The words you have brought from the Apostle are the very gate of life. For what could be plainer? Confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, and you shall be saved. This is the good confession to which our Master Himself bore witness before Pilate, declaring that He came to testify to the truth. To confess Him as Lord is to align yourself with that truth, to own Him as King and God. But let no one imagine that this confession is a mere movement of the lips, or that belief is a bare assent of the mind. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Faith must be planted deep in the soil of a humbled and obedient heart.
Consider therefore what it means to truly repent and turn from your sins. It is not enough to feel a passing sorrow or to shed tears for past misdeeds. Do you not recall how Esau sought the blessing carefully with tears, yet found no place of repentance? His grief, like that of Cain, was not godly sorrow that works salvation, but a worldly vexation over what he had lost. True repentance brings forth fruits meet for repentance. It hates the sin itself, flees from it, and clings to the mercy of God with a broken and contrite spirit. This is the work John the Baptist proclaimed, not to drive men to despair, but to awaken in them a longing for the Redeemer. For unless you first condemn your own sins, you will never eagerly seek the forgiveness that Christ alone grants.
Yet note this well: there is but one sacrifice for sins. The Son of God offered Himself once for all, and by that single offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified. There is no second cross, no re-sacrificing of Christ, no renewal again unto salvation by a fresh washing. Shall we then take sin lightly because His grace is great? By no means! For if we go on sinning willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, what remains but a fearful expectation of judgment? It is impossible to restore such a one by repackaging the gift of forgiveness as though Christ could be crucified a second time. This is why the Apostle warns that those who have tasted the heavenly gift and the good word of God and then fall away cannot be brought back to that initial cleansing, for they would publicly shame the Son of God all over again. The remedy therefore is not to look for another washing, but to cling with daily repentance and tears to the one sacrifice that cleanses now and ever.
Do not then delay or presume upon His kindness. Perhaps you wonder why God does not immediately strike down every sinner. He is longsuffering, not willing that any should perish, but desiring that His patience might lead you to repentance. Each day you remain unrepentant, you treasure up wrath against the day of wrath. Yet no one, however defiled, need despair. We have no hope of salvation in another, nor in our forefathers, nor in bare religious practice, but each one must work out his own salvation with fear and trembling, resting on the lovingkindness of God. Are you stained? Do not sleep in your stain. By repentance, by prayer, by almsgiving, by a changed life, wash away the pollution through the one fountain that never fails: the mercy of Christ which He dispenses to the contrite.
Take up the Scriptures, as you have resolved. Begin with the Evangelist John, and there behold the glory of the Word made flesh. See Him making the good confession; hear Him promise that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. As you read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, let the words shape your life, not merely inform your mind. To follow and obey Jesus is not a suggestion added to faith; it is the very breath of saving faith. Without obedience, confession is a hollow sound, and belief is a shadow. But if you will repent in earnest, if you will believe with your whole heart and not be ashamed to confess Him before men, then take hold of this promise: you shall be saved. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted, and He has never rejected a soul that fled to Him in true humility.