Dear Noelene.... I would never trust the "inner voice" within me, it once led me to do some awful things and think that I was justified in doing them, like eating animals. We cannot trust our hearts, Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
That is why we need a reliable authority and that was graciously given to us by God when He preserved His Word for us to have today. If you follow your heart, what you think is fine today, you may abhor tomorrow and everyone is different. Our opinions are worth nothing, they are of no value, but to ourselves. We need an authority to determine truth from error and without it, its all a vain chasing after the wind. Why bother? To make ourselves feel more righteous and worthy than the meateaters? That is not God's will....
The thief who believed on Christ was the one who went with Him to paradise, it was his faith that saved him so I am not sure what you are referring to there, I'm sorry I am missing your point. FAITH saves us, but faith in what? How I feel today or tomorrow or next week? No, the finished work of Christ, trusting that HIS blood is sufficient to cover my sin and make me pure so that I can live in God's presence for eternity, not faith in anything I could do on my own. Please, let this passage in Ephesians 2 really sink in, here is our story:
And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;
2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
4 But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,
5 Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)
6 And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:
7 That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
God Bless,
Elaine