Will Your Works Burn? The Judgment Seat of Christ

Hello, and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Okay, good to see everybody once again, and let's get right back into the book, 1 Corinthians chapter 3. Now, if you remember, the last several weeks we've been talking about the Holy Spirit is working amongst the masses of humanity to call out a people or a bride for Christ. Paul uses the term constantly, the church, which is his body. The head of that body is in heaven, in the person of Christ. And since Christ is the very epitome of the kingdom, as we've seen the kingdom taught all the way through Scripture, the kingdom is in heaven. And consequently, as we become members of the body of Christ, we also become members of the kingdom, as Paul points out in Colossians chapter 1, that God the Father hath translated us from darkness into the kingdom of His dear Son. And then in Philippians, he speaks of it as our citizenship is now in heaven. Well, indeed it is, because that's where the kingdom is. And as our citizenship is in heaven, from there is where we look for the Savior, the head of the body, to one day take us to Himself, and then, of course, have the marriage supper of Christ by faith plus nothing. We can't leave it there. In fact, I always tell people, you know, we're not saved just as a fire escape. We're saved to serve. And I think I've been stressing that enough in the last couple of programs, again going back to the person bought out of the slave market and how he wants to satisfy his master by being an obedient servant—doesn't want his freedom, he wants to be a servant the rest of his life. Now, in 1 Corinthians chapter 3, Paul gives such a beautiful illustration that fits every believer. And it may shock you a little bit, this is going to fit a lot of people that you can probably think of who do absolutely nothing to further the Word of God. But they're going to be in heaven. The Bible says they are. All right, let's look at it. 1 Corinthians chapter 3, verse 9, where Paul writes to the believer, we are laborers. See, now someone that's laboring isn't sitting in his easy chair, he's out there working. So we are laborers together with God. You are God's husbandry. We're under His control, we're His. You are God's building. Now, I'm going to use the analogy of the building more than anything else here, because all the language that Paul uses fits that description. According to the grace of God which is given unto me as a wise master builder—in other words, he's the contractor, it's Paul speaking of himself—and he says, as the master builder I have laid the foundation. Now, I don't know how many of you have ever done any building, but I know that whatever I've put up a building—of course now I know the pole buildings are in vogue, you just simply set the poles in the ground and you build on that—but usually when you build a home or you build something, you start with what? Foundation. And you build that foundation. Now, I've got a contractor right here in front of me, he's nodding his head, and that building will either be something or nothing depending on that foundation. You bet your boots. Everything is going to rest on that foundation. If that foundation sags in five or ten years, your building is kaput. If that foundation, it crumbles, your building is kaput. But if the foundation is sound, you can build upon it, and then of course it depends on who does the carpentering from there on up. All right, now he's laying the analogy then that he has put down the foundation, there's nothing wrong with it, but let every man—the end of verse 10—let every man take heed or be careful how he buildeth thereupon or on that foundation. Verse 11, for other foundation can no man lay. There is no way there can be another foundation for salvation. It has to be that which is already put down, and it's Christ Jesus. There's the foundation. Paul is the master builder. He has given us all the instructions. He has given us the blueprints of how to build on this foundation as a believer. Now verse 12, now if any man, woman or child, if anyone build upon this foundation—in other words, they're a believer, they've trusted it for salvation, they're in the body—now if they build upon this, they can have all of these materials to work with—gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, and stubble. Now, the casual reader won't see the difference, but anyone who has been in my classes immediately sees you've got two distinct kinds, and what are they? The first three can withstand fire and heat. The second three go up in a puff of smoke. You got that? Wood, hay, and stubble. On the other hand, gold, silver, and precious stones. Verse 13, every person's work—now I'm going to use the word person so that we include the women and children as well. If they're a believer—we're talking about believers now—every person's work as a believer, his day-to -day practices shall be made manifest. There comes that word again. You remember how I defined it a program or two ago? Like putting it in an intense spotlight where nothing is left to chance. Now this particular spotlight, of course, is going to be the penetrating, fiery eyes of the Lord Jesus at the judgment seat of Christ wherein every believer will be examined not for sin, but for what? His works. All right, let's read on. Everyone's work shall be manifest—placed in the spotlight—for the day, the judgment day—not the white-throne judgment now, don't misunderstand me—but the judgment seat of Christ. At that day it shall be declared because it will be revealed or tested—how?