Is a lack of faith in God, but not in performing good deeds, keep one from Heaven?

I have a conundrum that I have been mulling over. I hear two things regarding Christianity, specifically with believing in God. They are opposing statements:

1. You can only go to Heaven if you believe in God.

2. If you are a good person, do your best to not be evil and to follow the general teachings of the bible, even if you do not believe in God, you will go to Heaven.

The reason I ask is that, as someone on the autism spectrum, a 100% belief in God is impossible as far as I can tell. I try, but it requires unquestioning belief, and I can only falter in that regard. That tells me there is no point in trying. However, I do my best to be patient and to help those in need when asked. I don't do as much as I should (I like video games, so I buy that instead of donating time/money to a good cause, and I have to buy medicine and such) but I try not to be evil. My worst sin is masturbation, which I know I am guilty of and keep trying to stop and faltering. Part of that is my lack of faith.

So my post boils down to a simple question. If I cannot believe in God 100%, is it worth me trying to be a good Christian, even if that means I will not go to Heaven? To be clear, I believe Jesus existed, but that is because there is physical evidence he existed. You could say God exists due to everything around us, but to me, this plane of existence was not entirely created by God, but he may have molded it and corrected it when he deemed it necessary.

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We are saved by grace and faith alone, and not by actions nor works. All fall short of the kingdom of God (every man, woman, and child has sinned before except for Christ, who was God) and cannot be redeemed through any work. The blood of the slain Christ shelters all from sin.

So basically, 1 is correct, 2 is gnostic crap. Those who do not have faith in the factual event of the resurrection will surely perish eternally.

As “bad” as it sounds (it’s not bad, it’s just because most people believe in gnostic god), the “bad” Christian is favored over the “good” non Christian.

What that tells me is that I must know fear of God or I do not go to Heaven. I can say I am scared now, though not of
Him, but in my inability to believe in Him.

are you reprobate? If not, you have every ability to believe

Read Matthew 18 as it pertains to faith in children, and having faith "like a child", even "little children"

I'm sure you have more intellectual capacity than a 6 year old. The gospel is really simple, believe in Jesus!

Quoting the Catechism of the Catholic Church, faith is: "a personal adherence of the whole man to God who reveals himself. It involves an assent of the intellect and will to the self-revelation God has made through his deeds and words." (CCC 176)

Accordingly, when we use the word faith in this way, we are talking about more than just an awareness of God or an acceptance that God is real. For faith is a giving of one’s self to God, assenting in both “intellect and will” to what God has revealed.


Act as if Christian morality is real, even if you do not believe in God.
Basically, yes.

Look at the prophesies and historical evidence for Christ's resurrection. Combine that with the philosophical and scientific proofs of God, and you have 100% proof Christianity is true.

How much faith do you need to be saved? There are people who believe that it could be possible, maybe that Christ died for us, bit they still live pagan lives and worship their pagan God's, and there are people who are absolutely convinced with all their hearts and minds that Christ is Lord, and live holy lives marked by good works. Both have faith, but one has very little, and one has a lot. And people usually have a level of faith in between those two extremes.

So where is the threshold of faith that you need to be saved? Is the pagan's salvation just as assured as the holy man's salvation? Or is there a line between those extremes?

Can I just say "yeah. God may exist. Jesus may be his son. My sins may be forgiven." And go on with my life, or does their have to be an intense emotional and intellectual exertion to be saved? And exertion that needs to be constantly maintained and guarded?

This is kind of a "How much hay do you need to make a haystack" question.

Even if 2 was correct, how good do you think you'd have to be to get rewarded with eternal paradise? It's not a "well, I didn't kill or rape anyone and I gave to charity once" situation or 51% good situation, it would be a full time devoted every moment of your life to others perfect score type situation.
I'll take number 1.

Not really. Because what a stack is isn't hardly defined.
But salvation is well defined. You are in heaven or you are in hell.
There is no spectrum with salvation at one end and damnation at the other. Its binary. So it stands to reason that there is a threshold that needs to be crossed

Sorry to ask but how are you unable to believe in God 100% because of your autism? Because belief is like saying statement A is true or false. There is no between. Same thing for the existence of God either He exist or not.

BTW you can't "buy" your own way to heaven by your own works. Because compared to your sins, your works are "filthy rags" (Isaish 64:6). And God sent Christ to die for our sins because no one can go to heaven on his own. If one can go to heaven on his own then that means Christ died for nothing.

If you want physical evidence for the existence of Jesus, look for Roman historians. One of those evidence is The book Annals book 15 chapter 44.
Also if you want biblical sources on the existence of God then study His prophecies. They're there partly to validate His existence and show us that He is truly God


Look up the parable of the sower and the seed & the wheat and the tares(Matthew 13)

Also if you believe that Christ died for us and worship Him, how can you also serve the pagan gods? For no one man can have two masters

Well I believe in OSAS, so I'm going to save as long as you accepted Christ as Lord and Savior you're going to heaven. But some anons here might disagree

To achieve salvation, you must truly believe that Jesus is God and that He died and rose again for us. Not to be rude, but I see you’re a skeptic. Try and look up the skeptic’s prayer online and pray it to God to help your faith. By faith alone is one saved; your actions can’t get you into heaven, although you should act kindly to others.

