It is indeed a joy to have you
all present this evening, and among those who
regularly worship with us, I see quite a
number of visiting friends.
We trust that you will feel at home
with us, and that as we come to
meditate upon the Word of God, we shall
find that it comes through with power and
with clarity.
May I say to visitors here that we
base all that we try to preach on
the Word of Scripture.
We believe that God has spoken finally in
His Son, that He has caused the Word
of His revelation to be put into Scripture
for our eternal profit, and so in all
our gatherings this is our main means of
worshiping God.
We sing our praises, we offer our prayers,
but we very especially come to hear what
He has to say to us, and in
response to His inerrant Word, we seek to
offer continued and glad and grateful worship.
May we therefore come to the passage before
us tonight in that spirit, and I trust
we shall all be able to enter into
the spirit of continued worship as we meditate
upon these very remarkable words.
Now we've done something today which we do
not normally do.
We are continuing with a theme that was
occupying us in the morning hour.
That means that those who are not with
us tonight are missing half of what we
had in mind.
We pray for them, but it's good to
have you who are here.
For those who are not with us this
morning, may I say to you that we
were trying to expound the first few verses
of chapter 5.
Really we got as far as verse 4.
And we were thinking particularly of an aspect
of the Christians' assurance.
One aspect, really, though there are many facets
to that one aspect, and that aspect is
described very particularly in the first verse.
Now we know that if the earthly tent
we live in is destroyed, we know that
we have a building from God, an eternal
house in heaven, not built by human hands.
This is a blessed assurance, a glorious assurance,
which God has made possible for sinners such
as we are to have, not because of
any merit in ourselves or any hope that
we may attain to such merit.
On the contrary, this is given us because
Christ has died.
As we see at the end of this
chapter, he has died an atoning death.
And he has procured for us an eternal
redemption.
And included in that eternal redemption is not
simply the renewing of our spirit, that is
indeed a part.
We may be born again because Jesus died
and rose again.
We may have a new spirit, the spirit
of God dwelling in us.
But the redemption that he procured is not
confined to that.
He doesn't simply renew our spirit, but he
promises us a new body.
And that is the particular theme here.
So Paul is very bold in these early
verses to say, if this earthly tent, if
this tent in which we now live, passes
out, withers, and cracks up, well, we are
not left to be utterly naked.
He uses that very term.
Now he says we have another house, and
this is not a tent, it's a house.
And it's eternal.
It'll never wear out.
And it's in the heavens.
And human hands have had nothing whatsoever to
do in the making of it, in the
composition of it.
It is entirely the work of God.
Now that is a main aspect or facet
of the Christian's assurance.
So that if you are a genuine believer
in the grace of God and in the
God of grace, if you are, as I
trust you are, one who has turned from
sin to Christ as your Savior, and worship
him in the fellowship of his people, then
this is your privilege.
You and I may know this, says the
Apostle Paul, know it not because we're clever,
not indeed because we're better than people who
may not know, but simply because of the
merits of the Lord Jesus Christ.
He has died to procure this for us,
and because he deserves it, and he's made
it possible, we may know that we have
it, because we have him.
Now we turn to the next main thread
in this very, very precious passage.
And Paul now pinpoints the author of the
Christian's assurance.
Verse 5, Now it is God who has
made us for this very purpose, and has
given us the spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing
what is to come.
Now, this assurance grows and develops to something
which is massive and should be overwhelming to
all of us, eliciting worship from our spirits
and gladness in our hearts and joy as
we ponder its amazing significance.
Now correct though the New International Version is,
I prefer the Revised Standard Version because it
is more literally coincidental with the Greek here.
And it goes quite simply like this, he
who has prepared us for this very thing
is God, who has given us the spirit
as a guarantee.
Having expressed the Christian's certainty of ultimately inheriting
and inhabiting the new body, the Apostle now
immediately says, all right, I've made a tremendous
claim, now look away from me.
You've been listening to me or you've been
reading my words, now look away from me.
