by Dave Brown
Ye often hear it said ...
"... all you have to do is to call Jesus Lord"
but Jesus said (Matthew 7:21):
"Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of
heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven."
These were not immoral sinners; they were religious people. These were not liars; they believed what they said to the point that they were arguing with the Lord on the day of judgment. It appears that they even believed that they had performed miracles in his name.
Jesus said that we must "do the will of my Father who is in heaven." How do we know what the will of God is? This is given in the next verse: "Every one therefore that heareth these words of mine, and doeth them, shall be likened unto a wise man, who built his house upon the rock ..." It is essential that we hear (actually listen) to what God has revealed. This first step, learning the truth, is essential to doing God's will. "You are what you eat" holds much more in the spiritual realm than in the physical.
Citizenship in God's kingdom is for those who do the will of God; all of His will to the best of one's ability. This does not merit salvation, since we can never justify ourselves and earn it (Eph. 2:8-9). Salvation is a gift of God. But God requires that we believe and seek after him (Heb. 11:6). It is God's will that this belief motivate us to turn from our sins in repentance (Luke 13:3). It is God's will that we continue to replace our sinful nature with a life of confession of Jesus as Lord of our lives (Mt. 10:32). It is the will of the Father that we be born again into his kingdom, as Jesus said (John 3:5) "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. We see that terms of entering the kingdom are identical to those of salvation -- identical to those for becoming part of the body of Christ (Rom. 6:3). Indeed, the word kingdom is used figuratively to demonstrate certain aspects of the church that can be described in no other way. Those who differentiate between the church and the kingdom do so with no biblical basis (Heb. 12:23,28).