This morning, I'd like to go ahead and continue along with our basic theme, our back to the basics kind of a theme. So today's topic, obviously, to many sounds frightening when you first hear it. But I promise you that if you give it a chance, you'll see that, at least for a Christian, this topic has some great possibilities. It has little or no possibilities, no good possibilities anyway, if you happen to be lost here this morning. If you've never trusted the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior, when I mention the subject of judgment, you should break out in hives. Just sitting there thinking about it and what that means for your future. If you're lost here this morning or if you're lost watching this, when you hear the topic of judgment come up, then you should envision of this fiery flame surrounding your soul throughout all eternity. You're just engulfed in flames forever and ever and ever. Hell, right? I mean, who likes to think of that? In Mark chapter 9, the Bible says this, it says, and if thy hand offend thee, cut it off. For it is better for thee to enter into thy life maimed than having two hands and going to hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched. How's that for getting started? And the next verse says this, where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. Sobering thought. Very sobering thought. If I was lost here this morning, and I'm not, praise the Lord, but if I was lost here this morning and I heard the preacher preaching on judgment, I would begin to tremble. I would begin to shake in my shoes. I'd begin to start sweating. I'd wish they'd turn the fans up a couple notches higher. My knees would begin to shake. You see, we all have this natural adversity to being judged. You know, we hear it all the time. In fact, it's one of the big taboos in society. Don't judge this. Yet we judge everything every day. People just don't want you to judge them. I know in karate, we do compete in tournaments. And you watch this young student get up. And they've been practicing. And you see them. They put in the work and the effort. And they think they're going to do really well, really well, really well. And then they get out there to the competition. They get up in front of the judges. And it just triggers something in their mind. They get afraid. They get scared. They get nervous. And you see people that on every other moment of every other day, they could do just fine. And they make a big blunder and a boo-boo. Happens all the time. Why is that? Well, because all of a sudden, you're not just doing karate. All of a sudden, you're being judged. And it puts you in a completely different mindset. We don't like being judged. When it comes to being judged, we know this. We know that there is a holy God who sees everything that's going to be our judge. That's a scary thought, right? You know, the thought of standing before that God should definitely get your attention. I hope it does, right? I hope it does. Because certainly you're not tough enough to avoid God's judgment. It says in Hebrews chapter 9, verse 27, it says this, familiar verse, as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this, the judgment. I title this message very simply, Judgments and the Judgment Seat of Christ. Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Father, we thank you once again for an opportunity to be here on a Sunday morning. You're a great God, a mighty Savior. And Lord, you have done so much to give us a way out of being judged. But unfortunately, oftentimes, men miss it. Or worse yet, Father, they're not interested in it. I know that nearly all the folks here that are here this morning have recognized your glory, and they recognize you as Savior. They have come to the cross. We'll talk a little bit about that. And I thank you for their salvation. Thank you, Father, for the salvation that you offer in the Lord Jesus Christ. But I do pray that if there's somebody here that has never trusted Christ as their Savior, that today they would maybe make some connections and have a little better understanding of what it's all about. Pray, Father, you'd minister to the hearts of your people as well when it comes to this topic of judgment. And I ask these things now in Jesus' name, amen. So I titled this message, like I said, Judgments and the Judgment Seat of Christ. And I'm not going to go into all of them, but if you look through there, there are seven main judgments in the Word of God. And those seven judgments are Calvary, we'll talk about that in a little bit, a daily judgment for fellowship. There is something in the Bible called the judgment seat of Christ. There's the judgment of the Jews during the tribulation. There's the judgment of nations. There's the judgment of angels. And this thing wraps up with the great white throne judgment at the end of the millennium. And the reality is, as Hebrews 9 says, everyone is going to face judgment one time or another. Nobody's going to get by with it. Nobody has the option of saying, you know what? I'm big enough. I'm tough enough. I'm strong enough. I'm going to avoid judgment by God. Ah, see how that works for you, buddy. You can't. You can't. So there's obviously a lot of topics when it comes to judgment in the Bible. And I don't have time to go over all of them. And I don't know that I would want to go over all of them in one day. But I am going to concentrate on the first couple of them here. And that is three of the judgment categories that Christians, primarily in the church age, need to be aware of and need to be familiar with. If you're lost here this morning or if you've never trusted the Lord Jesus Christ as your savior, there is, you know, there is the great white throne judgment at the end of the millennium that you have to worry about. And that's ultimately when everybody gets cast once again back into hell for all eternity. But if you're saved here this morning, you don't have to worry about that judgment. So we're going to look at the first three because those are the three that have affected us the most. The first one of these judgments, obviously, is the judgment of sin at Calvary. You know the Lord Jesus Christ came. He died on a cross to pay for your sins. It says in John 3.16, it says this, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned, But he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. This is the judgment, ladies and gentlemen, where you are judged as a sinner. You're born a sinner, you're brought to this place called Calvary, and you make the choice, either yes or no, yes or no. And the judgment is for your sins for all eternity. And we know that, we know this