thanny, I think you are running a Protestant filter on what you think people believe the Christian faith is about, and your understanding of it. I personally was raised Catholic, became Agonstic, wandered through Protestantism, and ended up in the Eastern Orthodox Christian faith. I understand, based upon studies of my own, the history of Christian theological development and how things went the way they are. I understand how Western Christian theology developed, and how Augustine, Anstelm and others shaped western theology. I understand how Western Christianity took a VERY legal view of salvation, and how it got transformed into a legal pardon, rather than something tangible in this life. It is this spin that causes people to believe what they will about it, and believe Christians are a bunch of crooks who are just doing things to get to heaven when they die.
Several things here:
1. Protestant theology comes out of a reaction to the Roman Catholic theological system that ended up making the Christian faith one of legality, and complex theological development. Catholic theology tried to form to end up balancing free will with the sovereignty of God. And then you had reaction to the excesses that led to the Reformation and people feeling that the burden of the complex system was too much and people like Luther not finding peace in it. The indulgences system weight heavily on this.
2. The Reformation ended up producing a theological system that rested HEAVILY on the sovereignty of God, to the extend that people believe God directly picked everyone from the start, and sent others to Hell (Hell being set up, because Salvation and judgment are about punishing for sin, and Hell needs to be nasty to make up for how sinners offend the honor of God). And in this is peace, and TULIP and trusting in the grace of God, because no one can do anything without God doing it through them. It was a full grabbing of Augustine here, and total depravity, with a mix of Anselm, because on had to believe Christ dying on the Cross was meant to PAY for people's sins to make up for the offending of God's honor, which makes God VERY angry. They end up, under Calvin and others, taking the Bible and turning Christian theology that breaks things down into a lot of parts, and orders salvation into specific parts: Justification (God fixes your records, and pardons you), Santification (God separates you from the world over time, and transforms your nature through Christ) and Glorification (happens after you die and are with God, and you reflect His holy nature).
3. Then you have the camp opposed to Reformed theology that wanted man to have some free will and be able to pick whether to serve God or not, and not totally depraved. This side then became the Evangelical side, which is post-Reformed theology, and has people believe you can persuade people to believe, and all they have to do is believe in Jesus and they get it. Belief here is a mental affirmation of certain information about Jesus being true. In some, this will get you a ticket to heaven when you die (God apparently likes giving pop quizzes people answer). In this camp is the mainline evangelical, for whom it is the next life, and also the "Born Again" camp that wants people to be "Born Again" (santification happens quicker here) who is all about people having a personal one-on-one relationship with Jesus (not sure where the other person for the two or three in the name of Jesus gathering is though). And then there is Penticostal and Charismatic, who are all about physical manifestations of signs and wonders and speaking in tonges.
4. The world looks at this, non-Christians, and wonder what the heck this is about, and they don't even get it. Some do think there is some sort of ledger, but others don't. For some, they just want a better life here, and hope God has enough mercy in the next life, and they hope that God will see they have good intentions.
My take on the Christian faith? There is traditions passed down that make things work. They are there to help understand scripture right. People are called to follow Jesus and be students of Him. The call is to love others, and this is how you love Jesus. This love produces works, and actually helps people. And grace is what God provides to make it so, in all this. Salvation is the nature of all this. And you hope in the end that you got it right, and that God is merciful enough to allow you into the restoration of all things that will come one day. Beyond this, we just don't know. In all this, tools, traditions, rituals (like Baptism) and so on are given to aid people in the trip (so others see it). And yes, you do hope that, at Final Judgment, you got it. According to the wolves and sheep gospel texts, many won't get it. And looking at the world, I would be apt to say that is true. I will also say that God doesn't need anything from anyone, but just wants His kids to be good to one another.
Want to sum it up, consider this from the Book of James (James 1:27):
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
All other things are merely reflections of this. And go by the spirit of the text. If you merely take it literally, then you will fail to be a Good Samaritan (there you go, that is another reference to another parable). And it all consists of lots and lots of works and deeds involved, as it shows that the Christian faith is of this, and not just faith (belief). It is also written in James that faith without works is dead. And this for the faith only person is frustrating (I believe Luther wanted to throw out the Book of James). How one is able to harmonize James with the Book of Romans in regards to this, is an art (maybe something about the grace of God enabling the good works is an answer).
I should close by stating I fall VERY short of James 1:27 says. There is no try in that text, there is only do. So, on this note, I will say that mercy is called upon.
