I need help understanding

I have always had a difficult time understanding God and how He fits into my life. For a long time I've gone back and forth on my feelings... Is He with me, is He even real... I understand Christ as well as one can I believe, and I believe that He gave his life for us... But I can't wrap my head around certain parts of God. Not that it's for me to question or understand, but... It would help.

I want to know... What if a person lives a good life, a selfless life, devoted to helping others and spreading love and goodwill, but they don't ever accept God or Christ into their heart, either knowingly or unknowingly? Would they be punished for this? ... Even if their life has been nothing but good? Does God demand worship in this way? ... I genuinely don't know and want to learn, but it's a stumbling block on my path to acceptance. This just can't be the case, right? It can't boil down to "worship Him" or be condemned to Hell, can it? I know I am oversimplifying here, and I apologize for that, but I hope this question makes sense still.
 
It's not about "worship".... it's about love.

And no, I don't mean that as a cute little catch-phrase... it's simply the truth. For me, it was a growing process.. but once you truly understand just what He has done - for us... it's all about love!

Also, it's worth understanding just what is "worship" anyway? It's not all about attending church, singing, etc... it's much more. It's not about rules, and expectations, and standards... again, it's about love.

36 Master, which [is] the great commandment in the law? 37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second [is] like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
[Matthew 22:36-40 KJV]

What if a person lives a good life, a selfless life, devoted to helping others and spreading love and goodwill, but they don't ever accept God or Christ into their heart, either knowingly or unknowingly? Would they be punished for this? ... Even if their life has been nothing but good? Does God demand worship in this way?
It's not about being "good".... but do you believe ?
Go through the Bible and you will see multiple times, "thy faith hath made thee whole"...

6 But without faith [it is] impossible to please [him]: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and [that] he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
[Hebrews 11:6 KJV]

[Eph 2:8-9 KJV] 8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: [it is] the gift of God: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
-----------------------

I would say it might be helpful for you to read a bit in Romans... start with chapter 1, ask God to help you, and just begin to read...

[Rom 2:14-15 KJV] 14 For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: 15 Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and [their] thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another.
--

[Rom 6:14 KJV] 14 For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.


(It's very late here, but I will try to work on a more "proper" reply as time allows... and I'm sure others will jump in with much more to say. But for now, it's way past my bedtime!)
 
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I want to know... What if a person lives a good life, a selfless life, devoted to helping others and spreading love and goodwill, but they don't ever accept God or Christ into their heart, either knowingly or unknowingly? Would they be punished for this? ... Even if their life has been nothing but good? Does God demand worship in this way? ... I genuinely don't know and want to learn, but it's a stumbling block on my path to acceptance. This just can't be the case, right? It can't boil down to "worship Him" or be condemned to Hell, can it? I know I am oversimplifying here, and I apologize for that, but I hope this question makes sense still.
If Jesus and His righteousness is on the 95 yard line of a 100 yard football field, and you placed the most righteous person who ever lived on that field in relationship to the righteousness of Christ, you’d have to place him around the 5 yard line or even behind the end zone.
Our only hope of heaven is Jesus Christ.
 
I have always had a difficult time understanding God and how He fits into my life. For a long time I've gone back and forth on my feelings... Is He with me, is He even real... I understand Christ as well as one can I believe, and I believe that He gave his life for us... But I can't wrap my head around certain parts of God. Not that it's for me to question or understand, but... It would help.

I want to know... What if a person lives a good life, a selfless life, devoted to helping others and spreading love and goodwill, but they don't ever accept God or Christ into their heart, either knowingly or unknowingly? Would they be punished for this? ... Even if their life has been nothing but good? Does God demand worship in this way? ... I genuinely don't know and want to learn, but it's a stumbling block on my path to acceptance. This just can't be the case, right? It can't boil down to "worship Him" or be condemned to Hell, can it? I know I am oversimplifying here, and I apologize for that, but I hope this question makes sense still.

You have brought up a number of common questions.

How does God fit into our lives? For those in the world basically he doesn't. Many go about there day with little or no thought about God. As Christians though when we come to truly know God it becomes apparent that he is a loving caring Father. As such we learn to praise him and thank him for his help. God develops a relationship with us revealing his word, showing us how to act in love and faith. We become new as focus changes to God and others.

Is God with you? It would seem that God has woke you up, but only you can come to know if God is with you. The Father draws us to him (John 6:44) and through his indwelling Spirit we have understanding, given grace which takes on many forms such as love, faith, patience, kindness. We can come to know he is with us, by the grace God gives each of us.

Is God real? This is an important question that each of us must come to know. When the Father draws us to him, he starts to make it clear that he exists. The world around us also provides plenty of evidence that God exists. As Christians when we faithfully follow God we see plenty of evidence that God exists. Often though what people want is miracles to prove God's existence and Israel's example shows us clearly that miracles alone doesn't lead us to God.