The source of all this is not in
me, either as an individual Christian, ordinary Christian,
or indeed as an Apostle.
I as an Apostle or as a Christian,
I am not responsible for this.
Not all the saints of the ages nor
the angels together acting in concert could procure
such a boon for any man as this.
He that has wrought us for the selfsame
thing, to quote the King James, is God.
This boon, this blessing, is the blessing that
comes from the grace of God.
I want to stress that.
If you are to have the kind of
assurance that the Apostle had here, the place
to go to is immediately to God.
It is God who gives it.
It is God who confirms it.
It is God who assures us.
Now there is a ministry of encouraging one
another, and I'm always thrilled when I come
across somebody in the congregation who is given
that gift of standing alongside of other people
and encouraging them.
It's a wonderful ministry.
But to impart this really deep and personal
assurance of salvation and of our ultimately inhabiting
this new body that God has prepared for
His own is something that only God can
do.
So it says, pour all eyes on God,
as God who has done it.
And I want you to notice that He
has two things in this statement.
The divine action responsible, He who has prepared
us for this very thing is God.
Now first of all, He talks about the
action of preparing us.
He who has prepared us.
And then He speaks about the intention.
God has prepared us for this very thing.
Now let's take the latter half first, the
intention, the divine intention.
God He says has prepared us, that's the
word, for this very thing.
Now what's He talking about?
What's He referring to?
Well I trust it's clear already, but if
it isn't, let me make it as clear
as I can.
You may answer that question first of all
generally, or then more particularly.
Generally speaking, Paul is referring to the plan
of salvation.
God's plan of salvation includes the redemption of
the soul from death, eternal death, spiritual death,
separation from God in this life and in
the life that is to come.
The redemption wrought by Jesus Christ is a
redemption from the tyranny of death, temporal and
eternal.
It includes that, but it doesn't merely include
that.
The redemption wrought by Christ is such that
it includes the resurrection of our bodies from
the dead at last and our glorification in
that there will be given us a new
body like unto His own glorious body in
which we shall dwell to serve Him forever
and ever in the courts of the inner
sanctuary of the heaven of the heavens.
Now speaking generally, that's what Paul has in
mind.
And he says, God has prepared us, His
people.
If you are redeemed, if you are a
Christian tonight, God has been preparing you for
this and is continuing to do it.
You're in the mold.
You're in process of being made into something.
God's doing something with you.
He's working to plan.
He has an intention and the intention will
not even conclude with this, though this is
involved in it.
Putting off this old body and ultimately putting
on the new, capacitated as it is, not
for a temporal period or for labor in
the sphere of time and sense, but for
eternity.
Speaking more specifically, that is what specifically what
Paul has in mind.
He says, God has been working upon us
to this end.
He's been doing something to this very end
for this very purpose.
In other words, God is serious about this.
He really is serious and He wants us
believers to know that He has this in
mind.
He has not only procured the possibility of
our inhabiting this new body, but He's actually
working upon the hearts and lives of His
people in order to prepare us.
Now later on in this great letter, second
letter to the Corinthians, He will be telling
us how to perfect holiness in the fear
of the Lord so that we may be
capacitated spiritually to dwell in the spiritual body
for the heavenlies and to serve our God
there acceptably into eternity.
You notice the action here that, as Paul
puts it, he uses a word which one
of the translations gives us preparing.
He who has prepared us, that is the
new international version.
Or is it the revised standard version, I'm
not quite sure.
He who has prepared us for this very
thing is God.
Now this is a strong word.
It is a word that describes something that
is going on and there's a measure of
difficulty involved in proceeding.
God is doing something, and if you may
say so very humbly, even God is not
finding the work without difficulty.
God is molding us and preparing us like
a vase to beautify His palace or like
an instrument to serve His purpose.
But He's not giving up.
He is intent on going on and He
will go on, it's involved in the compound
verb that we have here, that the work
is going on continuously, toilsome though it may
be, and wearisome and effortful.
