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Volume 4 · Honest HereticsLesson 39About 22 minutes

Saved by Belief Alone

If someone asked Jesus "What must I do to live?", what do you think he would say?

Honest Heretics edition for skepticsSwitch to Centered (for believers)

The center · Luke 10:28
28He said to him, “You have answered correctly. Do this, and you will live.”

In this lesson

Millions of people were told the same thing at a camp, a crusade or a kitchen table: pray this prayer, mean it, and you are saved forever. Nothing you do afterward can change that. It is offered as good news, and it promises certainty. Several people asked Jesus how to gain life. Each time, his answer was about what they would do.

If you have watched people pray the prayer and live exactly as before, and be told they were safe, you're not imagining the problem. Neither are you wrong if you noticed the other half: kind, honest people told they were lost because they never said the words. Jesus was asked this question directly, more than once, and his answers do not match the formula.

Measured against the center

A contradiction
Teaching that a moment of belief or a prayer saves, whatever a life does after, contradicts every answer he gave when asked how to gain life.

The rest of this lesson is in Volumes 2-4 online

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