—by fire. Now, hold your hand in Corinthians. Come back with me to Revelation so that we see what the Bible is talking about when it speaks of being tested by fire. Revelation chapter 19, I think it is. Revelation chapter 19, might as well start with verse 11. This is a depiction of His second coming. Verse 11, And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war. That is, as he comes there at Armageddon to those nations gathered round Jerusalem. But here's the verse I wanted you to see. Verse 12, His eyes were as what? A flame of fire. Now, it doesn't say they were flames of fire, but they're just like flames of fire. In other words, they'll be so penetrating there'll be nothing that can escape them. Nothing can be hidden from them. It'll all be revealed. All right, now if you'll come back to 1 Corinthians then, this is the language that Paul is using. That as we come before the Bema Seat, now here's where I have to make a qualification. The lost people, from Cain until the very end of time as we know it, will only be for the lost. There will be no believers at the great white throne. Here Christ will be the judge, and He will judge the lost of all ages, because I don't know whether we'll have time in the next few weeks or not, but you know in John's Gospel chapter 5, Jesus taught so plainly that there will be two resurrections, the resurrection of the just and the resurrection of the unjust. In other words, the unbeliever is also going to be resurrected out of hell before the great white throne, and he will appear here bodily in a new resurrected body, but it'll be a body fit not for glory, not a body fit for heaven, but a body fit for that eternal lake of fire. It'll be a body that will have evidently many of the same appetites of this one, but without any hope of ever satisfying them. And so that's why the Scripture says, and let the drunkard be drunken still, and let the whoremonger continue on to those appetites, and they'll never be satisfied. They'll also have an eternity of regret, because you want to remember, nobody goes before the white throne except that he chooses to go there. Salvation has been offered to all people, everyone, red and yellow, black and white, rich, poor, doesn't make any difference. But if they reject it, they're going to end up at the great white throne. All right, we're not going to concern ourselves with that. We're going to concern ourselves with what Paul calls the judgment seat of Christ, and again I think it's a mistranslation in our King James. It really should have been the bema seat, or the seat of rewards. Now the reason it's called the seat of rewards is because the bema seat was the seat of rewards in the Olympic Games. And at the Olympic Games, the bema seat was occupied by the judges who would determine who was first, second, third, fourth, and so on. Now that's exactly what the bema seat is going to be in heaven. It's not going to be a great white throne judgment. It's not going to be a judgment for sin. That's all under the blood. But every believer will come before Christ in that moment of time to be examined on what he has done with his life as a believer for reward. Now a lot of people don't like to hear about reward, and they say, well, I don't like this whole idea of working for reward. Well, I can't help it. The Bible teaches it. I don't. The Bible, over and over, Paul says in another place that when you enter a race, what's to be your attitude? To win! To win! And he says, and again Paul always goes back to the Olympic Games, and he said they entered that race, and what did they do? Oh, they controlled their body. In other words, they trained, they practiced, all to only win a corruptible crown. Back in Paul's day, what was the crown? Just a wreath. By the time the poor guy got home, it was all shriveled up and fit for nothing that may be put between pages of a book. But he says they did all that for a corruptible crown. But we're not running for a corruptible. We're running for a what? Incorruptible, see? And so this is the whole concept of Paul's teachings, that yes, we're saved by faith plus nothing. But now what are we to do? Gear up for the race. Gear up to work for reward. All right, but we're using the building concept here. Now in this building, and again, I always like to just sort of draw a mental picture of a wall. And here, God, as a believer now, you've been given this section of the wall, and God gives you six materials to use. You can use gold, silver, precious stone. Now they're kind of hard to come by. You can't just sit down and let that stuff come to you. But on the other hand, I always like to come back to the three little pigs. I'm still just a kid at heart. You come back to the three little pigs, and what do they make their houses of? Sticks, see, and straw. But the enterprising little fellow, he went and got what? He went and got his bricks. Well, I always like to think of that here, because this is the believer. Are we going to be enterprising? Are we really going to be energetic? Are we going to go out and hustle for the gold, the silver, and the precious stone? Or are we going to be like 95 % of our fellow Christians and just say, oh, well, I'll just put sticks in my section of the wall. I'll just put some straw. I don't think it's worth going up into the mountains and dig for gold and silver. That's the attitude of too many Christians. But see, let's read on now. Verse 13, every man's work, what he puts in that wall, is going to be put under that spotlight of Christ's fiery eyes at this Bema Seat. Now we're not going to come before Him with our sin. We're going to come before Him, have we won reward. All right, reading on in verse 13, the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed or tested by fire, the eyes of Christ, and those eyes shall test every man, that is, every believer. Now we're not talking about the unbeliever. It'll test every believer's work of what sort it