Our God, says the Apostle Paul, is working
even though He is conscious of opposition to
Himself in doing this, but He's preparing us.
One of the commentators has a little comment
like this which is very revealing, like some
sculptor with a hard bit of marble or
some metallurgist who has to work the rough
ore till it become tractable.
So the loving, patient, divine artificer is here
represented as laboring long and earnestly with a
somewhat obstinate material.
That's the picture.
Not discouraged when He comes upon a black
vein in the white marble, nor even when
the hard stone blunts the edge of His
chisels, God carries on with a business of
preparation.
I trust we all know something about that,
of God refusing to give up in our
lives.
When we've fallen and when we've stumbled and
when we've rebelled, of God coming after us,
putting His hand upon us and shaking us
a little and telling us, look mate, look
child of mine, look son or daughter of
mine, I will not let you go.
I have something big and large and great
for you.
Something that is so momentously wonderful, I cannot
give you up.
Behind the production of the robust Christian certainty
that we have here in this context then
there lies a persistent divine action.
He who has made us or prepared us
for this very thing is God.
You do not come into real Christian certainty
all at once.
Now I'm afraid that this cuts across much
evangelical thinking.
We expect that a young Christian who has
only just trusted Christ can have the deepest
kind and quality of Christian assurance that is
possible.
I suggest to you that that is not
possible.
The deepest assurance that a Christian can have
comes after God has long worked upon him.
And when God has been working upon him,
molding him, shaping him, trying him, testing him,
correcting him, chastising him, and continues to do
the work, it is then that a man
becomes sure, I'm in God's hands, He'll never
let me go.
Of course, there is an assurance that the
youngest convert may have when the moment he
knows his sins are forgiven him and he
has peace with God.
Of course there is, but there is nothing
in comparison with this.
That's only but the foreglim of Christian certainty,
properly so called.
There is a depth of certainty which makes
you ready to die.
Indeed, yearning to put off this house of
clay, to be clothed with your house which
is in heaven.
And there are not many of us that
have such an assurance.
Now let's be honest.
I don't know whether I've ever told you
of the doctor who was a skeptic and
he had so many Christians on his panel.
And they were very rich people, most of
them.
And when they used to go with one
trouble or another, they were very serious, he
used to, with his tongue in his cheek,
give them an alternative.
Now the thing for you to do is
to pack up your job and go for
a world trip or go to heaven.
And he would have great glee in saying
most of them chose a world trip.
Few of them had that certainty of heaven
that it was an attraction.
And they were ready and they were waiting,
straining at the leash for the vision glorious
of their Lord.
Brothers and sisters, we talk about assurance.
Few of us have that, you know.
Now I'm sorry to disabuse you, but very
few Christians have this quality of assurance that
heaven is as real and as precious as
precious can be.
So that to me to live is Christ,
to die is gain.
Now that brings us further.
Further.
Now you see we're actually moving into the
deepest, into the bowels of Christian certainty as
it were.
And we'll see something more as we proceed.
Because the next thing that we look at
at the end of verse 5 is the
divine confirmation of all this.
The confirmation of the divine assurance.
God confirms Himself as He goes along.
He gives something to give us assurance.
Then He confirms that assurance again.
And it goes on like that.
And life is like that with God.
He confirms one thing after another so that
you can always have assurance.
Now the one who has made us, or
who has prepared us for this particular thing,
this self-same thing is God.
And He doesn't stop there.
And He's also given us the Spirit as
a deposit guaranteeing what is to come.
Now if this doesn't make the saints of
God sing, well I tell you there's something
wrong.
There's something wrong.
Though that is unquestionably the meaning of the
underlying Greek, I think that the RSV, the
Revised Standard Version, is closer to the original
when it puts it like this.
Who has given us the Spirit as a
guarantee.
Simply that.
Because that's all you have in the Greek.
It means, it means that He's given us
the Spirit as an earnest of what is
to come.
A deposit corresponding to the reality that is
to come.
But He's given us as a guarantee.
Now there's a little Greek word here.
