"Fire Insurance Christianity" AKA "F.I.G."

Fire Insurance Christianity refers to the practice of saying a sinner's prayer, understanding that you will now spend eternity in Heaven instead of Hell, then going about one's life pretty much the same as before.

The misunderstanding stems, I believe from a wrong understanding of why Jesus gave His life for us. Jesus died to reconcile us with Him, with God and bring us into a right relationship with Him. In contrast the Fire Insurance Gospel (FIG) says that the primary reason Jesus died is to save us from Hell. Here is an analogy of what that means in the outcome.

Think about I-70 going across the state of Colorado. I-70 goes over the Rocky Mountains. At the top is the Eisenhower Tunnel. The motorist who is not real aware of what is happening thinks that as they exit the Eisenhower Tunnel and start down the hill they have been over the top of the Rock Mountains. In contrast is the trucker that has a 14 foot tall trailer or is carrying a hazardous materials load. This trucker is not allowed through the tunnel, but instead exits I-70 and continues going uphill, zigzagging up and up and up until they come to the summit of Loveland Pass. From here it really looks like you are at the top of something.

The FIG Christian who has said the sinners prayer is like the motorist that has passed through the Eisenhower Tunnel. They think that they have been to the cross, and go merrily on with their life believing that they are now on the road to Heaven.

The person that is truly engaged with the PROCESS of salvation continues in the PROCESS until they get to the top of Loveland Pass and truly find the Cross and leave their old life there (actually not a one time experience).

The important question at this point is WHAT DOES THE BIBLE SAY about all of this. I believe that as a whole the Bible calls FIG a false religion. In order to see that to be so, however, the FIG follower is going to have to go through a paradigm shift because they have gotten so use to twisting Bible verses to say something they do not actually say.

There are some very commonly used Bible passages that are twisted by FIG followers. Let me show how I see them. The key word will be PROCESS. (I am using the New American Standard Bible).

JOHN 1:12 & 13. "But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God." Look at the phrase "He GAVE THE RIGHT to become". This phrase is almost always ignored. The PROCESS is ignored. The common understanding of this verse is that one receives Jesus and is immediately converted into a child of God. That is not what this verse says. Consider this word picture. John and Don are sitting in a cafe in Hood River, OR about 50 or 60 miles east of Portland, OR. They are talking about the zoo in San Diego. They would like to visit this zoo, so John gets on the phone and calls up an airline and pays for tickets to take them from the Portland airport to San Diego. He then asks the waitress how long their food will take. She says, “Unfortunately, we don't have any chicken so the cook is next door buying one. It will probably be an hour before you get your dinner.” John says "Nifty! So we have time to go visit the San Diego zoo. Come on Don, we can walk over to to the zoo, see the reptile collection and be back before the food gets here." Don says, "John, the airplane tickets only means that after we go from here to Portland we HAVE THE RIGHT to get on the plane to San Diego. We are not in San Diego, we are still in Hood River!!!" Equally, the person who has received Jesus still needs to go through the PROCESS of becoming a child of God. They HAVE THE RIGHT to become a child of God.

JOHN 3:3 "Jesus answered and said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." NEW BIRTH is commonly said to be put into practice by having someone say the sinner's prayer and then telling that person they are now born again and on their way to Heaven. They ignore the obvious problem that birth is the end result of a 9 month long PROCESS which began with conception. Equally, to be born again, to be born spiritually, one must engage in a PROCESS. Check out the parable of the sower in like Matthew 13, Mark 4 or Luke 8. The word of God being planted in one's heart does not make them a Christian. The seed needs to reach maturity and produce fruit. There is a PROCESS which begins but is not completed when the Word is planted in the heart. That PROCESS can not be entered into and completed by simply saying a prayer. If it could, then all three of the final types of soil would represent saved Christians. I believe that this does not agree with the Bible as a whole.

John 3:16

ROMANS 6:23. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The way this verse is typically explained is like this. The person explaining the gospel will hold something in their hand (like a dollar bill maybe) and tell them this is a free gift. ¿What do you need to do to receive it? All you need to do is simply reach out and take it. Equally, all you have do do to receive eternal life is simply say the sinner's prayer (and mean is with all your heart of course) and you will be on your way to Heaven. Remember the word PROCESS? To find the process look at the preceding verse, Rom 6:22. One should never memorize Romans 6:23 without also memorizing Romans 6:22. “But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life.” Eternal life is a PROCESS which begins with being “freed from sin and enslaved to God”, then continues with the PROCESS of “sanctification” and has the “outcome” of “eternal life.” Again, to decide if the PROCESS has resulted in new birth look at my comments about I John 5:13. The PROCESS is not engaged in by saying the sinner's prayer.

ROMANS 10:9-11 “ . . . that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. For the Scripture says, 'WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.'" The word “confess”. It fits the teaching of the Bible as a whole much better to understand confession as an ongoing practice rather than as just saying something one time. The word “believe”, go back to comments about it under John 3:16. Salvation is the result of a PROCESS.

ROMANS 10:9a “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord . . .” The word LORD is often misunderstood. The word LORD does not mean the same thing as the word GOD. The words LORD and GOD are not at all synonyms. LORD is what a slave calls their master. I once picked up a hitch hiker who believed that because he had said the sinners prayer that he was on his way to Heaven and could live any way that he wanted to. I asked him, “¿What would your wife mean if she were to call you Lord?” He gave an absolutely beautiful description of what our relationship with God is supposed to look like. I told him that his beautiful description is what our relationship with God is supposed to be. It totally shocked him. As we engage in the PROCESS of confessing Jesus as LORD, this is what we are learning to confess. (I am NOT saying that wives should call their husbands Lord.)

I JOHN 5:13. “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.” This verse is typically brought out in the gospel presentation with all of the emphasis on “You can KNOW that you are saved.” So once you have said the sinners prayer you KNOW that you have been saved. This understanding ignores the first part of the verse, “THESE THINGS I have written to you”. What things? We need to look at the rest of I John and find out what he (John) had written concerning knowing whether we have eternal life. We need to explore I John for a check list to compare our life and our heart against to decide whether or not we have eternal life. Have we engaged in the PROCESS that will assure us that we have eternal life? We do not know the answer because we said a sinner's prayer, no matter how sincere we were when we said it.


I believe that the FIG (Fire Insurance Gospel) is not just inexact; it is not simply a small problem. I believe that it results in FALSE RELIGION. To come to that conclusion we need to look at the Bible as a whole. But one verse that says it succinctly is JAMES 1:27. “Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” Focus on “ . . . keep oneself UNSTAINED by the world.” We do not keep ourselves unstained by the world by simply saying a sinner's prayer and going merrily on our way living however we feel like living. The Fire Insurance Gospel produces individual Christianity in which God is only loved and obeyed while it is convenient and feels good. They continue to love the things of the world, and Jesus is not truly their LORD no how many times they confess it to be so. To truly know that we have eternal life we need to engage in the PROCESS until completion.

The important thing to ask God right now is how is it between you and Him right now?  And the better thing to be thankful for right now is not that you are going to Heaven, but rather that you have the kind of relationship with God that is awesome and life giving. We want to stay engaged in the process of maintaining that relationship with God.