Believing in Christ and His Gospel is what saves you, not water baptism, not working good deeds of your own, not being the most charitable person, not your own self-righteousness, not how many times you attended church, not how many times you have prayed, not how many times you went to a priest, not how few things need to be 'purged', not about how good or 'holier than thou' someone may seem to be, It's not about us, it's ALL about Christ and HIS >finished< work FOR US. And that is what you need to accept and believe in order to be saved and justified.
"Investing" in your relationship with God by leaning into Him is good and being faithful to God throughout your life will improve you spiritually in a way to you will be more Christ-like with the fruits of the spirit: Galatians 5:22-23 "22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law." But all these things are not what saves and justifies someone. Believing in Christ and HIS finished work for us is what saves. Good works is what comes after you are "born-again", it is God working in and through you doing the good works which He lays before you to step into, as long as you keep leaning into Him and stay faithful in your walk with God, which is part of the sanctification process that comes after being saved and justified.
Some people may add the word 'repentance' to (keep) being saved and justified. Repentance itself is not wrong, in fact it's right, we all must repent of our sins and turn to Christ. And throughout your life there will be sins and other things to repent on to God. But some imply that if you repent or confess (often bundled together) long or often enough that you will be saved, implying that you would have the power to save yourself by repenting and/ or confessing and would have the power to unsave yourself by sinning. Meaning that as a Christian you are only saved and justified as long as you repent or confess of every single sin you commit, so when you commit sin today you would have been 'unsaved' until you repented or confessed that sin, this would mean that you would need to 'maintain' your own justification. Which is wrong because as a believer in Christ you are sealed in Christ, you are saved thanks and through Christ, that is a free gift, not a reward of works.
Of course this does not mean that you shouldn't repent and confess sins to God after becoming a believer, because you should, and it is a good thing to do as it is part of leaning into God and is part of the sanctification/ grow work that the Holy Spirit is working out in you. So I am NOT saying that you shouldn't confess/ repent of sins after you are already saved, as it is important in your sanctification process, but the point is you do not have the power to repent/ confess your sins (the debt) away yourself, you cannot save and unsave yourself and cannot remove Christ's justification from yourself as some imply, neither can you pay or pray it away saying some exact words/ sentences, same for evangelizing in the sense of: "say these words/ prayer after me and then you are saved", is wrong and dangerous. Also repentance comes from the greek word: "Metanoia". It means a change in way of life, a change of heart or change of mind. It's a spiritual transformation/ change. In the case of coming to Christ, it means you accept and understand now that your sin seperates you from God, that as an non-/unbeliever you had a spiritual debt and death penalty, that there was a gap between you and God. But when you become a follower of Christ, by responding and asking Christ and the Holy Spirit to come inside you and your life, turning from non-/unbelief to believing, turning from sin to being accounted worthy through Christ by Christ's finished work is what saves and justifies you.
However, a follower of Christ does not have a license to sin, you must actively fight temptations and your sinful nature, but sadly you will sin. We all must try and fight but none of us is without sin, but eventhough we are not without sin, it does not mean we shouldn't try and fight it. You try, you fight and you will go into this tug of war, this race to run, and you keep getting back up and run the race again after falling and failing. If you fall a thousand times then you get back up a thousand times, but you have to keep running the race and this is the tug of war that will continue on and on. But with Gods help you can overcome and have more victories the longer and better you lean into God. So repenting of sins and confessing your sins to God and asking God for help with sins in your life, praying, worshipping, praising, thanking, reading yourself, studying, are all good things to do. But in Christ you can have confidence that by accepting/ repenting/ understanding/ turning from non-/unbelief to believing in Christ and HIS finished work for you, you are saved, justified and sealed, and that is the good news, that is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Do you believe and trust in the blood of Christ? God's finished work? in God's mercy? in God's Grace? in God's forgiveness? that is what saves and makes you a follower of Christ.
The other pages contain information on a believers Christian walk, about "end times" (the years before Christ His second coming as He will usher in His 1000 year Millennial Kingdom) that may be close and what will happen in those years before Christ returns (different positions exist on these subjects). You can use it all for your own walk with Christ, for your own studies, encouragement and getting together with fellow believers (in this case online).
God bless you all, and to all my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ: Hold on to Christ, if you fall a thousand times get back up a thousand times, run and finish the race until the end, and one day these fallen bodies, fallen world, mental and spiritual opposition will all be over and be done away with. We will all be together in His kingdom, together with all our brothers and sisters from all over the world, together with our Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ.
Last Updated: 23-11-2022
-Through Brenda Weltner I learned about Paul's teachings about Salvation having "3 tenses" (being justification, sanctification & glorification), Updated and expanded some Salvation parts and clarified some parts between being justified and being in the process of sanctification.