You've Got to Be in Christ — Robert B. Thompson

The Day of the Lord and the Coming Judgment

Far and away, very little is said about what's going to happen to us when we die. When we die doesn't seem to be all that significant. What is significant is the day of the Lord, sometimes called the day of vengeance of our God, the day of the Lord, the day of Christ, the coming of the Lord, but it's drawing pretty close.

And so we want to be ready, we want to be prepared in our mind, because whether we are in the spirit realm, if we're in the spirit realm, if we have died and we're in the spirit realm, we're going to return with Christ at one point or another.

We've got to come back and face the music. You can't hide in the grave. You can't hide in heaven. You're going to be here at some point to deal with Christ. And all of the words of Christ in the Gospels point to this.

For example, in the parable of the talents, where the man was given a talent and he didn't use it, he buried it, and then when the Lord came, he took it away from him and gave it to someone who had been more diligent.

Well, you see, dying has nothing to do with it. Let's say that you die now and you have not used the talent that God has given you in his kingdom, and you're in the spirit realm. Then when the Lord comes, you have to be raised from the dead and face that issue.

So the issue, am I coming across it? The issue is not, am I going to be saved and when I go to heaven, when I die? That's not the issue. You'll go, I can't speak with authority about where you'll go when you die, because the New Testament doesn't deal with it very much.

I can speak with authority on what will happen when the Lord returns, because I've got a lot of thus saith the Lord, but I don't have much to offer you from the Bible on what will happen to you when you die.

I don't have that. But I do know that we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. And I doubt seriously, I see no inkling on the scripture that this, that the judgment seat of Christ will take place in heaven.

It's going to take place here on earth and it will take place when you're in your body, not when you're a spirit. Spirits will not stand before the judgment seat of Christ. People will stand before the judgment seat of Christ.

And so we would love to relegate the future to a kind of a mysterious, vague, hope we get there a kind of situation. We hope our death will not be too painful. We hope we'll die and go there. And then our picture of it is as one of the old hymns says, we'll sing and shout and dance about, or we'll be by the river and I'll meet you by the river.

And we'll have our hearts and we'll see the angels and we'll see God. And isn't that basically about what we look for in the future when we die? See, that's, that's what we look for. And we look for freedom from dread and the fears and the bills we have to pay and the responsibilities and that will all be lifted from us.

And that is our hope for the future. Isn't bad. But while that may be true for season, I don't know. I'm, I'm of the opinion that we'll go to the place in the spirit realm where we, for which we are suited.

And I take that from an expression that appears several times in the old Testament. He was gathered to his people. He was gathered to his people. In the old Testament, it doesn't say he went up to heaven.

It says he was gathered to his people. And I notice in Matthew 24, it says he shall call his elect from one end of heaven to the other, from one end of heaven to the other. So I rather expect there'll be an awful diversity and separation of peoples in the spirit realm.

It's not a simple heaven, hell thing by any means. It is, you go apparently to where you are suited and this is what you'd want. You wouldn't want to be put in some place for which you weren't suited.

I mean, if you live a kind of a lackadaisical Christian life here, you wouldn't want to be put up in the company of Peter, Paul, and James. And you'd feel like an oddball. You'd rather, if you think about it, you'd rather go where you're comfortable and you recognize the people and they're all kind of like you are.

And you see, we've had too much that's been too mysterious, too vague. We don't think about the reality like Moses and Elijah talking to Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration. See, we can't picture, they were discussing the crucifixion and we can't picture intelligent life occurring after death.

It's like we'll float around somewhere and we'll sing and shout and dance about. Well, I can't speak authoritatively on it because we have so little in the Bible. We don't really understand that. I read a lady's book writing about the afterlife and she was saying the heaven is just full, the Bible is just full of references to heaven and what's going on in there.

It was a great book and I enjoyed it thoroughly because she gave several accounts of people who had been resuscitated after they had died. They had died clinically but not biologically and they had been resuscitated and it was marvelous.

But that expression, she was talking through her hat. She was saying what she thought was true. But see, when you get down and read the Bible, it simply is not true. It is not filled with references to heaven at all.