judgment very well. We know that in Romans 5, 8, the Bible says this, but God commendeth his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. How many of you here this morning are saved? You trusted Jesus Christ as your Savior. Raise your hand. Yeah? Well, praise the Lord. Right? That's what the Lord did for us. And our sins were judged at Calvary. And he washed them away. And he threw them as far away as the east is from the west. The Bible says that he took our sins. When you trust Jesus Christ as your Savior, the Lord takes your sins. And he throws them as far as the east is from the west. And it says he remembers them no more. Well, that's a great thing. When it comes to eternity, your eternity is set. And we talk about that an awful lot, but how could I do a sermon on this topic without at least mentioning this? So this is the place where you come, Calvary, where Jesus Christ offers himself to take your judgment for sin. Sin has to be judged. So Christ looked down, and he looked over at the Father and said, Father, you know what? I love those poor, helpless human beings. Those men, those women, those boys and girls. He said, I love those human beings, and you know what I will do? I will go down to that earth, I will become a man, and I will take their punishment for them. And that's what he did on the cross. What an amazing thing when you stop to think about it. Every one of us is going to have to face judgment. And if you reject the payment that the Lord Jesus Christ made, for you on Calvary's cross, if you choose not to get saved, there's coming a day at that great white throne judgment that I talked to you about where you're going to stand before God and you're going to, every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess and you're going to have to give an account and the Lord's going to basically ask you this, what do you have to pay for your sins? To which you're going to reply, nothing. Depart from me, cursed in everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." That's a rough, that's a rough place to be. But there's no escape from it, except through Calvary. Can you imagine the day when somebody stands at the Great White Throne Judgment because they neglected to trust Jesus Christ, their Savior, they rejected Him, they didn't believe the Bible, they didn't believe in God, they thought they had a better way, they wanted to do religion their own way, and they just, no, I'm not going to trust, they thought, well, I'm good enough to get in on my own. Look at all I've done to help other people. I'm not as bad as that guy who claims to be a Christian down the road from me. I'm better than him. If he's going to make it to heaven, certainly I'm going to make it to heaven. I hate to tell you this, buddy, but no, you're not. The only reason that worthless guy down the road from you is going to heaven, if he is, is because he trusted the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ for his sins at Calvary. He trusted Jesus Christ to pay the sin price for him. That's the only thing that separates a saved person from a lost person. It is certainly not merit. But when you do that, you can escape the burning fires of hell. I hope that every one of you has done that here this morning. If you haven't, I pray that would weigh heavy on your mind and that you would maybe tremble in your knees, shake in your shoes a little bit, and think, think, think about what it must be like to be engulfed in flames and to burn for eternity what little bit left there is of your body. I can't imagine that. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. And God didn't wish that on anybody either. In fact, he took such great measure to avoid it, he came down here and died for you in your place. But God commendeth his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. He died for your sins before you even chose to acknowledge him as God. Amen? What a great thing that is. I need to move on. The second judgment that I want to talk about, and I'm getting up to the judgment seat of Christ ultimately, but I have to hit this one as well. The second judgment that I want to talk about today is this, the daily judgment of sins for fellowship. It says in 1 John 1.8, it says this. It says, if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. How many of you here are sinless this morning? Yeah, good. No hands. OK. But if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. A quick distinction between this and Calvary, this is in the context of this, and I don't have time to go into all of it, but the context of this is talking about fellowship with the Father. Fellowship and how your sins in your natural body hinder your fellowship. So at Calvary, you are judged as a sinner. If you trust Jesus Christ as your Savior, your sins are forgiven. They're taken away for all eternity. And you don't have to pay the price for your sins in eternity. You're going to heaven. Well, that leaves you here on this earth, but you're still in this fleshly body. And day after day after day, you have to get out of bed and face yourself. And what you realize very quickly after you get saved is, you know what? I didn't stop sinning completely. Right? And you've got to face that, and you have to deal with that. And so how do you deal with that? How do you reconcile being saved and knowing your sins are forgiven, but yet look what I did yesterday? And it makes your brain go crazy if you think about it too much. But the reality is this. Judicially, the Lord's pardoned you. You're still guilty, and you're still committing sins, but the Lord, that blood is going to atone for everything you've ever done. Or because, let me say that, because your sins were judged at Calvary, you were judged as a sinner. Well, on this judgment, you're judged as a son. You're judged as a son. Day by day, you get up out of that bed and the Lord looks down at you and says, well boy, how are we going to do today? Well, well, gal, how are we going to do today? How are we going to walk? Are we going to walk in fellowship? Are we going to have good communion? Are we going to be able to talk to one another? How are you doing day by day? See, when it comes to your parents, it doesn't matter how bad you are that day. And some days you have bad days. You're still a son or a daughter to your parents. Amen? Well, that's what this is talking about. And the days when you have really, really bad days, the fellowship is kind of broken, isn't it? Maybe there's a little tension in the home. Maybe there's a little rift going on. Maybe you get to the place where somebody doesn't want to talk to somebody, and I'm going to go into my room, and I'm