Religion vs Gospel

Philippians 3: 1-11

Earlier today I listened to Mark Driscoll's talk from his church website and he was talking about religion and gospel and he was preaching from Philippians 3:1-11 and I thought I would like to share it with you here.

That passage is talking about how Paul is reminding us to rejoice in the Lord because of his grace. Because of what Jesus had done on the cross and the fact that we do not have to do anything to go to heaven becoz Jesus did it for us. We dont deserve it but yet we get it anyway:D:D (those of us who go to church would hear this so many times but do we really get wht it means???). For those who do not know Paul, he is a guy in the bible who was a very2 bad guy because he persecuted christians in those days, he killed many christians for the sake of obeying the law. He then became a christian becoz God appeared to him on his way to Damascus. As he become a christian, he is now persecuted by people instead of persecuting people.

So, Paul is encouraging us to keep rejoicing in the Lord because of his grace. He is also reminding us to becareful with false teaching about God. Many religion will tell its followers to do good things so then they can be a good people and in the end go to heaven and Jesus is not enough to make us go to heaven. But how can we really go to heaven? well from Christians point of view there is only one way to heaven and to the father which is through Jesus (John 14:6). Many religion teaches people that to go to heaven you have to do good things so that God will accept u or do as many good things as u can while u're alive to balance out ur bad behaviour.

BUT:
- how many good things do we have to do to balance out our bad behaviour since we sin all the time??
- are we able to reach God's standard???
-what if we died but we havent finish doing good things to balance out the bad behaviour we did??
- what sort of good things i should do to meet god's standard???
- what is god's definition of good people??
- am i a good person in God's eyes??

Why would Paul convert to a christian if going to heaven is through being a good people and following all the law because he certainly did follow all the law thus he persecuted christians because the law said that at those times. Paul is missing something which is Jesus, God had mercy on Him by giving him grace and allowing him to share this great news to us.
Mark said that religion is rubbish because many religion teaches people to do good things and to be a good person dont do this and dont do that so that we can go to heaven neglecting the fact that the only way to go to heaven is through Jesus.

I guess, from this passage i wanted to share to u guys that i found it very encouraging knowing that i am saved by grace alone not by my works and i hope as christians you will be reminded of his grace and find it comforting.
The final question that I guess worth asking esp to myself is "what does it mean to live as christian knowing that I am saved by grace?"