I must show off my little bit of
Greek again tonight.
You'll forgive me.
I don't often do that.
But it has to be done every now
and again.
There's a word in the Greek, arabon.
Simple little word.
But it's so rich.
And that's the word that we have here.
And you notice that it's so rich that
some of the translators use four or five
words to bring out the meaning of it.
You encounter it in 2 Corinthians chapter 1
and verse 22.
And it's translated there exactly the same as
it is here in the NIV or in
the RSV.
God has set His seal of ownership on
us, says Paul there.
And put His Spirit in our hearts.
In the New International Version says, as a
deposit guaranteeing what is to come.
Now instead of all those words, what the
Greek says, as an arabon.
You have it again in Ephesians chapter 1
verses 13 to 14.
You also were included in Christ when you
heard the word of truth, the gospel of
your salvation.
Having believed you were marked in Him with
a seal.
The promised Holy Spirit.
Now here it is.
Who is a deposit.
The Holy Spirit is a deposit.
Guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those
who are God's possession.
To the praise of His glory.
You were given the Holy Spirit.
How?
Who is the deposit or as a deposit
guaranteeing our inheritance.
The simple word in the Greek is arabon
again.
Just one word.
Now what does it mean?
Well let's just get two or three of
the main strands in it.
First of all the arabon, the earnest or
deposit or guarantee, was the first installment of
something.
We still have this concept in buying things
we'll pay down.
We'll have a down payment, a deposit.
And we'll give the down payment.
But that means of course when you put
the down payment, you virtually symbolically promise that
you're going to pay for the whole thing.
The Holy Spirit says the Apostle Paul, is
the down payment that God has given.
It's the first gift.
He says I'm giving you my spirit and
I mean to give you much much else.
And even though you may be filled with
a spirit, you still don't have everything that
I have to give you.
But I will give you more.
I will give you the whole inheritance.
Again the arabon was a guarantee of full
payment.
Not just symbolic of it, but it was
a guarantee of it.
Now it's difficult to have any illustration of
this from common life.
I don't know that there is one.
But in Greek legal documents it comes in
very often.
A Greek person would be asked to give,
to make an arabon which meant that he
was going on oath.
And he was guaranteed to do something or
to go somewhere or to pay something.
It was a guarantee.
It was a pled.
The third element in this word arabon is
this.
The arabon was of the same nature or
texture as the full inheritance.
Or whatever was going to be paid.
Let me illustrate.
Assuming that you were coming to me to
buy a plot of land on my farm.
We strike the bargain.
And I give you a handful of the
soil.
Indicating thereby that I was giving you the
arabon of the total fullness that was to
come.
What I had promised.
But now the point is this.
The arabon would be a little bit of
the very land that you had bought and
that you will ultimately inherit.
Not a handful of dust.
Or even of dirt from another field or
whatever.
It would be exactly from the same place.
So that ultimately your inheritance would be of
the same nature as the little bit of
earth that you'd already got.
Now can you see the significance of this?
When God gives his people the Holy Spirit
to dwell in their hearts.
He gives them an assurance that there's more
to come.
It is the down payment of something that
he will fulfill.
It is the pledge of something.
But the point is this.
What he's going to give in all its
massive and eternal fullness by and by.
Is of the same nature as the down
payment he has given us.
Which in unmistakably clear words means this.
Whatever heaven is like.
It will be of the same, the life
will be of the same texture and of
the same quality as the life that is
given us by the Holy Spirit.
Here and now.
No man, no woman who has the Holy
Spirit in his heart or her heart will
find heaven a strange place.
Because the life of the heavens is the
very life that we have now by the
Holy Spirit.
We have it now as an arabon.
A foretaste of glory divine.
We have it in as much as we
can take it.
Indeed Paul tells the Ephesians that they should
always be being filled with the Spirit.
We should never miss that present participle there.
Because it means this.
It's like a cup always under the tap.
Being filled all the time and there's always
an overflow.
Not just going to the tap turning it
on and filling my cup and drinking it
up and then coming back for a refill.