just going to stay in there, and I just won't say anything. I'm not going to ask for a show of hands if you've ever done that. But that happens. But you're still a son or a daughter. And the Lord's looking, the Lord's going, hey. And the parents look down, and they go, you know, I wish I could figure out a way to get through to them. I wish there was a way that we could restore that relationship. I wish there was a way where we could have those good times again together, where we could go to the park or go on an outing. And I just wish that we could sit down and talk about the things we used to talk about. And I miss those times. When you're having one of those bad days, you miss the good days. Well, that's the way it is with the Lord. in our Christian life. Some days we get up and we don't do so well in our Christian life. There's a lot of things that can creep in and keep us, you know, and keep us, excuse me, from living the Christian life that we should. And so I just ask you a question here this morning. When you got up this morning, or just take any random day this last week, when you got up, you're saved, you're born again, I know most of you are. But when you got up that day, let me ask you this, were you a delight? or a disappointment to your Heavenly Father. You ever think about that? Lord, what kind of a son or daughter was I today? How did I do today? Okay, how am I going to do tomorrow? I, you know, you should think about that. I'll say this, you guys did very good just by being here at church this morning. Amen? You got up. You got dressed. I'm sure most of you probably took a shower, if not last night, this morning. And if you didn't, well, there's always next week. Don't wait that long, though. But you got up. You got dressed. And you know what you decided? You decided, I'm going to go to church. Or maybe your parents told you you were going to church. Whichever way it worked, it's OK. You got here. Well, that's good. Right? Pat yourself on the back. You did a good job. During the course of the week, just the normal week, not on Sunday morning when everybody's dressed up and all looking sharp and sitting down paying attention. But during the course of the normal week, how close do you walk with the Lord? You see, that's what this judgment is all about. It is day by day, how's my relationship with my father? How is that communication? How is that relationship? Do I think about him throughout the course of the week? Or does it just kind of get put out of my mind because I'm so busy with worldly things that I don't even bother thinking about God until next Sunday? Because after all, God's at church. What are we talking about? We're talking about a relation. Hey, listen, nobody's perfect, right? But you want to have a good close fellowship. Hey, you know as well as I do, when things are better between parents and children, when the relationship is good, and when there's communication going back and forth, and when there's not tension and fighting, that is a much more peaceful life. That's how you want your Christian relationship to be. Well, how do you achieve that? Well, you know what you do? Daily. Daily. If we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Moment by moment throughout the day, you go to the Lord. Lord, would you? Hey, man, I just almost lost my temper there at that traffic light because what that car did in front of me. Could you please forgive me? And Lord, forgive them too. Maybe it was their fault. Maybe it was your fault for being impatient. No, couldn't have been. That never happens. But you know what you do? You begin to nurture that relationship between you and your heavenly father, between you and your parents. How do you nurture a relationship between you and your parents? You talk to them. You say, it's hard. It's difficult. I'm embarrassed. I don't want to talk. Welcome to life. You say, I don't want to go to God and tell him. I'm embarrassed about it. Well, guess what? He already knows. And your parents probably already know, too. They're just waiting to see if you'll come talk to them or not. And you know what? You know what the parents want? The parents just want the child to come talk to them and have that good relationship. Why? So we can restore that fellowship. And the child goes to the parents, says, you know, I lost my temper, and I was just having a bad day, and I, you know, I yelled it loud, or I slammed the door, and I just, I'm sorry. And the parent goes, that's all right. I had my share of door slamming days too. And you know what? There's an understanding. There's a forgiveness. There's a closeness that builds up when you can go back and you can talk. to that individual, your parents, your child. And every now and then, the parent has to say to the child, don't forget this parent, because sometimes it happens the other way around. Sometimes a parent's got to go, you know, honey, listen, I'm sorry. I had a bad day at work, and it was that idiot and the dry stoplight that really got me, and I didn't pray about it when I got back. And so it's still bothering me. And you know what? I blew up at you when you came and asked me that question. I shouldn't have. I should have been a little more tender. And you begin to get in a place where that becomes a natural part of your character. That becomes a natural part of how you interact with one another. You know what you're going to do? You're going to wind up building some good relationships. That's what the Lord wants. That's our daily walk with him. Right? That is confessing your sins to the God when you realize, hey, good Lord, I messed up again. Could you forgive me? And I'm going to try harder tomorrow. And I just need you to help me, God, because I'm just having a hard time. If one of your kids came to you with that kind of an attitude, what would your response be? You'd put your arm around them and you'd go, hey, I get it. Let's go to Dairy Queen and get ice cream and we'll talk about it. Kids, I just got you some free ice cream. Come on, come on. I had kind of gotten to the point where I was frustrated. My son was going through a phase, and I've maybe told the story before, but it's just kind of funny. He was going through a phase where he didn't really want to listen to me all that much. Advice or things I would try to teach him, and he was old enough that, you know, he was being independent and a young man, and, oh, I got this. I got this. And, well, I bought a new snowblower. And this was several years ago, and it was about ready to snow, but I had to leave and go to Oklahoma City to go to a school for work. And this time my family wasn't coming with me, it was a short enough