In fact, the expression go to heaven doesn't even appear one time in the King James Version. Not even one time. We would assume it's in there at least 150 times. When you get up into the 150s, you're talking about words like righteousness, not heaven.

So, that I can't speak about. But you see, it affects how we live because if we realize that at some point, whether we die before the Lord comes or not, at some point, we're going to be raised up in our body and given account to Christ for our behavior.

Accountability Before Christ

And I told the little anecdote before but it's so fitting. Some of you are here, we're not here, about how we're traveling across the country and we're all disheveled and we went into a restaurant, as crummy as we were, because we said, they'll never see us again.

Because we were on route toward California. We said, well, they'll never see us again. So, we went in filthy, dirty, and you know, we said, well, they'll never see us again. Have you ever done anything like that?

They'll never see us again. Well, see, we have that kind of idea about life. See, they'll never see us again. In other words, we'll never really be called to account for our actions. See, we don't picture the fact that we're going to come forth from the grave.

And we are going to, at some venue, as Karen would say, at some point or some place, sometime, there will come a day when you and I will stand before Jesus Christ and we will answer in detail for our lives.

At some point, there's no hiding in heaven, there's no hiding in the grave. You're going to come forth and answer to God for your behavior. And I think when we realize that, when we realize that Jesus said every idle word, a vain word, a word without any purpose to it, that a person shall utter, they shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment.

And that's to us like, well, I'm saved, I don't have to worry about that. Well, you know, maybe, maybe, that's kind of far-fetched. But see, God said that. God said that. And so we know it's true. Now, what about our sinful life?

What about the many sins we have committed since we've been a Christian? We take care of that now. We can take care of that now by confessing to Christ what we have done. And not just listing it. I'm not talking about listing it.

I'm not even talking about listing it and then doing penance. I notice in an ad in the Smithsonian, no, it's in the Archeological Review, and it appears in every issue of the magazine. And it is a Catholic order, and I never downed Catholics.

My dear Aunt Annie was a Catholic, and she prayed for me once when I was healed, so I never downed Catholics. Because I know there's an awful lot of good Catholics that love God. But this appeared in this ad, and it's an invitation to come to this monastery, and it quotes a verse, and it says, instead of saying repent, it says do penance.

I forget the exact verse, but it's, the idea is from Acts, and it's, I think it's where Peter said, of men and brethren, what shall we do? Repent, you remember? Repent and, what does it say? Does anyone remember how that goes?

Huh? Repent and be baptized. Well, in this little ad that appears every month in the Archeological Review, it says do penance and be baptized. And with all due courtesy toward your Catholic people, there is a vast difference between repentance and doing penance.

For example, if I commit a sin, let's say I fornicate, or I lie, or I steal, now I can confess that, I can list that, I can go to the priest or to God, and I can say I've done that. Well, what do I do?

Then I do penance. Maybe I say be our father 25 times, or 50 times. That's penance. That's not scriptural. In fact, penance is not a proper translation of the Greek term. The difference between doing penance and repenting is that in repenting, let's say that I've stolen something, okay, I've got to make restitution, but in the meantime, I have to confess it as sin, and then I have to denounce it as being vile and fit only for the lake of fire.

And then I have to renounce it. I have to say never again is that going to happen. And then I have to draw near to God and in the future resist the devil. See, that's a lot different than going to a confessional every week and having stolen something again and doing 50 more our fathers.

This is a big difference between doing penance and repenting. Repenting means you thoroughly denounce and renounce this as evil and wicked, and you just have faith in God that this will never, never happen again.

If it ever happens again, you come before the elders of the church and have them lay hands on you, because you have a vicious bondage here, because it is not God's will that any Christian continue in sin.

A brother in the third heaven, 1 John chapter 3 verse 6. The King James obfuscates this verse with its archaic language. The NIV is beautiful. It brings out the Greek tense in a marvelous way. 1 John 3 .6.