I am not sure what reprobate means in regards to this discussion, but I do not believe so.


I fully believe that Jesus existed and performed the deeds described in the bible. However, the reason that I have trouble believing that God exists, or at least cannot comprehend so easily, is that He is not in front of me the same way that another human being can be. I can hug a family member, but not so much with God. But, as I said, I 100% believe Jesus existed and did what was described.

Do you confess with your mouth and heart that the Lord Jesus Christ is your Saviour?

When? Like right now? I can and I would believe it.

THEN DO IT! NO JOKE SAY IT LIKE A MAN (unless your female) AND KNOW HE IS WITH YOU! DO ITTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT! (REEEEEEEEEE)

(like seriously whats taking you so long? There's only Holy high fives waiting for you afterwards)

I will pray for you tonight. Its a scary step, but trust us; It'll be worth it.

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I should mention, I was baptized already, and I do state (nowadays) that I'm Christian. It just popped into my head that the Holy Trinity, although they're all one, I believe in Jesus moreso than the Father and the Holy Spirit. It made me think about believing in one means you believe in the whole, or if I misunderstand the concept of the holy trinity.

/thread.
If you deny him, He will deny you too.

Isn't there a passage in the bible that states that if a non-Chrstian offered a Christian water, they would receive His gift? I took that to mean 'even if you aren't Christian, if you behave as a Christian, you'll be treated as a Christian.'

Developing an understanding, and a more complete belief of God, is the same as getting to know any other person. It doesn't happen overnight, you have to spend time getting to know Him - pray and read your Bible, and spend time with other Christians.

You said that you have an inability to believe in Him, however you demonstrated that this isn't true when you said that your inability to believe scares you. If you were truly unable to believe then you wouldn't feel that fear, and you wouldn't be here asking the questions that you're asking. Your belief is developing, and your understanding of things like the Trinity will develop as you mature in your faith - there isn't an on/off switch that makes you go from atheist to devout Christian in a split second, so don't worry about not having a full understanding of everything right away. Things will be revealed to you as you go along and grow in your faith. Continue to pray for understanding

Let me phrase it in another way:

Say I feel like I believe He is real. Let's say I am using my soul to believe in Him. Then I have my brain saying 'well, from what you've learned throughout your life, it doesn't make sense.' It casts doubt. It's like my souls says one thing and my brain says something else. If they're separate, I would hope they can achieve reconciliation, but if they are the same, I feel like I'm damned to never move past that. Basically, how much of what I believe do I really believe, or is it only out of fear due to my autism causing me to over-analyze and overthink things?

Yeah I get what you're saying. It's normal to be unsure at the start, and everyone will have doubts, some even feel doubt when they've been believers for a long time. Based on what you've learned in your life, some things won't make sense right now. But remember that you're still learning, you're always learning throughout your life. You might feel like you'll never move past that stage, but you will move past it if you persevere. Like I said before - read, pray and spend time with other Christians. If knowledge of God is something that is interesting or important to you, then you'll naturally seek it out and things will eventually fall into place.

It's easy

John 3:36
He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.

If you believe in Jesus alone as your saviour, then uou go to Heaven. If you don't believe then you burn

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The protestants are throwing you away, why.
Repost without "literally", >>731338 is deleted

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I did see your response, user, but it confuses me. If we are to give ourselves to God, that would require belief, would it not?

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I suggest you read The Case For Christ and When Skeptics Ask. Both are very helpful in strengthening ones faith.

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I see there is a movie for The Case for Christ. Would it be acceptable to watch that?

Movie is good. Thought it is more about Lee Strobel's journey from Atheist to Christian. Being a movie it can't pack all the information you'll find in his book

#2 and #1 are both false, OP.

You can only go to Heaven if you believe in Jesus Christ and ask for forgiveness of your sins and for him to save your soul.

John 14:6: I am the way, the truth and the light, no man comes to the father but by me.

Jesus Christ is the intercessor for mankind's souls whereby we are reconciled with god a.k.a Yahweh/Jehova, etc.


The Bible doesn't tell people not to question brother, it simply says "blessed are those who believe without seeing" and "the just shall live by faith".

That and "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of god".


The Bible is more iffy on masturbation. Its lust that is moreso painted as the "sin" than the act of masturbation itself.


There's actually no evidence that he existed at all.

We're Christians because we have faith he existed in physical form.

We have faith but no proof.

Proof is something the worldly non believers concern themselves with to their detriment.

Well, lust is odd. I only masturbated to drawings and the written word, so I did not look at physical females. The things I looked at were not illegal or required much effort to reach. It had no victims, so to speak. I liked what I saw, and heck, in some ways it was capable of making one feel like improving. I rarely felt guilt for what I was looking at, but felt more guilt at masturbation controlling my life in some ways.

Regarding Jesus, isn't there the cloth with his imprint on it? I have seen some screencaps posted on this very board that had rather detailed analysis about some historical and geographical aspects of the New Testament.

Your reddit spacing is out of control