school that they stayed. And so my intent was to take, to go out and take him to the snowblower and then show him how it operates and impart to him all this grand knowledge that would make his life easier, that would make his work and his labor much more efficient and much easier for him. And he kind of had this attitude of, ah, I got that, dad. Don't worry about it. I'm like, OK. So. You know what a pet cock valve is for the gas? Turn it off and on? Well, normally, you leave it off. It was off. That was one of the things I was going to show him. But he told me, oh, I got this, dad. I can do this on my own. I'm grown up enough. I can handle this. I'm like, OK. I go to Oklahoma City. Sure enough, it snows. Next thing I know, the phone's ringing. Ding, ding, ding. Hey, Dad. I think it was Teresa, actually, that called me. Can't get the snowblower to work. Huh. Gee. He goes, it started for just a second, and it ran a little bit, but now it won't start again. I'm going, I guess you're going to have to use the shovel. Yes. You say, that's mean. Yes. You know what God wants to do for you and me in life? Listen, you know what God wants? God knows what the troubles are going to be before you get to it. And a lot of times, we as Christians take the attitude, oh, I got this. I know how to do this. I don't need. I got it. But there's one little detail that you weren't aware of, and it turns everything completely upside down. How many of you? I won't ask for a show of hands. But how many of you have ever been in a situation where you thought you had things planned out and everything was going just fine, and then the one detail that you didn't think of popped up? Yeah. A lot of you are raising your hands anyway. Appreciate it. Thanks. One little detail popped up. Listen, if you're a Christian, you don't keep yourself confessed up. then you realize there's consequences for that. It's not going to hell. My son was still my son. But there are some consequences. And a lot of times, when it comes to judgment and things in our life that we see on a daily basis, When it comes to judgment a lot of times the Lord's not up there with a with a bolt of lightning Sitting on the throne just going target practice. Who can I get next? If that's what you think God is you you really don't understand the God Bible but But I tell you what he does. He is up there and he may sit back and go You know, he doesn't realize what he's doing is about to get him into world trouble man. I wish he would ask I And then we, being all self-sufficient, I got this. I can do this on my own. And the Lord goes, see, a lot of times the Lord doesn't have to pass judgment, so to speak. He just lets us suffer the consequences of our own ignorance. I didn't realize that was going to happen. If you would have asked, I could have told you. I really wanted to warn you about that. I really wanted to show you where that gas shutoff valve was, because I promised it would have made the job a lot easier, but you didn't want to know. Sometimes that's the way we are as Christians. So the best thing to do is day by day, day by day, listen, you get up, you confess your sins to God. Lord, what do you want me to do? How am I doing? What do I need to do? And you keep that relationship in good working order. You keep that communication up. You keep that fellowship up. And you know what? You avoid a lot of those consequences from not having a good. How many of you, and again, I'm not asking for hands, but how many of you know of kids who have bad relationships with their parents who suffered some pretty bad consequences because of it? Yeah. The Lord just. wants to be a good parent. Listen, you can't lose your soul once you've been to Calvary and been judged as a sinner. That's taken care of. But that day-to-day judgment as a son, that determines your fellowship. That determines everything else in this life. If you don't keep yourself walking with the Lord and confessed, and in fellowship with the Lord. Listen, you can lose your testimony. You can lose your character. You can lose your joy. You can lose your fellowship. You can lose your witness. You can lose your rewards. You can lose your inheritance. You can lose your health. And you can lose your life. That's true. Amen. You can't lose your soul. You're going to heaven whether you like it or not. But there's a lot of other things you can certainly lose. Your soul has been paid for by the Lord Jesus Christ at Calvary. That's a daily judgment of sins, and that is for fellowship. Best thing to do, folks, confess your sins on a regular basis. Keep the communication open, even when it's uncomfortable. Even when it's hard to have that conversation, have that conversation. And now we get to the main part that I wanted to talk about. I've been trying to get to for a few weeks, and they've gotten sidetracked. And that is this. Ladies and gentlemen, there is something coming up called the judgment seat of Christ. Right? The judgment seat of Christ. It says in Romans 14.10, but why dost thou judge thy brother, or why dost thou set it not thy brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Here at the judgment seat, again, at Calvary, you're judged as a sinner. Right? Your daily, that daily judgment, you're judged as a son. How's your relationship? How's it going day to day? And how are you getting along with your Heavenly Father? Here at the judgment seat of Christ, this is after you die, or we're raptured out of here. This is up in heaven. We are judged at the judgment seat of Christ. We are judged simply as a servant. How well did we serve the Lord Jesus Christ? What kind of service did you do for the Lord Jesus Christ? If you turn to Romans chapter 14, your Bibles, Romans chapter 14, verse 7, it says this. It says, for none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. Romans 14, verse 7. Folks, listen. Everything that you do in this life affects other people. Your salvation affects other people. Your daily walk and your fellowship affects other people. If you're having a rough time with your walk, other people are going to be affected. I promise you. Your service to the Lord pretty much is concerned about other people. In verse 8, it says, for whether we live, we live under the Lord. Whether we die, we die under the Lord. Whether we live, therefore, or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end, Christ both died and rose and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living. But why dost thou judge thy brother? Why dost thou set it not thy brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. There's a connection. The judgment seat of Christ in connection with your brother. For