what Jesus was agonizing over before he went

to the cross. If you saw the movie The Passion,

at the very start, Jesus is in this gold He's

praying the night before he goes to be crucified, and

he's just in agony. Why not because of all of

the physical torture he was going to go through, Although

that was great, It's because he's going to take all

of the guilt of the world on himself. Now I

feel bad enough just when I'm carrying my own guilt

much less yours and Jesus that I'm going to take

the guilt for the whole world. Every rape ever committed,

I'm going to take the guilt for it, every murder,

every committed, I'm going to take the guilt for it,

every molestation, every wife abuse, every evil thought, every evil action,

every betrayal, every adultery, every lie, every theft. I'm going

to take the guilt of the killing fields, and the

guilt of the Holocaust, and the guilt of the genocide.

And I'm going to take the entire guilt of the

world on me. That's pretty amazing. And this is the

way he says. It's just a gift. It is finished.

You can't add anything to it. It's only by grace.

The third step to knowing for sure you're going to

heaven is to respond to God's offer. Respond to God's offer. First,

you recognize God's love. God so loved the world. Then

you receive God's gift that he gave his only begotten son,

that's Jesus. Then you respond to God's offer to know

that God's made an offer to you. It's an incredible proposal.

He says this that whosoever believes in him should not perish.

That's a pretty incredible offer. Now, did you know that

there are over seven thousand promises in the Bible from

God to you. They're like blank checks waiting for you

to cash and over and over in scripture, God says,

if you'll do this, I'll do this. With every promise,

there's a premise, and God says there promises about your finances.

God says, I'll bless your finances if you'll do this,

I'll do this. There are promises about your relationships, you're

marriage your kids. God says, if you do this, I'll

do this. There are promises about your God says, if

you'll do this, I'll do this. And with every promise,

there's a premise. Now, the promise of heaven is whosoever

believes on him should not perish. Now, I want you

to notice who this offer is to. There on your outline,

the Bible says, the free gift of eternal salvation is

offered to who everyone. Everyone. That means you and me

and everybody. Look at the next verse. One's nationality or race,

or education or social position is unimportant. Such things mean nothing.

Whether a person has Christ is what matters. And he

is equally available to all. Jesus Christ is an equal

opportunity savior. It's amazing grace for every race. And God says,

I don't really care what your ethnic background is. Doesn't

really matter what your economic background is. Shoot, it doesn't

even matter what your religious background is. I say that

you could be Muslim or Mormon, or Jewish or Buddhist

or Baptist or doesn't really matter. Jesus Christ still died

for you. Let me give you a real important pointer

about life. In life. It doesn't matter so much what

you've been. What you've been does not matter as much

as what you're becoming. That's what matters in life, not

what you've been, but what you're becoming. I've been a

lot of things in life, some things I'm proud of,

some things I'm not proud of at all. Doesn't matter

what I've been. My past is past. What matters is

what I'm becoming right now. Now, Notice, how do I

accept God's offer of eternal life in heaven. Well, look

what it says next verse. God says he will accept

us and acquit us, in other words, declare us not guilty,

in other words, for all the things I've done wrong.

If here's the key, we trust Jesus Christ. You might

circle that if we trust Jesus Christ to take away

our sins, and we can all be saved in this

same way. I love this part, by coming to Christ,

no matter who we are or what we've been like.

Aren't you glad for that last part? In other words,

no matter who we are or what we've been like

for insan, there's only one way you're going to get

into heaven, it says right there, by trusting Jesus Christ. Trusting. Now,

what does it mean to trust Jesus Christ, Well, it

means more, and just know about it. It means to

trust him. The word there in Greek, the Bible is

written in Greek, is the word pistevo. It means to

trust in, to cling to, to rely on, to adhere to.

It means to commit yourself to. And I begin to

trust God in every area of in my life, begin

to trust him with my finances, and I begin to

trust Him with my relationships. And I begin to trust

God with my future and my dreams and my ambitions.

And I trust God with my talent, and begin to

trust God with my problems. And I learned to trust

Him in every area. That's what it means to really believe,

not just a head knowledge. The Bible says whosoever believes

in Him shall not perish. A lot of people know

about God, they just don't know God in others. I

believe in Hitler, I believe he existed, but I'm not

a Nazi. I believe in Stalin and Kruse eevan Marx,

but I'm not a Communist. I believe in beIN Lauden,

but I'm not a member of Al Qaeda. But I

believe in Jesus. And that's different because I trust him.

Why because I know him. You don't trust somebody you

don't know, So you got to get to know him,

you know. It's the difference between your head and your heart.

You know. I know a lot of people. I know

a lot of famous people. For instance, I know Bill Gates. Okay,

the World's wealth this man. I know Bill Gates. We've

spoken on the same program together. I've sat on a

couch and explained the peace plan to him. I know

Bill Gates, but I don't really know him. It's not

like he's a close personal friend where you know, I

know what makes him tick. I'm not on his inner circle.

I don't know him enough to trust him. That's why

I have an apple. Just kidding, just actually I'm a

PC guy. But you know, you don't trust somebody you

don't know, if you know what I'm talking about. It's

not like, not like the way I know my wife

now there, I know that woman. I know her inside

and out. I've been married to her for thirty years.

I know what she's thinking before she thinks it. In fact,

I put words in her mouth she didn't like it,

but I you know, I put it in her round.

And so because I love my wife and I really

do know her, not just know about her. I know

what makes her tick. In fact, I know what makes

her ticked. And that's you know, I really know her.

That's what it means to know God. I know God

just like I'm talking to you. I talk to Him

all the time, just like this, and you can't too.

It's not just for pastors. Anybody can talk to God

that way, knowing him personally, having a relationship. That's what

it means to trust God. See, a lot of people

are going to miss heaven by eighteen inches. They got

it here in their head, but not here in their heart.

You can go to church your entire life and still

miss heaven because you know about God. You may have

a religion, but you don't have a relationship. God says, no,

I want you to learn to trust me.

Hey, thanks so much for being with us today and

listening to Pastor Rick's daily Hope. I hope that you

were just as blessed as I was from today's broadcast.

Right now, here's Pastor Rick with a special message.

You know, when I started Saddleback Church over forty years ago,

just a handful of people in our living room, I

also began writing a simple devotional just for the people

in our church to help them start each day with

hope and with truth and with peace that comes from

Jesus Christ. Well, you know, that little devotional grip and

grew and grew, and today Daily Hope is one of

the largest email devotions in the whole world. And each

day people all around the globe are reconnecting with God's

promises and finding fresh strength in his word to face

whatever comes their way. Now here's the best part. It's

absolutely free. Okay, we don't have any charge for this.

Every day you'll get a quick devotional read and a

podcast that you can listen to on the go. Now,

you know, in a world that's more distracted and uncertain

than ever, I want to help you start your day

centered on what never changes, and what never changes is

a God's love, his unconditional love for you, and his

promises to you. You know, if you'll just spend just

a few minutes a day in the morning with the Lord,

it can bring so much more clarity, more purpose, more

peace to everything that happens in your day, particularly a

psychologists has said that what you do with the first

five minutes of your day pretty much sets the tone. So, friend,

you were never meant to go through life alone. I

want to personally invite you to just sign up for

the Daily Hope devotional.

Do it today.

I think it's going to bring fresh encouragement to your

walk in God.

If you'd like to sign up for the daily devotional,

it's easy. Just go to pastorick dot com. That's pastorrek

dot com. Be sure to join us next time as

we look into God's Word for our daily hope. This

program is sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your

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