I miss my dog Sugar. She was 14 years old and passed a week ago.  My greatest comfort has been envisioning a creamy white pup running through fields chasing rabbits. It was her happy place and on most of our walks over the years a rabbit usually showed up just around a corner or ran across the street in front of her to entice her.

I hope there is a doggy heaven, that dogs and pets alike may be guaranteed a heavenly home because of their innocence and inability to make human choices. 

They make choices but it’s limited to chasing a rabbit or not, begging for food or escaping the back yard into the neighborhood and beyond.

Unlike humans, animals do not have the same understanding that we have.  Our Creator gave us a free will to make our own choices — good, bad and ugly — and as a reward we get to own our mistakes, failures and successes.

We get to take responsibility for the good and bad. We may want to blame God for our mistakes and the ensuing results but our Heavenly Father never forces anyone to make a choice. It’s all on us!

The bigger question is will my good choices outweigh my bad ones and will that make me good enough to enter heaven’s gates? Will the good outweigh the bad in my life and allow me to meet the requirements of eternity?

The Bible says that “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23)

What does this mean?

It means that we are without excuse, “no one” can fulfill the righteous requirement that would place us in heaven. There is no thought here of our good deeds outweighing or cancelling out our bad ones.

If this is the case, what hope is there of heaven?

Well it comes down to making one choice, one decision.

The Bible says:

⁵ he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.

Titus 3:5

Salvation is not based on doing a bunch of good deeds to outweigh our bad as we hope scoring a 51% will give us a passing grade into heaven.

It is all about embracing God’s mercy, through the death of Christ on the cross. The Bible says that Christ’s death paid the penalty for our sin.

The assurance (deep knowing) and security of heaven lies in our faith and trust we put in Christ’s work on the cross where He suffered, bled and died for the sins of mankind. 

Christ’s death was a display of God’s pure love being poured out for our redemption so that we could be brought back to God with one simple choice, one simple decision.

We need to acknowledge our sin, and believe that Christ paid the penalty for our sin. We do not have to carry the weight of dos and don’ts or trying to be good enough. Jesus makes us good enough!