It's not that.
Keeping the cup under the tap and the
tap is running all the time.
And the cup is full all the time.
And it's overflowing all the time.
What Paul is saying to the Ephesians is
this.
The fullness of the life of God is
such you can never come to the bottom
of it.
You can never come to the end of
it.
And you should be filled all the time.
In this world.
But when you are filled all the time
in this life.
The fullness of this life is as nothing.
In comparison with a harvest that will follow.
The first fruits that we can only enjoy
here.
Now Paul actually uses that word.
In Romans 8.23. Not only so he
says.
But we ourselves who have the first fruits
of the spirit.
Grown inwardly as we wait eagerly for our
adoption of sons.
The redemption of our bodies.
We have the first fruits.
And the first fruit of the harvest is
a sheaf from the harvest field.
The whole of the harvest will be of
the same quality.
Of the same kind.
But much more of it.
There the apostle affirms then that the Christians
already possess the first fruits of the spirit.
Now in the words before us in 2
Corinthians 5.5. The gift of the Holy
Spirit is to be viewed as a God
given deposit.
Guaranteeing a full inheritance in due course.
Now in the words before us in 2
Corinthians 5.5. The gift of the Holy
Spirit is to be viewed as a God
given deposit.
Guaranteeing a full inheritance in due course.
As far as our spirits are concerned.
As far as the body is concerned.
God is guaranteeing.
God is confirming his own promise.
So that we may say with Paul.
We know that if our earthly house of
this tabernacle were dissolved.
We have a building of God.
A house not made with hands.
Eternal in the heavens.
How can we say that?
Just because we believe God.
The God of all grace.
And the God of all mercy.
And the God of pardoning mercy.
The God of sustaining grace.
The God who never begins what he doesn't
mean to end.
We believe God.
Now that brings me to the last point
tonight.
In this very rich passage.
There are many things that might have called
our attention.
In the verses that we have been looking
at.
But we must pass on.
I want to say a word about the
attributes.
Of the assurance which God gives.
Or better still perhaps the behavior of this
kind of assurance.
Verse 10.
Verses 9 and 10 I should say.
So we make it our goal.
To please him.
Whether we are at home in the body
or away from it.
For we must all appear before the judgment
seat of Christ.
That each one may receive what is due
him.
For the things done while in the body.
Whether good or bad.
Now there is a false assurance as well
as a genuine one.
You may discern the true.
And distinguish it from the false by its
behavior.
You say you have assurance.
Then very well.
You will show it.
And the quality of it in your behavior.
The characteristic of the quality of assurance.
That Paul is speaking of here.
The characteristic features or attributes are laid bare.
And he mentions two things.
First of all the intention that dominates.
And then the incentive that determines.
The intention that dominates.
Do you have this quality of assurance?
Well says Paul.
Very well.
You may have your choice as I have
my choice.
I really says Paul.
I hope I'm not misunderstanding him or misstating
his case.
I don't want to die.
But I want to be alive when the
Lord Jesus returns with the clouds of heaven.
So that what is mortal may be swallowed
up of mortality.
And he uses a Greek word which is
just like this.
It's putting one garment over another.
And the concept apparently that he has.
Is that of the Lord Jesus Christ coming.
And presenting him as the dead are raised
from their graves.
Presenting those who are alive at his coming.
As those who are raised from their graves.
With this new body.
It's a very remarkable.
It's a very, very remarkable statement there.
He is looking forward to that.
He is so full of it.
And he so believes it.
Now he says alright.
I'm expecting that.
How do I show.
How do I manifest to the world.
That my assurance is genuine.
Well in this way he says.
We are always confident and we know.
That as long as we are at home
in the body.
We are away from the Lord.
We live by faith not by sight.
We are confident I say.
And would prefer to be away from the
body.
And at home with the Lord.
Now notice.
We may not be able to dwell with
those verses.
They have difficulties.
But we must come to this last statement.
So we make it our goal to please
him.
