Every Work Gets Judged

Matthew 16:27 “For the Son of Man will come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and then He will reward each according to his works.”

 In the book of Revelation when our Lord Jesus spoke to each of the seven churches in Asia, He opened each of His addresses to those churches with the following statement, “I know your works” (Revelation 2 & 3). Jesus still says those exact same words to every church on the earth today, and He also says those same words to each individual believer on the earth today. So why does the Lord Jesus emphasize to the church that He knows our works? He does that because He wants us to realize that it is our works that will be judged by Him on that day. In the passage of scripture quoted above our Lord plainly tells us that He will reward each one of us according to the works that we have done. And so we see that every saint will stand before the Lord Jesus on that day to give an account to Him for their time on the earth. The works that will be judged by Him will be all works which we have done from the time we are born-again until the time that we leave our earthly tents to be with the Lord.

2 Corinthians 5:9-10 “Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him.  (10) For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.”

As believers we will be judged by our Lord Jesus on that day; for all that we have done in the body, both good and bad. Most Christians think that only their good works will be judged on that day. But as revealed in the passage of scripture quoted above, the Holy Spirit through the apostle Paul tells us plainly that every work we have done will be judged, both good and bad. When the scripture teaches us that all of our works will be judged on that day, both good and bad, it is referring to every thought, every word spoken and every deed done. And so it is extremely important for us to realise that everything will be judged, and that nothing will be overlooked, for heaven’s records are absolute and cover every thought, every word spoken and every deed done during our time here on earth.

Romans 2:14-16 “for when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, (15) who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them (16) in the day when God will judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ, according to my gospel.”

In the passage of scripture quoted above the Holy Spirit reveals to us through the apostle Paul that the secrets of men’s hearts will be judged on that day. The secrets of our hearts refer to those thoughts and motivations that we assumed no one knew about. Nevertheless all have been recorded in heaven and we will have to give an account for each one. And so those thoughts that were pleasing to God will be praised by Him on that day, while those thoughts that were not pleasing to Him will be a cause for us to be ashamed before Him on that day.

1 Corinthians 4:3-5 “But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by a human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself.  (4)  For I know of nothing against myself, yet I am not justified by this; but He who judges me is the Lord.  (5)  Therefore, judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the hearts. Then each one's praise will come from God.”

In the passage of scripture quoted above the Holy Spirit through the apostle Paul reveals to us plainly that God will reveal the thoughts of our hearts on that day. In other words nothing will be hidden or overlooked on that day. Everything will be brought into the light and everything will be brought to account. The scripture teaches us that love thinks no evil (1 Corinthians 13:5). You will recall that the apostle James counselled us to live our lives as those who will be judged according to the perfect law of liberty. In other words even our thoughts will be judged in the light of the Lord’s commandment to walk in love.

Matthew 12:36-37 “But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak; they will give account of it in the Day of Judgment.  (37) For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”

In the passage of scripture quoted above our Lord Jesus said that we will have to give an account for every idle word spoken on that day. So what are our idle words? These are the words we speak in our everyday conversations that we have with believers and non-believers alike. Think about that for a moment. Do the words that you speak in your daily conversations meet God’s requirement that no corrupt word is to proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification that it may impart grace to the hearers (Ephesians 4:29)? And so we see that even our idle words spoken will either receive praise from our Lord Jesus on that day, or cause us to be ashamed before Him on that day.

Hebrews 6:10 “For God is not unjust to forget your work and labour of love which you have shown toward His name, in that you have ministered to the saints, and do minister.”

It is important to note that no good work that we have done will be forgotten or overlooked on that day. From the time that we are born-again every good work we do is recorded in heaven and cannot be blotted out. In the passage of scripture quoted above the Holy Spirit tells us that God is not unjust, and because He is not unjust He will not forget the good works that we have done while on the earth, which means that every good work done will be rewarded on that day. And so by looking at these scriptures we can begin to realise just how thorough our judgement will be, and we can understand just why the Lord’s apostles encouraged us to walk in the fullness of grace provided to us, for time and again the writers of the New Testament admonished us to walk worthy of the calling with which we were called (Ephesians 4:1). Clearly our day of judgement is not to be taken lightly and we should approach it with the same purpose that Paul displayed.

Michael E.B. Maher

Eternal Judgement

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