it is written, as I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess. So then every one of us shall give an account of himself to God. Now this judgment is for Christians. And it's not whether you go to heaven or hell. This is a judgment, ladies and gentlemen, and this is where, again, everybody gets nervous about the judges. But you know what? Judges can give you points. You can stand before a judge and you can do good. Amen? Well, this is where you get a chance to shine. This is where, you know, when we stand at the judgment seat of Christ, you know what we're going to be judged on? We're going to be judged on our service for the Lord Jesus Christ. How we did, what we did, why we did it. And I just want to talk about that a little bit. It says, like I said, in Romans 14, everyone shall give an account of himself. In 2 Corinthians, it says this. It says, wherefore we labor that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted with him. So we labor so that we can be accepted of him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ that everyone may receive the things done in his body. whether they be good or bad. This judgment seat of Christ, we get judged. God's going to judge us, and he's going to look at what we did, and he's going to look at our labor, and we're going to be judged on those things, good or bad. In 1 Corinthians 3, it says this, for other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now, if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, and stubble. Every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire. And the fire shall try every, not every man, but every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward." This judgment, you have the possibility of walking out of there with a lot of rewards. Right? If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss. But he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. So again, this is a judgment for a Christian. Our soul is eternally secure. We had our sin taken care of way back at Calvary, where we were judged as a sinner. That's done. That's gone. Then we live our daily life while we're on this earth. And we try to stay in close fellowship with the Lord. And that gets judged on a day-by-day basis as a son. And then after the rapture, or after we die, We go up to heaven, and we wind up sitting at something called the judgment seat of Christ, and we're judged as a servant. And God's basically interested in, folks, how did you serve him? How did you serve him? Right? It says in Revelation 1.14, it says, talking about Jesus Christ, his head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were a flame of fire. That's John describing the Lord Jesus Christ. I mean, imagine. Imagine what it's like at the judgment seat of Christ. You get up to heaven, and praise the Lord, you're never going to have to see hell. That's set. That's settled. That's a good thing. But you get up to heaven, and all of a sudden, the Lord Jesus Christ is there. And he's sitting on the throne. And his eyes are like a flame of fire. Now, what are our works going to be judged in? They're tried in what? The fire. Guess what the Lord's going to do. The Lord's going to sit there and look at you. And those eyes are like a flame of fire. And you know what? God knows everything. And I imagine sitting up there, and there's going to be a lot of tears, a lot of regret. But there's going to be some joy as well, because folks, you did some things to serve the Lord. That's going to be recognized. We'll talk about a couple of them in a minute. But at the judgment seat of Christ, you have the Lord up there with these eyes that are like a flame of fire, and all he's got to do is look at you and look at your service as a Christian, and your service is going to be judged for what type of service it was. Not how much, but what type, what sort it is. Some people can only do a little. But the Lord says, you know what, that person did a little with their whole heart. I remember the story in the, and we don't have time to go there, in the Bible, of the widow woman who came in and she gave just a mite in the offering plate. And the Pharisee got up and he put in a big stack of cash, man. I mean, you know, $100 bills, that high. And he thought to himself, ah, look at me. Look at what I did. My service was great. And that woman, huh, that's not even going to keep a light bulb on. And the Lord looked at it completely different. The Lord said, hey, that woman right there gave more than them all. Why? Because she did what she could. The Lord's not interested in how much. The Lord's interested in what did you do with what he equipped you to do. And did you do it with the right heart and with the right attitude? Did you do it because you love the Lord? Did you do it because you were trying to serve the Lord? Did you do it because you just, you know, the Bible talks about helping your neighbor and you wanted to help your neighbor. And you were just, you did it for the right reason. It goes a long way. The Lord looked at that widow woman who to the outside world would say she didn't do anything. And the Lord looked at that and said, hey, she did more than them all. See, the Lord judges sometimes differently than what we think. So he checks on our heart. And you know what the Bible says? The Bible says that there's three things you can get here that talks about gold, silver, and precious stone. Listen, ladies and gentlemen, gold in the Bible, and again, I don't have time to go into all the details, but gold is a picture. It represents a deity in the Bible. Right? You see that over and over again in the Bible. It is those vessels in the temple were made of gold. And they were used for what? They were used to worship. They were used in the service of the Lord. They were used to worship the Lord. You want to know what I think, how you earn gold at the judgment seat of Christ? I think your worship is gold. When you come to church, when you open up that hymnal, you begin to sing out. I don't care if you're in key or not. I'm not. What difference does it make? Enjoy. There's sometimes when you come in here and people are singing and their heart's in it, and they're like, it's not just, oh, yeah, I turned to number 722, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. What's next? What's next? Announcements. What's next? Oh, yeah. What's next? There's sometimes when you come in here and your heart's in a place where, you know what, you had a bad week and you just need to get away from it a little bit and you just want to spend some time with the Lord. And you open those hymnals and those words and the hymnals begin to speak to