I was raised Catholic. I grew up believing I had to "earn" my way to heaven. I was also told that if I confessed my sins, then talked back to mom and got hit by a car and killed...I would more than likely go to pergotury. The only way I could go to heaven was to leave the confessional and drop dead.

Unconfessed sins kept me from heaven. And trust me, you know the sins of youth: picking on my brother and sisters, talking back to Mom and Dad, taking the last piece of cake and lying when Mom asks "who had the last piece of cake and didn't clean the plate?" This was quite a cross to carry as a little kid, but it's what I believed. I was a candidate for purgotury no matter how you looked at it. And purgatory was the heaven and hell limbo. I could go either way at that point.

My childhood God was one of fear.

My adult God is one of love! In my mid-twenties I went through some struggles: infertility, suicide death of a friend, and my husband's health problems caused by Diabetes. It was at that time Ross and I went to a minister friend for help.

Since that time, this is what I believe:

I am going to heaven because I believe in God, I beleive He sent His only son to die for me and I believe He rose from the dead to save me from my sins.

I believed these things before, but I didn't know they gave me eternal life. I thought I had to "earn" it.

How in the world can anyone be "good enough" to "earn" their way to heaven when you take into consideration what Jesus did for us?

Knowing God has a place for me in heaven gives me tremendous freedom.

Now, some people say, "so you mean all you have to do is believe and you can go kill someone and go to heaven. Just because you believe?"

My reply to that is that when you believe as I do, you do all you possibly can to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, try to be more Christ-like, and love your neighbor as yourself. If one is doing those things they are not going to kill someone.

As far as judging others for what they believe. That is not what God wants me to do. I need to leave that to Him. All He wants me to do is LOVE everyone, regardless of our beliefs. It's really quite simple.

He doesn't care if my neighbor believes something else. His only care is that I love them.

We can't change people,. That's not up to us. But I believe loving people can make them wonder what we are up to. Especially if they are the downtrodden. If you can share that your love comes from a personal relationship with Jesus Christ it may make them curious.

The changing we need to leave to the Holy Spirit. And that's a whole other topic.

Thanks to everyone for sharing in this thread. It's such a good one!