Can someone live a good life without accepting God or in spite of God? The Bible makes it clear that this is not possible.

Matt 19:17 And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God: but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments. (KJV)

Christ himself said that he was not to be called good while walking this earth. Christ is the only man to lead a sinless life. In the world, we do see actions that seem quite good and that do benefit many, but so often these actions are self motivated.

God makes it clear that we must have faith to please him and faith comes only from God.
 
If Jesus and His righteousness is on the 95 yard line of a 100 yard football field, and you placed the most righteous person who ever lived on that field in relationship to the righteousness of Christ, you’d have to place him around the 5 yard line or even behind the end zone.
Our only hope of heaven is Jesus Christ.

Hello, crossnote;

That's a really awesome way of looking at it, brother.

God bless you and thank you for sharing.
 
I want to know... What if a person lives a good life, a selfless life, devoted to helping others and spreading love and goodwill, but they don't ever accept God or Christ into their heart, either knowingly or unknowingly? Would they be punished for this?
Absolutely. They HAVE NOT lived SIN-FREE, and their load of accumulated SIN has not been cleansed by FAITH in the SIN OFFERING of Jesus on the Cross. Consequently they have FALLEN SHORT of God's Glory, and are Hell-bound.
... Even if their life has been nothing but good?
Their life HAS NOT BEEN "nothing but good".
 
I have always had a difficult time understanding God and how He fits into my life. For a long time I've gone back and forth on my feelings... Is He with me, is He even real... I understand Christ as well as one can I believe, and I believe that He gave his life for us... But I can't wrap my head around certain parts of God. Not that it's for me to question or understand, but... It would help.

I want to know... What if a person lives a good life, a selfless life, devoted to helping others and spreading love and goodwill, but they don't ever accept God or Christ into their heart, either knowingly or unknowingly? Would they be punished for this? ... Even if their life has been nothing but good? Does God demand worship in this way? ... I genuinely don't know and want to learn, but it's a stumbling block on my path to acceptance. This just can't be the case, right? It can't boil down to "worship Him" or be condemned to Hell, can it? I know I am oversimplifying here, and I apologize for that, but I hope this question makes sense still.


I know this original post goes back to Sept of 2021, but here are some thoughts.

In Romans 3 we reach a point where Paul has been asking the same questions you have. He's actually shown that people are pretty much failures. But he means to get us familiar with justification.

At first, you might say, well this is ridiculous, because he as said (earlier in ch 3) that none can be. He meant to do that.

But in v21, he says 'But now the righteousness of God has been revealed...' and this is meant to be the first encouraging line in the past 20 minutes of talking about the degenerate human race. It turns out that term 'righteousness' is in the same family as justification, and maybe you can see it is about justness, justice, etc.

In other words God has now done something that justifies a person from their sins--it's not about justifying sins as they are. The whole letter of Romans has actually been something like a court case, and us humans are the defendants, and in any other instance, it is a slam dunk against the defendant. But an unusual thing has happened: God has taken the place of the defendant! That's crazy but is exactly what has taken place in the Gospel event. That is what you will find in 3:21--26, sometimes called the 'declaration of independence' of a Christian.
 
I know this original post goes back to Sept of 2021, but here are some thoughts. In Romans 3 we reach a point where Paul has been asking the same questions you have. He's actually shown that people are pretty much failures. But he means to get us familiar with justification. At first, you might say, well this is ridiculous, because he as said (earlier in ch 3) that none can be. He meant to do that. But in v21, he says 'But now the righteousness of God has been revealed...' and this is meant to be the first encouraging line in the past 20 minutes of talking about the degenerate human race. It turns out that term 'righteousness' is in the same family as justification, and maybe you can see it is about justness, justice, etc. In other words God has now done something that justifies a person from their sins--it's not about justifying sins as they are. The whole letter of Romans has actually been something like a court case, and us humans are the defendants, and in any other instance, it is a slam dunk against the defendant. But an unusual thing has happened: God has taken the place of the defendant! That's crazy but is exactly what has taken place in the Gospel event. That is what you will find in 3:21--26, sometimes called the 'declaration of independence' of a Christian.

Well said, Decoder, and thank you for sharing your thoughts. In Romans 3 Paul gives us a good teaching. God sees all and knows our failures. According to the world, as you said, "it's a slam dunk," it's over for us. But with God it's not over by His justification and most of all, His mercy.

I like how you refer to 'the declaration of independence' of a Christian.

God bless you, Decoder, and your family.
 
Think of it this way (if it helps).

Remember (or learn for the first time) that the enemy (Satan) was once an Angel of the Lord. The problem was that He thought He could decide what was good and evil, apart from what God desired and expected the other angels to follow him (many did).

When you say someone leads a good and selfless life, but excludes reverence for God, that person is saying that his life is good without God, and is thus in a small way doing what the enemy did (and does).
 
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