your, you say, why do we sing the old hymns? Most of those hymns were written by people that went through some pretty tragic times or pretty joyful times. And they pin down, you know, the results of their experience and there's depth to them. Sometimes we sing them kind of flippantly, and it's shame on us. But man, sometimes you come in, and those words mean something to you, and you begin to sing it, and you lose your inhibitions, and you sing out, and you don't care if somebody next to you hears you. You just enjoy singing to the Lord. I think the Lord looks down and goes, huh, now that's a mite right there I can enjoy. Hey, put a little bit in his account. That was good. That was good. Sometimes you get to, you know, again, maybe it's alone, maybe it's with a bunch of other people, but sometimes you get in that mode of, you know, worship service and your mind and your heart and everything, it goes to thinking about the Lord Jesus Christ and you literally just want to praise Him because He's God. Not because you don't necessarily want anything back. You just recognize the glory of God and the holiness of God. And you begin to praise God. Listen, the Lord takes note of that thing. He goes, put a little bit of gold in that guy's account. Why? That's worship. You sing. You praise the Lord. You worship God. I think when you do that, I think the Lord gets more out of that than you realize. It means something to him. And he notices. So when you come to church, hey, just forget all this stuff. Don't worry about what anybody else thinks. Just, man, sing out. Think. Think about how holy God is. Think about why it is we even have church. Because there's a real God. It puts your mind in the right mindset to worship a holy God. And then your heart goes out to him. When that happens, I think the Lord just, eh, give him a little more gold. Give him a little more gold. Give him a little more gold. That's good. I think it pleases the Lord. Next thing in that verse is silver. Silver is a type of redemption in the Bible. Again, I don't have time to lay all the foundation because I'm still not to the rest of this. But you have silver. Silver is a type of redemption. Well, redemption has to do with getting people redeemed. Right? Redeemed. They've been bought. They've been bought by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. I'll tell you what I think. I think when you just make an attempt to witness for the Lord Jesus Christ, when you attempt to get the gospel out there and you talk to your friends about it, hey, do you know about heaven and hell? Hey, do you know where you're going to go when you die? And you begin to make this attempt to try to get the gospel out to somebody, and you try to explain to them what redemption is, how they can be saved. I think the Lord takes note of that. I think the Lord gives you credit for when you try that. You say, yeah, but they didn't get saved. I think the Lord gives you credit for doing your part. See, you can't determine whether they get saved or not, but you can do your part. And when you do your part, why? Because you care for them, because you love them, because they're your friend? I mean, how many of you want your best friend to go to hell? Right. Nobody. I hope. But I think when you reach out and you make that attempt at redemption, at trying to explain to somebody else what redemption is, what salvation is, I think the Lord takes note of that and just throws a little bit of, Silver, silver that way. In the Old Testament, the men and the women and the children there, you can read through there, but they were redeemed by silver. It says in Leviticus, it says, and my estimation shall be of the male from 20 years old even under 60 years old, even my estimation shall be 50 shekels of silver. That was the price. That's what it took to redeem that male, and that was different for women and different for children. But silver is redemption. The other thing that's mentioned in there is gold, silver, and precious stones. Precious stones. It says in Malachi, Malachi. It says in Malachi, then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another. And the Lord hearkened and heard it. And the Book of Remembrance was written before them. that feared the Lord, and they that thought on his name. And they, that is those people that feared the Lord, they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels." People. People are jewels. Right? So how do you earn precious stones? I tell you, I think the precious stones represent the people that you had an opportunity to lead to Christ. Those that actually won, they're the jewels in the Lord's crown. I think that's how you earn jewels. You can earn gold, silver, precious stones. We won't talk about the wood, hay, and stubble, because this is a positive message. Those aren't the only things that you can earn at the judgment seat of Christ. There's more rewards. There are crowns that you can earn. At the judgment seat of Christ, listen, there's an opportunity to earn a crown of righteousness. It says in 2 Timothy, henceforth there is laid up for me, this is Paul talking, a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day, and not to me only, but to all them also that love his appearing. You go to the judgment seat of Christ, you know what, guys? You can earn a crown at the judgment seat of Christ because you love the Lord's appearing. I went to help Brother Caslaw in Hawaii for a week or so. And while I was gone, my wife left and went to Arizona because, I don't know, grandkid number 10 showed up. She felt like she had to be there. I got back from Hawaii, and the house was empty. And so we say, what'd you do? I did laundry. I did dishes. I cooked. I waited for my wife to come back. Day after day, I was waiting for her. And for a while there, I didn't know how long it was going to be because we hadn't set a return date. And so for a while there, there was a few days where I was going, you know, I know she's coming back. I know she's coming back. I just don't know when. It's going to be soon, though, because she can't stay there forever, right? So I didn't know when she was coming back. I said, what did you do? I just did the daily stuff that you're supposed to do and waited for her return. You know what, ladies and gentlemen, you get a crown of righteousness because you love the Lord's appearing. You're waiting for his return. How often throughout the week do you think of that? Hopefully on a pretty regular basis. You see, this is the judgment. Like I said, judgment, it makes everybody nervous. But the reality is, you can earn some rewards at judgment that are going to last for all eternity. How do you earn