Whether we are at home in the body
or away from it.
I suggest to you that what Paul has
in mind is this.
He didn't find any attraction in death.
But what was attractive to him was to
be with his Lord.
Oh he had mastered death.
He is the one who in 1 Corinthians
15 as we saw this morning.
Challenged death.
Oh death where is your sting.
Oh grave where is your victory.
It's gone he says.
Thanks be to God who giveth us the
victory.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Even so death was no attractiveness.
Had no attractiveness to him.
What really attracted Paul was this.
Was the thought that perhaps he would be
alive when the Lord Jesus returned.
So that he wouldn't have to live in
an intermediate state.
As he calls it naked.
Not in this physical body.
Not yet inhabiting the new body.
But spiritually naked.
I don't want that says Paul in effect.
I want the Lord to come so that
I can receive my new body.
Now he says.
Alright.
I have my preferences.
But he says whether I am in this
body or in that.
Or whether I am in the body or
out of the body.
It makes no difference.
This is the intention that dominates my life.
And should dominate all of ours.
We make it our goal to please him.
Whether we are at home in the body.
Or away from it.
It matters not.
The thing that really matters is that we
bring pleasure to our Lord.
Oh my good friends.
I find so much that I would like
to say about this.
That I really do not know where to
start.
You see we were hearing here on Wednesday
evening.
About the law of God embodied in the
ten commandments.
And we have so many ethical injunctions in
the new testament.
We have the sermon on the mount.
We have the ethics outlined in all the
epistles.
Telling us what to do.
And it is very possible for us to
think of these things in purely legal terms.
But behind all these injunctions.
There is a more basic and fundamental factor
that we need to get hold of.
And here it is.
Do you want to please your Lord?
Do you want to give pleasure to him
who took the pain of your condemnation on
the cross of Calvary?
Or are you more concerned about your own
pleasure here in this life.
Than giving pleasure to him.
Who counts most?
Him or yourself.
That is the issue.
And it says Paul.
I exhibit the reality of my assurance of
the body of glory.
I exhibit the assurance that God has given
me in this way.
By making it my priority.
Whether I am in the body or out
of the body.
Whether I go home via the way of
death.
Or whether I go home via the skies.
I make it my priority to please him.
Oh that the spirit of God would catch
the sails of our lives here tonight.
And just give us this tremendous propelling sense
that the apostle has.
Oh to please him.
To me to live is Christ.
That has the priority.
And the verb that he uses is rather
a strong one.
He implies a verb which really says that
it is his consuming ambition.
Not just a little desire.
But it is his consuming ambition.
It is the controlling motive force behind everything
he does.
But now you notice there is also here
something to be said about the consistency of
it all.
The consistency of it all.
We must note Paul's consistency.
In vain do we say that we desire
to be at home with the Lord.
Unless we are equally concerned to serve and
please our Lord here and now.
One has met people who had a lot
to say about the heaven they expected to
see at last.
But strange, strange, strange to relate.
They had very little concern to serve their
Lord here and now.
Or to please him.
And when heaven will be taken up and
the eternities will be taken up.
With pleasing him and serving him day and
night in his temple.
My dear friend, if you've got the hope
of that and the assurance of that.
And you're sure that's where you're heading for.
Surely we should be a little bit concerned
about it here and now.
Paul is consistent.
And he would have us exhibit something of
that same kind of consistency.
If we know we're going to heaven to
serve our blessed Lord.
The Father through him by the Spirit.
And let us set about the business of
pleasing him here and now.
In doing what he requires of us.
And in becoming what he has made it
possible for us to be.
Is it your priority?
But now I must say a word to
close about the incentive that determines the same
end.
With verse 10 Paul passes to something else.
This is a very staggering verse.
For he says adding another reason.
For what he's already said.
For we must all appear before the judgment
seat of Christ.
That each one may receive what is due
him for the things done while in the
body.
Whether good, whether bad.
Now I've no doubt it is a legitimate
thing to preach on this verse in and
of itself.