And it shows you why penance is not adequate. There must be a repentance. There must be a denouncing so strong and so firm in the presence of God that it does not happen again. And if you look at 1 John 3 .6 up here on the board, the NIV has it so beautifully, and the King James does not have it maybe in those days it was clear.

No one who lives in him keeps on sinning, thus saith the Lord. See, the King James says it in such a way you don't get the full impact of that. But see, he's gone into the Greek tense. Greek is more finely tuned than English, and it will say whether an event is protracted or an immediate.

Tony could lecture you on that, but it tells us, what is the tense, Tony, that speaks of a continuance? Which one is the aorist? There's one of them that speaks of a sudden action that does not continue.

No, no, I want, what's the name of the tense that denotes a continuation of an action? In the Greek, is it imperfect? I don't know. All right. Well, anyway, the King James doesn't show whether it's a continuous thing, continuing sinning or sinning once or whatever, but the NIV is very accurate in this respect.

See, you don't, it doesn't say, if it said no one who lives in him sins, then it would be contrary to 1 John, the first chapter of the eighth verse, which says, if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

See, but the point is, yes, we all sin, but we don't keep doing it because God has made a provision for us in 1 John 1 9, if we confess our sin, he is faithful just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Then there's no inconsistency. You see, then we have the Greek tense that shows a continued action. See, keeps on sinning. Sure, we're all going to sin once, but then the Bible gives us a way of handling it.

And it's not by doing penance because that doing penance is like atoning for your own sin. And that was done on the cross. See, I can make up for the sin by doing 50 hour fathers. Don't let me come across as down in Catholics.

I'm not, I'm talking about preparing ourselves for the coming of the Lord. And we do not prepare ourselves for the coming of the Lord by doing penance. We prepare ourselves for the coming of the Lord by repenting, by coming before God and by his power, getting delivered.

There is deliverance from sin. We may steal once, but we don't steal twice. And if we do, then we come to the elders of the church and get hands laid on us because no one who lives in him keeps on sinning.

The Judgment Seat of Christ and Sanctification

Now, this is very important because you see, the Lord Jesus in his goodness. Now, the Bible states, thus saith the Lord, we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ that we may receive in our body what we have done.

2 Corinthians 5 .10. We receive the good we have done. We receive the bad we have done. 2 Corinthians 5 .10. Okay. Now, if we want to escape that and just get good at the judgment seat of Christ, then we have to deal with our sins beforehand.

Does that make sense to you? And you can't deal with them by doing penance because that is making an atonement for your own sin. And God will not buy that. He will not buy that at all. He did that once on the cross.

He's not asking us to make an atonement for our own sin. He does ask us to make restitution on occasion. And even there we have to be led by the Lord. But he absolutely insists that when we sin, that we confess our sin, that we draw near to God and we resist the devil.

And I mean when you, when I say you confess your sin, 1 John 1 .9, I mean you confess it with the idea you're never going to do it again. You're going to draw near to God until you get the power through the Holy Spirit.

And it says in Galatians 5 .16, walk in the Spirit and you will not fulfill the loss of your flesh. Galatians 5 .16. So God has made a provision, again in Romans 8 .13, if you live after the flesh you shall die.

But if you through the Spirit put to death the deeds of your body, you shall live. Romans 8 .13. So there's an, and then in the sixth chapter of Romans it also tells us because we're under grace and not under the law, we are not bound in sin.

And if we choose the sin, we're going to die. Now, the reason that's so important for us to understand is because at some point we, you and I, by the word of the living God, we are going to stand before Jesus Christ and receive in our body the things we have done, whether good or bad.

And if we don't take care of it now, and we've had the opportunity to take care of it now, we're going to face, I mean big time, problems like the outer darkness. These expressions like many lashes in the outer darkness and depart from me, none of those is addressed to the unsaved.

They're all addressed to the servants of the Lord. The parable of the wise and foolish virgins is not addressed to the unsaved. It's all addressed to the servants of the Lord. So what kind of a vision you have of your future will determine how you act today.

