Some people will not be allowed in heaven because they are not fitted to be there. Jesus died on the cross to forgive your sins and acquit you of all guilt to make it possible to inherit eternal life, but entitlement is not enough; you must also be made fit to go there. This work of making a person fit to take to heaven is the work of the Holy Spirit. Jesus told Nicodemus that unless a new birth by the Spirit of God was accomplished first (John 3:3, 5), there was no chance of entering heaven. This new birth is necessary to enable the Christian to keep the law of God and reflect the character image of Jesus Christ (Romans 8:1–14; I John 3:9, 10; 5:18).
“The Holy Spirit was the highest of all gifts that He could solicit from His Father for the exaltation of His people. The Spirit was to be given as a regenerating agent, and without this the sacrifice of Christ would have been of no avail. … Sin could be resisted and overcome only through the mighty agency of the Third Person of the Godhead, who would come with no modified energy, but in the fullness of divine power. It is the Spirit that makes effectual what has been wrought out by the world’s Redeemer. It is by the Spirit that the heart is made pure. Through the Spirit the believer becomes a partaker of the divine nature. Christ has given His Spirit as a divine power to overcome all hereditary and cultivated tendencies to evil, and to impress His own character upon His church.” The Desire of Ages, 671.
Unless we allow the Holy Spirit to change our disposition into a reflection of the disposition of Christ, we will not be in the kingdom of heaven. “None who continue to cherish a querulous, fault-finding disposition can enter heaven; for they would mar its peace and harmony. They will be left outside the city of God, with all who stir up strife. Nor should they be permitted to remain in the church to prevent unity and destroy its usefulness. Let them be reproved, and if they do not change their course, let them be separated from the church.” Historical Sketches of the Foreign Missions of the Seventh-day Adventists, 214.