"He who endures to the end shall be saved" (Matthew 24:13)

To gain everlasting life, you have to keep doing God's will for the
rest of your life. Ezekiel 18:21-28 explains that when a wicked person
repents and becomes righteous, "none of the sins he had committed will
be remembered against him". Also, when a righteous person backslides
and becomes wicked, "all the righteousness which he has done shall not
be remembered". In other words, you will be judged on the basis of
your present behaviour, regardless of any glorious or dirty past.

Let's examine a few Bible examples in this regard.

1. Michal, David's first wife, protected him from being killed by her
father Saul (1 Samuel 19:11-18). After David's flight for his life,
Saul married her off to another man (1 Samuel 25:44). When David
became king, he regained her (2 Samuel 3:12-16) but she had changed
for the worse. She despised David to his face for dancing vigorously
before Jehovah. There was no record of her repentance in the Bible and
she died childless, regardless of her initial good deeds (2 Samuel
6:12-23).

2. Reuben started well by dissuading his brothers from killing Joseph
(Genesis 37:19-30). However, he lost his birthright as the first son
by sleeping with Bilhah, his father's concubine (Genesis 35:22;
49:1-4).

3. Rahab the prostitute kept the Israelite spies safe and was rewarded
by being saved with her family when Jericho fell. In addition, she
became an ancestress of our Lord Jesus Christ. She married Salmon and
bore Boaz, David's great-grandfather (Joshua 2:1-21 & 6:22-25;
Matthew 1:5,6). Even if you are no longer a virgin like Mary (Luke
1:26-27), you are still treasured by God if you genuinely repent.

4. David killed Uriah over Bathsheba (2 Samuel 11). Because he
genuinely repented when Nathan confronted him, God forgave him (2
Samuel 12: 1-15; Psalm 51) though he suffered some consequences (2
Samuel 13; 15; 16:20-23; 18:9-17).

Other examples are those of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1-10) and the prophet
who allowed an older prophet to make him disobey God (1 Kings 13).

*You may now ask: Won't people abuse this privilege by doing evil all
their lives and repenting just before they die?

For one, God reads human hearts (1 Samuel 16:7) and can detect an
insincere repentance. For another, nobody knows when he/she will die
or the Lord will come. After someone dies, he is "conscious of
nothing" and incapable of repentance (Ecclesiastes 9:5-10).

May God help us to remain in the truth. Amen.