If you feel that in the future you'll die and that'll be the end of it, you're going to live with God forever in heaven in peace and joy and you go there by making a statement about Christ or something, then you're not going to get too excited about getting rid of sin in your life.

You'll figure everybody's doing it and nobody's perfect and as long as we're in the world, we quote that famous scripture, you know, as long as we're in the world we have to sin and nobody's perfect and all this stuff, that's what we're going to do because we figure, well, you know, there's no need of getting too excited, everybody's kind of doing it, we're in a sinful body.

But when I die, then I know the Lord loves me, I feel that assurance in my heart, which very often is a gross deception, gross deception. Satan can counterfeit the Holy Spirit because you can't tell the difference in how you feel.

I saw on the back of a t-shirt, somebody had a thing on there like, no matter how sincere you are, you'll drown if you don't know how to swim. And that's very true. No matter how sincere you are, it doesn't affect the Word of God.

No matter how good you feel, it doesn't affect the Word of God because Satan can counterfeit feelings and emotions very readily. You can't tell the difference. But we do know from the Bible, he who does what is sinful, see verse 8, is of the devil.

And so whenever we sin, steal, that's the influence of Satan, because that's where it originates. That's what the Bible says. He does what is sinful, is of the devil. No, no, no, not all us nice church people, that's not us.

That's a delusion. We have to go by the Word. The Word will never change. God said this to the Apostle John. And so when we see sin in our life, we don't atone for our own sin by doing penance. We come to the fountain of blood and we say, Jesus, I have sinned, forgive me.

And I'm, this is wrong, by your grace, it's never going to happen again. We go to prayer, we get the Holy Spirit, until that bondage is broken. If you notice also in verse 8 up here in the third chapter, this, for this reason the Son of God was manifest or revealed that he might do what?

Destroy, not forgive, destroy the works of the devil. He didn't come to make peace with the devil in us, or to forgive the works of the devil in us. He came to take away the sin of the world, not forgive the sin of the world.

Now, I'm saying all this because we're talking about the vision of the coming of the Lord. And it is not as we have imagined, it is quite different from what we have imagined. And the only people who will really have a good time in that day, and who can look forward to it with joy, are people who know that they are walking in the light of God.

Walking in the Light and Preparing for the Lord

If you see 1 John 3, 6, 3, well, that's not right. Yes, 3, 6, 3, 6, 3, 7, 1 John 3, 7, if we walk in the light, that is, in God's will, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanses us from all sin.

Now, see, that starts off with an if. If, 1 John 3, 1, 1 John 1, 7, 1 John 1, 7, if we walk in the light, if, if, and only if, and that means in the light of God's will. So, how do I know God's will? How do you know God's will?

Present your body a living sacrifice and prove God's will. Now, what I'm saying to you, dear ones, is this, that we are not, in America, we, most of us who believe in the blood washed, in the evangelical doctrine, are not prepared for the day of the Lord.

We are not prepared for the day of the Lord. I'm not saying we're going to be lost and go to hell or go in the lake of fire, I'm not saying that. I don't know all the ifs, ands, and buts about it. All I know is, we are not ready to see a smiling Jesus saying, enter into the joy of thy Lord, good and faithful servant, when we haven't been a good and faithful servant.

And most Americans, Christians, and it's supposed to be 50 or more of the population, even the President and the Vice President claim to be born again, and we know from their actions how accurate a statement that is, but that's, that's what they're hearing in the church they go to.

The minister doesn't skin them alive when they get in the church and say, you're not anywhere within a thousand yards of being a Christian. They go, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, we're all saved by Christ, everybody's going to heaven, and it's wonderful.

Well, we've got a nation that is sinking into moral corruption, and the large part of the reason is because God's people are not prepared for the coming of the Lord. We're just not prepared for the coming of the Lord.

And for us, it's going to be a very, very painful experience. You want to know something? The things you are doing today are going to determine your status a thousand years from now. But a thousand years from now, you won't even remember what went on today.

You won't remember anything about your life. God said, I make all things new. You won't remember anything about the travail of life, your relationships, anything, a thousand years from now. They'll all be gone.

