And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

John 17:3 – Scripture Of The Day (January 6, 2014)

It is a very popular notion among religious folk who have been influenced by our post-modernistic, we’re-all-okay, everyone’s-right-and nobody’s-wrong society to try to take faith in Jesus Christ out of the salvation equation.  Take this article by Fox News commentator Bernard Goldberg.  He seems to offer a snarky criticism of the Roman Catholic Pope’s recent pronouncement that people who don’t believe in Jesus will go to heaven anyway…while at the same time joining the Pope in questioning the notion that only believers in Jesus will be saved…and then ends the article by denying that he’s an atheist and thus implying that he believes in God.  Confusing, I know…

The truth is much simpler.  Do you want eternal life?  Know that there is only one true God, and know his Son, Jesus Christ.  Those who will be condemned for eternity are those who do NOT know God and do not obey his Son’s gospel (2 Thess. 1:8-9).  What does it mean to know God?  Keep his commandments (1 John 2:3-5).  What does it mean to obey the gospel of Jesus Christ?  Believe in him (Mark 16:16), repent of your sins (Acts 17:30), be immersed via water into him and his body, the church (Mark 16:16; Acts 2:38; John 3:3-5; Gal. 3:26-27; 1 Cor. 12:13; Col. 1:18), and hold fast to his Word (1 Cor. 15:1-2).