To wrench it from its context and to
expound the truth that it contains.
Separate from its context in scripture.
But nevertheless the real significance of this verse.
Can only be appreciated when we see it
in its context.
And I think it has to be taken
very closely in connection with the preceding verse.
That the priority in our lives should be
to please our Lord Jesus Christ.
Whether we're in the body, whether we're out
of the body.
In verse 10 then the apostle clearly implies.
That the coming judgment of all Christians by
Jesus Christ.
Should actually be a further incentive to please
him.
And that's how I understand it.
The implication is that the believer should carefully
make his choices.
And his decision in life.
So that Jesus Christ is pleased.
He does so out of love for him
and gratitude to him.
But he also does so because he wants
the judge to be pleased with him.
At the day of judgment.
In other words he doesn't simply want to
give pleasure to his Lord Jesus Christ in
this life.
He wants to give pleasure to his Lord
at the day of judgment.
It's the kind of thing that you have
when a trainer is satisfied with his trainee.
You have it in the world of sports.
You have it with your football teams.
You have it in other areas of life.
But when the person who has been training
the team.
Or training the individual for whatever it is.
Sees him finally functioning just as he was
taught to.
Working to the maximum of his capacity.
And speeding along or whatever it is.
Finally doing more than he could a few
years ago.
And achieving what he was meant to achieve.
And you can see the trainer with a
sense of satisfaction.
And a sense of pleasure.
If I understand the meaning of the apostle
Paul.
That is the main thought here.
It's to bring pleasure to him in this
life.
But to remember this.
Our Lord and Savior is not a soft
one.
He is just.
And he is holy.
And he is concerned.
And at the day of judgment.
He will want us to answer for the
things done in the body.
Whatever they are.
And as we shall be brought to account.
And will have to answer.
He will reward us exactly as we deserve.
Exactly as we deserve.
There will be such a perfect correspondence.
Between that which we shall receive by way
of reward.
And that which we have done in the
body.
There will be no one who will be
able to say.
You've exaggerated my downcomings or my sins or
my faults.
You've not done me justice.
Not a soul.
There will be an exact correspondence.
Between the reward that will follow.
Or the loss as the case may be.
And what we have done in the body.
Now.
Let me say.
It's very necessary for us to remember here.
That the purpose of this tribunal.
Or this judgment.
The judgment seat of Christ.
Is not positively penal.
As theologians would say.
But retributive.
Involving the disclosure.
Not only of what has been worthless.
But also of what has been good and
valuable in life.
Let me give you a comment from one
of the best commentators that I've been able
to find.
The judgment pronounced is not a declaration of
doom.
But an assessment of worth.
With the assignments of rewards.
To those who because of their faithfulness deserve
them.
And the loss.
Or withholding of rewards in the case of
those who do not deserve them.
The question of this judgment is not whether
a man is saved or lost.
That has been settled out of court.
That's settled in a service like this.
That is settled in this life.
Whether a man is to be saved or
lost.
By whether or not he repents of his
sin.
And turns in faith to the only Savior.
You read on to the end of the
chapter and you will see how true that
is.
Jesus Christ was made sin for us on
the cross.
In order that we should be made the
righteousness of God in him.
He changed positions with us.
He took our positions as condemned men and
women.
He became a condemned person instead of us.
In order that we should become the accepted
person in his place.
He took our place that we should take
his.
And we are saved when we accept him
as such.
The one who died for us and gives
us pardon and righteousness.
What then is this judgment?
It's to determine the worth of the life
you have lived as a saved man or
a saved woman.
Now if you want the best comment that
I can give you upon this.
It's way back in 1 Corinthians 3.
I can do it hurriedly as we close.
You remember how the apostle Paul says there
that.
Other foundation can no man lay than that
which has been laid.
We do not lay the foundation of our
own salvation.
The church can't do that for you.
A preacher can't do that for you.
No one can do that for you.
That foundation is laid by God and it
is Christ.
On Christ the solid rock I stand.