But what you are doing today, in this valley of the shadow of death that we call life, will determine your state a thousand years from now. Think about that. You won't remember the joys, and God will wipe away all tears.

You won't remember the joys and the pressures of life, the busyness where we run around so feverishly working at this and working at that. You won't remember any of it, because it doesn't mean anything anyway.

The only thing that really matters is what God has done in your life. And your job, and your household, and your relationships are only tools that God uses to test you, to see what you're really made of, and to change you if you're willing to be changed.

So that a thousand years from now, you will be what God wants you to be. But you're determining that right now, with your diligence in serving the Lord. And a wonderful thought, just imagine that. A thousand years from now, that which seems so important today, you won't even remember it, because he makes all things new.

But what you are, will be very important, because it will determine your place in the kingdom. If you have been faithful in renouncing Satan, and denouncing him, and resisting him, resist the devil and he will flee from you, and have lived a victorious life in Christ, then when the Lord comes, it will be wonderful.

A reward so marvelous that we couldn't describe it. Now, if we could understand it, we couldn't describe it. But if we have been something less than that, we will face that in that day. Any laziness, any indolence, any lack of...

See, God is a businessman, that's why we have the parable of the talents. Any slothfulness, any... See, we here tonight, specifically, and in America generally, have much greater access to Bibles, and to the word of the Lord, and to the cutting edge of prophecy, and what God is doing, than the great bulk of the population of the world.

And we are going to be held responsible for it. To him who has been given, much has been given, of him shall much be required. So we really need to think about the coming of the Lord, what it's like, and see what the Bible has to say about it, so that we can understand, it's not a case of dying and going to heaven, it's a case of where we will be, what our situation will be, when the Lord Jesus returns, and we have to stand before him.

The Bema Judgment and the Meaning of 2 Corinthians 5:10

Okay, we better just peek once to 2 Corinthians 5 .10, just to seal that in, and then we'll go on, and we're going to go from there to 1 Thessalonians 4, verse 16. But first, I want to just... I've mentioned 2 Corinthians 5 .10 so much.

Now, you need to realize, people, that this verse, 2 Corinthians 5 .10, is waved away in evangelical teaching today. They say, because of grace, this is not applicable. We all will hear something wonderful and joyous in this day.

That's how backslidden our nation is. We have absolutely defied the word of God. And you know why? Trying to please people, trying to please people, currying favor with people. That's why we're doing it.

We're worshippers of our own deli, instead of God. We're lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, and we have made the gospel so to people that it's, you all come, and you don't have to do anything, Christ did it all, it's all good news and everything, and next Sunday we'll have a potluck.

That's exactly what's going on. Fill the churches. We need prophets in the land. Brothers and sisters, 2 Corinthians 5 .10 will be standing when heaven and earth pass away. It will never be changed. And it means exactly what it says, like the rest of the word of God.

For we must all appear, and that word means be made manifest. It doesn't mean come to the court, to the department at 11 o 'clock in the morning. It means be made manifest. We must all appear before the judge, it's a funeral, that's the word, before the judgment seat of Christ, and Christ is the only one who judges.

God does not judge anymore. In John 8 we see the Father judges no one. He's committed all judgment to the Son. Now, Christ is the judge, and when we are part of Him, and living in the Spirit, we also shall be judges, and we shall judge the world and judge angels, and that's very clearly taught in both testaments.

But all we need to worry about is Jesus, because He is the judge. Remember Paul said in Athens, He has appointed a day in which He will judge the world by that man whom He has chosen. Now this is important, because we think of Jesus just as being our advocate, our lawyer, our friend.

But Jesus is also His honor. When He comes into the court, the bailiff says, everyone please stand, His honor the Lord Jesus Christ presiding. That's right. This is the bima of Christ, in the Greek the bima.

The word itself means a step, and it refers back to the Roman court, a criminal court where there was a step on which the defendant stood. Pilate came before the bima. Christ came before the bima of Pilate.

It's being taught today that this is a sports award banquet. That's right, where everybody gets a prize. Some get the gold, some get the silver, some get the bronze, but everybody gets something. The word bima is used about eleven times in the New Testament.