is. Is it wood, hay, and stubble? Is it gold, precious stones, and silver? Now look at verse 14. If any man's work, in other words, what we've put in that wall, and the torch of our Lord's eyes come upon it, is it going to remain? Is it gold, silver, and precious stones? Yeah, then it will. But what if it's wood, hay, and stubble? Puff of smoke. Nothing. And that, I'm afraid, is going to be too, too many Christians. Nothing. Now I'll read on. Verse 15, if any man's work shall be burned, it's wood, hay, and stubble, he shall suffer loss, not of salvation, but of what? Reward. He won't get a reward. He hasn't earned it. Now you see the difference between salvation and works? Of course they go together, but you can't put works over here in salvation. It has to stay over here in the area of Christian service, of working for reward. All right, now read on. If any man's work shall be burned, it's wood, hay, and stubble, he shall suffer loss, that even that believer, misfit as he is in God's overall program, what's the promise? He'll still be saved. See? Now you can't change that. A lot of us would probably like to, but listen, the Scripture says that even that careless believer, he's going to be saved. He's going to be there. I'll never forget years and years ago, one of my favorite pastors, when he was preaching on this, he said, yeah, he's going to be there. He said, this being saved, so as the fire, he said, in the English slang could be called, he'll be there by the skin of his teeth. And I like that. Oh yeah, they're going to be there. I'll never forget, I had a very devout religious person that, back in Iowa, I used to feed a lot of fat cattle, and he was one of my primary fat cattle buyers, and he was a very devout religious person. And we had a lot of discussions on these things way back then already, and I'll never forget he made almost the same statement, he said, Les, he said, I don't care what I've got when I get there, he said, just so I can somehow slip under the door. See, isn't that sad? Isn't that sad? And he thought he could do it with his work, see? But whatever. Do you get the picture? For the person that is carrying out the Lord's bidding, we are doing what God expects us to do, we're using gold, silver, and precious stones. If we're careless and we could care less, we're simply putting in wood, hay, and stubble, and it'll amount to nothing. But yeah, we'll be there. Those believers will be there. In fact, I've often told my classes, I know it won't be that way, because God's going to take away memory, I'm sure. But you know what's going to shock a lot of people? The people that are going to be in heaven they didn't think would be there, and the people that aren't going to be there they thought sure would. You know why? Because man looks at things from the human point of view, God looks at it from His point of view, and that's all the difference in the world. All right, so we're to work for reward. Now the crowns, of course, are something else, and I think the crowns we will definitely lay at Jesus' feet, but the rewards, what's it going to be? Well, I have to think that since Paul makes such a beautiful picture of the fact that when Christ sets up His kingdom, we're going to rule and reign with Him. Is that right? We're going to be joint heirs with Christ. We're going to rule and reign with Him on the earth. So I like to think that the reward aspect will be the amount of responsibility that God will give us in our role as ruling in His government. Now, I don't know if I'm scripturally correct here, but I like to go back to his description in the Gospels, in his own earthly ministry, when he gave out the talents. Do you remember that? He gave the one individual ten talents, and he gave one five, and he gave one one. What'd the guy with ten do? Came back with ten more. The one with five came back with five more, and the one with one came back with one. He buried it, and at least he was tickled to death he had the one. But then what did Jesus answer? Now, He says, when I come into my kingdom, the one who had gained ten talents, he will rule what? Ten cities. See? The one who had five will rule. Now, I don't, like I say, I don't know if I'm totally correct in bringing this into Paul's teaching, but I like to—I hope I'm not wrong—that when we finally get into that kingdom economy and we'll be ruling and reigning with Christ, our reward will be the amount of responsibility we'll be given in that kingdom operation. Now, a lot of people shrink from that, but I don't think God wants us to. God wants us to want to be able to accept responsibility, to take the energy that it takes to get out and move and do things. In fact, I would like to give the illustration. I'm a cowboy fan, and I make no apology for that. That is a Dallas cowboy. And I would like to give the analogy. Now, so far as I'm concerned, if I were given a choice of having a seat clear up in the euchre seats or being down there as a quarterback, where would I rather be? Where would you rather be? Hey, I'd rather be that quarterback. Even if I did get my head knocked off, I'd be a lot happier down there on the field than sitting clear up there in the seats. All right, that's exactly the way I like to picture this. If we work for reward, we're going to be in the very center of activity when that kingdom comes about. But if we're careless, we've got nothing but wood, hay, and stubble, we'll be there. Oh, yeah, we'll be there, but we'll be up in the sidelines, and we just won't have the excitement. Now, a lot of people come back to me saying, well, now, that's going to make people jealous. Oh, now, wait a minute. Jealousy is part of what? Sin. The old Adam, and that's not going to be there, see? So the person who goes into the glory without reward, he's not going to be jealous, he's not going to be envious, and he's not going to be tickled to death he's there, but they're not going to be envious, and all these things are just going to work together so beautifully. But anyway, if I don't make anything else clear, I want you to see that salvation is by faith alone, but the Christian life is that working for reward. Now, I hope I've got enough time to quickly move into, then, how is the church age going to end? Now, you're in Corinthians, so just turn over to chapter 15, and we're going to do this speedily. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. There's coming a day, and we think it's real, real soon. The way things are happening in the world, I don't see how it can be put off much longer. But we're fast approaching the day when the last person will be brought into the body, and that vessel will be full, and God's going to have to take it out of the way. All right, you've got 1 Corinthians 15, drop down to verse 51. Now, here again are teachings you won't find anywhere but Paul. Nowhere is it ever hinted that there's going to be a day when living people are suddenly going to be translated. But here it is. Verse 51, behold, I show you another mystery, another secret. We, that is, believers, shall not all sleep or die, but we have to be what? Changed. See? In a moment, in the twinkling, in the split second of an eyelash, at the last trump, for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead, the dead in Christ, those who have been part and parcel now of the body of Christ, not the Old Testament saints, Daniel says he has to wait. We'll look at that in another lesson. But for now, it's the church-age saints, these who are in the body. At the last trump, the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we, Paul says, and he expected to be alive, shall be changed. In other words, when the trumpet sounds, and if we're living, and I think we will be, the dead in Christ will rise first, and then we will suddenly take flight, and we will go up with them. Now, in order to culminate all this, we have to go to Thessalonians. Go to 1 Thessalonians, chapter 4. And here, some people just simply refuse the concept of the rapture, but when they do that, they have to throw Paul away first, because Paul makes so much of it. And here is probably the clearest language in 1 Corinthians, chapter 4, coming in at verse 13, where he writes, But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them who are asleep, that is, our loved ones who have died, that you sorrow not, even as others who have no hope. In other words, if we as believers have lost loved ones, we don't have to weep and wail and carry on like the heathen do, because we're going to see our loved ones again some day. All right, verse 14, for if we, what's the word? Believe. See? It doesn't say if we are repenting and baptizing. It doesn't say if we've joined the church. It says if we believe. But we've got to be careful what we believe. You don't just believe in God. We believe what? That Jesus died and rose again. There's the gospel. So if we believe the gospel, even so them also who sleep or who have died in Jesus, God will bring with him. Now watch the language. Now we know that the believer, as soon as he dies, his spirit soul takes flight to where? The presence of Christ in heaven. And there it's waiting for this day of resurrection to what? Be reunited with the resurrected body. All right, let's move on speedily. Verse 15, for this we say unto you by the word of the Lord that we who are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not go ahead of them who are asleep or who have died. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven. Now you remember Isaac, he met Rebekah where? Part way, away from the home. The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, the voice of the archangel and the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them, everybody, in the clouds, that is in the atmosphere, to meet the Lord where? In the air. And then we go back up into heaven with him to go before the judgment seat of Christ. We'll have the marriage of the Lamb and we'll be ready to come back with him seven years later as time reckons it at his second coming as he comes in, of course, as I won't have time to look at it. But Zechariah chapter 14, you can read it when you get home. Just read those first six, seven verses. And what does it say? And in that day his feet shall stand where, Pat? On the Mount of Olives, see? And his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives. The other night I was teaching Acts chapter 1, and there he stood with the eleven, and he went up. And the angel said, Why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus in like manner you have seen him go shall come again. And I don't say these things to be funny, I try to make it clear. He left how? Head first. He's coming how? Feet first. And he's going to stand on the Mount of Olives just as sure as it's there tonight, and that will usher in then the kingdom. And when he comes, we're going to come with him. In fact, I always like to use two prepositions, and that probably helps you to remember as well as anything. When he comes, he comes with us. How does that help? He comes with us. Thank you for watching Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a weekly Bible study. If you would like more information about the Les Feldick Ministries, a Bible study in your area, or about this program, write to Les Feldick Ministries, Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. That's Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick is viewer supported, and your gift is appreciated. 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