Your Head Can'T Go to Heaven — E.A. Johnston

The Danger of Religious Activity Without Conversion

I believe, friends, that there are, in some churches, some really good people, that are hard-working, honest folk, that stand for God and country, and who oppose evil in society. And every time the church doors are open, they are there faithfully serving and giving of their money and their time.

Somewhere back yonder, they made a decision for Jesus by responding to a gospel invitation, and they joined the church and were baptized, and they've been serving faithfully for years. But the sad fact remains, they are strangers to a work of grace upon the heart, because they've never been awakened to their lost condition, never been brought under Holy Spirit conviction, and have never been wrought upon by a work of grace upon the heart, whereby the heart of stone is made a heart of flesh through the supernatural act of regeneration in the new birth.

George Whitefield's Awakening From Reliance on Good Works

George Whitefield, the great British evangelist, wore himself out at the age of 55 by traveling up and down two continents for God, proclaiming one singular message, Ye must be born again. Whitefield knew firsthand what it was like to be an unconverted church member.

He lived that way for several years. He fasted. He prayed. He gave alms to the poor. He visited widows and prisoners for the sake of the gospel. But Whitefield was yet a stranger to a work of grace that God performs upon the heart through regeneration.

It wasn't until his good friend Charles Wesley gave him a book written by the Scotsman Henry Schugle entitled The Life of God in the Soul of Man. Whitefield read it and realized all his good works for God were nothing more than a hole in the wall, and he realized he'd been trying to climb up to heaven on a rope of sand.

The very last sermon the old boy preached was in Exeter, New Hampshire. As he stood in a field, in the open air, with an audience of four thousand before him, he shouted out with his very last breaths, for he died the next morning.

He cried to them, Works! I'd no sooner trust in works than I think of climbing to heaven on a rope of sand. I've stood on that exact spot, friends, where Whitefield preached that day. There's a commemorative stone there which marks that special occasion.

I've got a photo of it in my biography of Whitefield if you want to see it. But you can't get to heaven on good works and a long track record of service, friend. And you can't get to heaven on a good opinion of yourself.

Salvation Requires Forgiveness and the New Birth

And you can't get to heaven resting on your church membership for salvation. And you can't get to heaven by being just a deacon, elder, or pastor. Titles won't get you in there. And you can't even get to heaven, friend, by being a good person.

Because good people don't go to heaven. Only forgiven people get to go there. Only those whom God has wrought a work of grace upon the heart. Because you have to be washed in the blood and born from above.

You must be born again. Do you know, friend, if you've ever been truly born again, you'd know it for sure if something so remarkable like that happened to you, like the life of God and the soul of man took place in your heart.

A man let out of prison knows full well of his release. A dying patient spared death. That very much understands the reality of what just happened to them. Even when you come inside from being in a violent thunderstorm, you know your safety in that refuge from the storm.

The Failure of Head Knowledge Without Heart Transformation

You can't be a halfway Christian, friend, where half of you has done your level best to serve God and be faithful to your church and that half of you is your head. Because when you walked that aisle or repeated that sinner's prayer or just said yes to Jesus, you did it with your head.

And your heart was never in the deal, because you were yet a stranger to a work of grace upon the heart through the new birth. That's why you can't stand long nights of prayer. That's why you don't live in your Bible.

That's why you can't talk deeply about spiritual things, why you can't have any victory over sin, and why you feel God is a block of wood or a mountain of stone. And he's hundreds and hundreds of millions of miles away.

You have no living reality of God in your life, because you do not possess the life of God in the soul of man. You're just a good boy, or you're just a good girl, but an unregenerate good boy and an unregenerate good girl can't go to heaven.

No, sir, you can't get to heaven as a halfway Christian, because your head can't go to heaven while the rest of you rots in hell. You must be born again. In John's gospel, Jesus speaks to Nicodemus the following words.

Jesus' Teaching to Nicodemus About the New Birth

Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Then Jesus further explains, that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit.

Marvel not that I said unto thee, you must be born again. Listen to me, dear friend. I don't preach these messages to make you feel bad or make you doubt your salvation. I know what it's like to be a halfway Christian, only having a head knowledge of Jesus, but not possessing him in the heart.

A Personal Plea to Examine False Assurance

For I was an unconverted church member for many years, believing church membership was salvation. I preach these messages to you because I care about your soul. And the reason I try so hard to get under your skin and gnaw at you is to awaken you to your danger of relying upon a false profession of faith and dying in your sins to be cast into a burning hell for all eternity, you must be born again.

Salvation is Christ. You must get an interest in Christ, be washed in his blood for forgiveness of sin, and be born from above in a supernatural experience through the new birth if you want to get to heaven when you die.

Because why your head can't go to heaven. Let us pray.