It's used to mean a court where accused criminals stand. Jesus stood at the bima of Pontius Pilate, who judged Him. Now Jesus Christ is the judge, and Pilate will be standing on the step. Oh yes, hallelujah.

You know, sometimes short gains are long loses. That each one may receive what is due Him. Now right here, the NIV has tried to make the verse make sense. And I use the NIV because it's very excellent, but you have to know your Bible to know when it does this.

And the thrust of the passage is not that we receive something that we kind of earned by our action. The thrust in the original language is more that we actually receive what we have done. Not a reward for what we have done, but actually what we have done.

I like to use the illustration of the abortion doctor, who has maybe handled 500 abortion operations. In that day he may find that these fetuses are revolving in his sight, and he can't shut them out.

They're ever before him. You see, the thrust of this passage is not that he committed the abortions and as a result he went and burned in hell. He receives back what he has done. As it says in Galatians 6 verse 7 and 8, what you sow you reap back.

If you have sowed to your wicked nature, in the day of resurrection you receive back from that nature. So it makes it absolutely just. You see how just that is? What you do you get back. And that shows up in the law of Moses, doesn't it?

An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. You knock somebody's tooth out, you went to the court and they knocked your tooth out. And that's still true in some Islamic countries. I was just reading where a man knocked somebody's eye out, so they took him into the court and they had a doctor there and they took his eye out.

An eye for an eye. But I wonder, Brother Smitter, if we had that today, would that have an impact on crime? If you knew what you were going to do, you were going to get back. I just wonder if that wouldn't have quite an impact.

And some of these guys that appear in court wouldn't be quite so arrogant because they would know if they were convicted that what they had done was going to be done to them. And so that's the thrust of this verse.

And it's very well spoken in the King James. It says that everyone may receive the things he has done, I believe the King James says, while in the body. Now see, this is everyone, we all, whether good or bad.

So you see, it's not a sports award banquet. Now, people have said, this doesn't apply to Christians because we're saved by grace. That's the common teaching in America, you need to know that. But you see, the next verse puts the light of that because evidently Paul felt that it applied to him because he says, since then we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade men.

King James says, knowing the terror of the Lord. So Paul is not saying, I'm not going to experience this. He's saying, I know what it is to fear God, and you better fear God. We're persuading you, you better straighten up.

How many can see that that's clearly what it says in 10 and 11? Can you see that? Okay, so now that is part of the vision of the future. And you see what a difference in your actions that will make if on the one hand you picture yourself going to heaven, somehow it will come out in the wash and you'll be up there and you'll sing and shout and dance about.

Or if you realize that what you have done is going to be done to you in that day. Unless, as I said, Christ has made a provision for us. If we are willing to confess our sins now and turn from them by his help, it is an eternal judgment, it will not be mentioned to us again.

Let's say you have stolen something, okay, you make restitution, you confess it to God, resolve by his grace, you will never do that again. It's an eternal judgment, it will not be brought up at the judgment seat of Christ.

So you see the Lord has made provision for us. Okay? Everyone will be judged righteously. And even the great white throne judgment that is taught, that's where God the Father judges. It is not true. Only Jesus judges.

And he will judge on his great white throne. He is the judge of men. As Paul said in Acts, he is appointed in the day in which a man by which he will judge the world and give proof by raising him from the dead.

So Christ is our judge as well as our advocate. He is both our advocate and our judge. So if we live righteously right now, right now for you and for me, Jesus is serving as our advocate and he is making intercession for the Father on our behalf.

Right now he is doing that for you. Because you and I are not perfect. And we do things that displease God. Every foolish remark that comes out of our mouth displeases God. And Jesus is up there saying, God strengthen them, God help them.

You remember where Jesus told us about the tree and it didn't bear fruit, didn't bear fruit, and the farmer said cut it down, and the man that worked out there, the field hand said give me another year, let me dig around it, let me cultivate around it, water it, give it one more year, and if it doesn't bear fruit, then we'll cut it down.