one of them? Well, you got gold, silver, precious stones. We talked about that. Well, the crown of righteousness, folks, you earn just by waiting for the Lord, by being interested enough in Him coming back, like I was with my wife coming back. It would have been a whole other kind of marriage if she was in Arizona. I was going like, ah, the old hag. I hope she never comes back. Yeah, you could tell there would be something wrong there in the relationship. Right? But no, I was looking forward to her coming back. That's how we ought to be with the Lord. I mean, I know we got stuff to do down here on this earth. OK, so do the dishes, do the laundry, make food, take care of all your stuff. But you know what? In the background, hey, Lord, would you please come back? I'm ready for you. I'm hoping you're coming right now. You can earn a crown at the judgment seat of Christ just for having that attitude. Here's another one. There's a crown of life spoken of in the Bible. Be thou faithful unto death, it says in Revelation, and I will give thee a crown of life. OK, how many of you want to go out and die for Jesus? I don't see very many hands. But if it ever gets to that, so be it. I hope it doesn't. But take a look at James. Blessed is the man that endureth temptation. For when he has tried, he shall receive The crown of life? Ladies and gentlemen, think about that for a second. That thing there says, listen, when Satan tries to tempt you to sin, and you resist it, and you make up your mind that you don't want to sin, and you resist that sin, God gives you the same crown as somebody that was killed for him. That's a wild thing. That's a wild thing. You want to earn crowns of the judgment seat of Christ? OK. Hey, how about this? Love is appearing. Hey, resist temptation. Resist the sin. You say, oh, but it's so easy to fall into. I know. That's why you get such a great reward for not doing it. I got a conviction when I was reading this one, going, oh, man. I need a few more of those crowns. See, the Lord's out. Again, this is the judgment seat of Christ. The Lord has got a lot of things in store for you. And this is your service. You're being judged as a servant. Well, let me tell you something. If you're actively engaged in trying to resist sin, you know what? You're going to be serving the Lord. The Lord's going to take note of that. And the Lord goes. Boy, the devil kept throwing some tempting stuff right in front of that guy's face. And he resisted. Give that boy a crown. And the Lord counts doing that, apparently, at least by all indications we get in the Bible, as the same level as somebody that gave their life a martyr. That's wild. Hopefully, that makes you want to resist sin even more. It does me. I'll tell you another one. At the judgment seat of Christ, there's another crown. It's the incorruptible crown. It says in 1 Corinthians, and every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now, they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we, we, an incorruptible crown. Right? An incorruptible crown. What is the incorruptible crown? Listen, the incorruptible crown, that is this, folks. The Lord gives each one of us our own race to run. You don't run somebody else's race. Right? He gives you your race to run, and he wants you to do your best at serving and running the race that the Lord gave you in this life. And he wants you to strive for the mastery, whatever the Lord wants you to be, whatever the Lord has in store for you. If it's just a church member who's faithful, praise the Lord. You need those. Church doesn't exist without it. If it's a Sunday school teacher, a missionary, if it's a mechanic, if it's just a good father, a good mother, a good child, the Lord gives you your race to run. And whatever that race is, hey, you don't have to run somebody else's race. A sprinter is not a marathoner, right? They're completely different races, and they train different, and they have different objectives, and it's completely different. Well, that's the way it is with Christianity. The Lord expects you to run your race. The Lord expects you to strive for the mastery. And in the martial arts and karate, we have this thing called, it's a Korean term, it's Ryunma. And it means polishing self. And the idea is, you know, the idea, think of a sword or a knife and, you know, think of polishing it and sharpening it and polishing it to perfection. And it's a constant process. You're constantly trying to work on yourself. That's what striving for mastery is. It's taking a look at your Christian life and your daily walk and going, hey, how am I doing on confessing my sins daily like I'm supposed to? I know I got Calvary taken care of, but I want to work on that daily walk. And then I want to think about service, my service to the Lord Jesus Christ, because there's a judgment seat of Christ coming up. And I love the Lord, and I don't want to show up empty. So I'm just going to work on polishing myself, polishing my Christianity. You know what? I want to be a better Christian next year than I was this year. I want to be closer to the Lord next year than I was this year. You say, are you going to have it mastered by next year? No. But you can get closer to it, right? That's all the Lord wants. All the Lord wants is you to do is run your race and work towards your mastery in your Christian life, right? It says in 1 Corinthians, it says, know ye not that they which run a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run that ye may obtain. Hey, the Lord gave you your race. Run your race. It says, and every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible. The crown, listen, you can strive for a lot of things down here on this earth. But in the end, they're all going to burn. In the end, you say, yes, but I saved up $12 million, and I got 47 houses and 32 rental properties, and I've got, OK, so? I mean, I'm glad you have those things. Praise the Lord. That's good. There's nothing wrong with that. But in the end, so? You say, I get to leave them to my children. Great. I'm glad you get to do that. Praise the Lord. What a blessing that is. Eventually, what are your children going to do with them? Because they're going to die. So? Well, they can give them to their children. OK, well, let's just continue on down the road. Eventually, somewhere down the road, great, great, great, great, great, great grandchildren are going to squander it all the way anyway. But the things that you lay up for and store at the judgment seat of Christ, they're never going to fade away. They're incorruptible. You take the time to resist temptation. You take the time to do some of those things right here, right