Before I begin, I should note that I am not saying deeds have nothing to do with salvation. No, it is clear that deeds do play a part. What I am trying to point out is that this fact has been overstated. Deeds do not have everything to do with salvation, and I intend to explain to you why. But before I do, allow me to unveil two of my statements regarding things to know about heaven.
My first statement is that heaven has a ruler, a king, a god, etc. of some sort who runs it. Regardless of what you believe about heaven, it must meet that standard. Why? Look at how it is if heaven supposedly has no ruler. That means that, upon dying, our soul finds its own way there. How does that make sense? How is it that our soul can exalt itself like that after death while death is a destructive, humbling thing? Furthermore, if our soul is capable of going to heaven on its own right now, shouldn't we be able to sort of "astral project" to heaven whenever we wanted? Or, could we not simply say, "I'm done with this world, I'm going to heaven," and our soul would immediately leave our lifeless body and go to heaven? At the very least, would we not have more knowledge about what heaven is like? No, clearly heaven has a ruler who sees the death of our body as a fitting "right of passage".
My second statement is that heaven is perfect. If it were not, it would be little different from the world we are in now. And if that is where you think you go when you die, then what you believe is much closer to "reincarnation", which is a different topic entirely from "salvation". This essay is not for anyone with such a belief.
So heaven is a perfect place with a king deciding who gets in and who is shut out. This puts us in a rather delicate position. When we say that deeds can get us into heaven, we are saying that mankind can make itself worthy of heaven. That statement makes no sense. Heaven is perfect. No human who has ever walked the earth has ever been perfect (I do not consider Jesus human; I believe he was perfect. You may not believe that, and that's fine. I only wanted to make a clarification). If the king of heaven let a human (who is imperfect) into heaven, then heaven would no longer be heaven because heaven has to be perfect. In fact, the king of heaven doesn't simply choose to lock imperfect people out; he has no choice. He cannot break the laws dividing good and evil because he is perfect (though I suppose he is the one who wrote those laws. Aaaand we've just discovered a circle of reasoning).
Now, some of you may conjecture this: "The human soul is perfect, it is the desires of the flesh that makes mankind imperfect. When the body dies, the soul is free and can go to heaven." That makes no sense either. After all, what is the soul? How can you define it? Does not your "soul" include the way you think, the way you approach life, your hopes, your fears, your fondest dreams, your darkest desires, etc.? And if all those things were perfect, how would the "desires of the flesh" stand any chance against you? If the inside were perfect, so too would the outside be. The outside is not, therefore the inside cannot be either.
It seems that raw logic and reason have taken us to a dark place. According to truth, no one can get into heaven. But don't go and get too down-trod. Logic and reason cannot explain everything to us. If it could, we would not be in an imperfect world now. We have no where else to turn but to the ruler of heaven in hopes that in his perfect knowledge he has found some way for us to be saved from our terrible fate.
Now, although all these things are true, I don't want you to go out and do whatever you want. That would be the equivalent of saying, "The world will never be perfect, so why even try?" Just because the world will never be perfect does not mean we shouldn't try to make it more perfect than it is. It is the same with you and your fallen state. Just because you will never be worthy of heaven, does not mean you should not try to make yourself more worthy. Just be mindful; the final decision is for the king of heaven. You are at his mercy.
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