As they sing in Ireland all other rocks
are shamrocks.
There is no other rock.
There is only one rock and that is
Christ Jesus our Lord.
He's been laid there by God.
He's been placed there for you to build
your life's hope upon him.
But now says our Lord in writing there
in the third chapter of 1 Corinthians.
Every man has to build his character upon
that foundation.
And the kind, the quality that he incorporates
into his character may be this or maybe
that.
The quality of his life and living may
be in terms of wood, hay and stubble.
So that when the judgment comes it will
all go up in blazes.
Or the quality of his life on the
other hand may be more like those things
that are purged by the fire.
And come through the fires totally unscathed.
Perhaps the better for it.
Gold, silver, precious stones.
Now there are some he says whose works
will be burned.
They're useless.
They will be saved but so as by
fire.
And if you'll pardon me for putting it
in a metaphorical way.
And using the language of common parlance by
the skin of their teeth.
Because grace is the basis of salvation.
They will be saved but by the skin
of their teeth.
But they will have nothing to show.
They know nothing of what the psalmist sung
about.
He redeemeth thy life from destruction.
If I understand the word life there it
means life and living.
The thief on the cross went to be
with Jesus in paradise.
His soul was saved but his life was
lost.
And if I'm not mistaken many another thief
and many another person has come to paradise.
Without anything to show in terms of living
and obedience and character.
Duly formed.
But the merits of Jesus Christ was theirs.
So they were justified freely by his grace.
They were received in Christ.
But they never worked out their own salvation
with fear and trembling.
There was no character.
There was no service.
You and I should so please God in
this life.
Knowing that there's a judgment day coming.
When we shall either hear the deafening silence
of our Lord.
And he'll have nothing to say that is
good of us.
Or his well done.
Good and faithful servant.
Enter thou into the joys of your Lord.
Now you see what Paul has done and
I'm closing with this.
You see what Paul has done.
He has told us this.
If you really have the hope of things
that are eternal and unseen.
All right.
Treat them genuinely and realistically.
There is a judgment that you haven't seen.
It's on the books of God.
It's on the program.
It is written.
It is revealed.
And you will all have to stand before
the judgment seat.
Of Christ is his right.
Treat that as real.
Let the light of that coming judgment fall
upon your every act.
And every decision here and now.
And make you more and more determined to
please your Lord.
In the body, out of the body, before
the throne.
Christian assurance.
It's author, God.
He that has prepared us for this self
-same thing is God and God alone.
So if you need it, if you desire
it, if you haven't got it.
The thing to do is to go directly
to God.
The behavior of it.
Well you can recognize this deep assurance.
By the determination to please Jesus Christ.
Out of love for him.
Out of a sense of awe.
Of the thought of standing before him on
that judgment day.
But very especially.
Out of the desire to bring pleasure to
him who bore your pains.
That yours should be the eternal pleasure of
glory.
Where do we stand tonight my friends?
In relation to these massive, massive truths of
divine revelation.
I'm not asking where we stand merely in
terms of accepting them intellectually.
That is one side of the question.
I'm asking where do we stand in terms
of our response to them.
In terms of life and living and behavior.
Oh may the Spirit of God so work
upon us.
That a new sobriety will come into our
lives.
And a new determination to please the one
who bore the cross for us.
Let us pray.
Almighty God our Father in heaven.
We thank you for giving us such a
word as this to meditate upon.
It solemnizes us most certainly.
And yet our Father at the same time
it releases within us a fountain of gratitude.
That you have given us a Savior who
is qualified to save us in this life.
And to keep us into the next.
And has made all provision for us as
we pass through the scene of time.
Until we arrive in your presence.
And there dwell with you for all eternity.
Oh Lord our God we thank you for
Jesus Christ.
And we pray now directly to your throne.
That you will of your mercy enable us
to please him more.
More and still more.
With greater and ever greater determination.
May we set about the task of bringing
pleasure.
To the Christ of the cross.
And the Christ of our hearts.
We ask it in his name.
Amen.