“What must I do to get saved” and “How can I get to heaven?” are the essential questions of salvation in terms of eternal life. The answer to both is wrapped up in the extremely “good news” of our salvation basics found in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians: We are saved “by grace through faith” (vs. 2:8).
These basics get you started, but the basics also keep you going! Once you get a satisfactory answer to those two elementary questions, you will quickly discover a few more: “Is there anything I need to do to stay saved? How can I stop sinning? How do I live now that I am saved?”
The answer to these and all other daily life questions is the same: You are saved by grace through faith! That dual purpose may surprise you, but don’t let it throw you. God has no need to alter His methods, as if one way might work for getting us to heaven, but not for helping us live a heavenly life on earth. His way is perfectly designed to work for our benefit.
Anything you try to do to “save” yourself (in this life or for the next), will only end in failure. Such misplaced effort will also burden you with unnecessary stress all along the way, because you put the responsibility of rescuing your life on you rather than on God. That is trying to live by making self into your savior. The truth is self cannot save you from sin and death; neither can self save you from your own failings as a person or from the many predicaments of life. We need God’s salvation to reach us in both of these dimensions:
1. Getting us to heaven means God has to save us from our sins.
2. Getting a heavenly life into us while we are still on earth means God has to save us from ourselves.
God’s laws found in the Bible will show you what you need to do and what you need to avoid, but the law cannot give you the power to live within its boundaries. It certainly cannot give you the freedom to soar on wings of the Spirit. For that you will need God’s grace which is also found in the Bible. By His wisdom God foresaw that we could only be saved by His grace through faith. You simply have to learn to trust God that His way of saving you—for heaven and in this life—really works.
Believe in His grace and live by His Spirit!
For more on salvation for heaven see http://forerunners4him.org/get-saved/salvation-home-page.html
For more on the “heavenly” new life choose from a tantalizing array of articles at New Life in Christ.
About the Author: Steve Evans
For over a decade Steve Evans and Healing Streams have been helping people recover inner peace and freedom. Through Forerunners4Him he has been showing how we can be saved for heaven and teaching the way to live a Spirit filled life on earth. Go now to receive a completely free primer, Getting to Heaven and/or an introduction to Living in the Spirit at forerunners4him.org. 