now for the Lord. You know what? Those things last for all eternity. It's a great thing. There's another one. There's a crown of glory. And when the chief shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. This is also referred to sometimes as the pastor's crown. But it's a crown given to those that feed the flock. Well, I wouldn't be a bit surprised, but what the Lord also extends that to, let's say, Sunday school teachers, missionaries, people that actively go out and try to feed the flock. You know what you can do? You can go out and try to feed the flock. Right? But there is a crown that's reserved for that. I hope that I feed you. I hope I give you something to think about. I'd like to get that one. I may not get any other ones, but I'd like to get that one. And then there is, finally, there is a crown of rejoicing. Paul said this in 1 Thessalonians, for what is our hope or joy? or crown of rejoicing. What is it? Are not even ye. It's the people, right? It's the people. We call this the soul winner's crown. You say, you get double credit for winning soul. Yeah, absolutely. The Lord's interested in that. Let me ask you this. Since you've been saved, how many people have you been able to lead to the Lord? Now, you know, Brother Jim's not here, so I can harass him a little bit. And he won't feel as bad about it. That man's a witnessing machine. He's got a lot of these ones laid up, right? Not everybody, the Lord's given him a special gift to be able to do that. Praise the Lord for that. But you know what? The Lord offers this at the judgment seat of Christ to all of us. Not everybody is going to be as proficient at it as he is. Praise the Lord for him. That's a great thing. But you know what? The Lord offers it to all of us. How many crowns do you think you've won? I hope every one of you, and I'm about done here. I hope every one of you would at least think this. I hope everyone here would at least think, you know what? I would like to at least win one, one person to the Lord before I leave this planet. Why? Just because the Lord's been so good to me, you know what? I want somebody else to get in on it. Parents, lead your children to the Lord, absolutely. But I hope every Christian, when we get to the judgment seat of Christ, I hope every one of us, when it comes to giving out this crown, I hope we're all there in line to get at least one. Amen? If you haven't, If you've never won a soul to the Lord Jesus Christ, hey, listen. If you've got questions, just ask. There are a lot of people around here who would love to help you with that. But you know what the biggest obstacle is? We're just scared. We're embarrassed. To which I say, think of what the Lord Jesus Christ did for you. And think of how he sacrificed his life on that cross so that you could escape from hell. And then go, you know what? If somebody did that much for me, I can be a little uncomfortable for him. I may not be the best at it. I may not have the right words. I may not have all the verses memorized like other people. I may not know all the Bible doctrines. But you know what I can do? I can tell them what the Lord did for me. And I can figure out enough Bible verses that I can struggle through them. And even if I misquote them, I can get somebody the plan of salvation. Ever been there? Ever misquoted a verse when you're trying to lead somebody to the Lord? Oh, I have, dozens of times. Oh, yeah. It's like, ah, how'd that thing go? Oh, yeah. But you get the gist of it. The Lord takes the words. And you know what? You just put forth the effort. The Lord will take that effort, and he will bless it, and he will multiply it. And guys, I promise you, if you give it a try, you'll be surprised at how successful you can be. Crown of rejoicing. All right. It's about time. The three Christian judgments that we as Christians ought to know about. One, Calvary, that's where we're judged as a sinner. That determines heaven or hell. Second is a daily judgment where we just keep in fellowship with the Lord. It's a judgment just about fellowship and our walk with the Lord, and that's a day-by-day thing, hour-by-hour, sometimes minute-by-minute. And you just go to the Lord and when things get, you know, a little tense, you go and you get it taken care of and you walk back in good fellowship again. You should do that with the Lord on a regular basis. You should do that with one another on a regular basis. And then the third thing, the third judgment is at the end of the After the rapture, when we're up in heaven, while the tribulation's going on down here on earth, we are going to sit at something called the judgment seat of Christ. And folks, at that point in time, we're going to be judged on our service. And we went over all the things, gold, silver, precious stone, the five different crowns, how you can gain those crowns. There's an opportunity for all of us to do extremely well at the judgment seat of Christ. I know there's the terror of the Lord associated with it. And I know there's a lot of failures, and I haven't served him like I should. And there's a lot of time. And Lord knows my failures in humanity. But you know what I'm hoping for? I'm hoping when it's all said and done, I know there's going to be a big pile of ashes from wood, hay, and stubble. You say, did you ever do something for the Lord selfishly? Oh, yeah. I'm sure. Probably more than I even realize. But man, I'd sure like there to be some things I did for the Lord that were just for him. And we have an opportunity to win those things at the judgment seat of Christ, but it just takes knowing about them, keeping them in our mind, waiting for His appearing, and just giving a little bit of effort. Amen? I hope that you guys all fare well at the judgment seat of Christ. Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Father, we thank you again for an opportunity to be here. You're a great God, a great Savior. I do pray, Father, that as we, most of the people here in this building are Christians. I know that. They're saved. So Father, this whole topic of a judgment seat of Christ is very applicable to us. Lord, one of these days, we're going to be able to see you face to face. And when that day occurs, Father, this life will be all over. It'll be a thing of the past. We probably won't even remember all of it that much anymore. but we'll have eternity to spend with you. I pray, Father, that we'll be able to lay up some treasures for ourselves while we're here for that day. Pray that we might be able to come out of the judgment seat of Christ with a good measure of gold, silver, precious stones. Father, with some of these crowns, Lord, not just for selfish reasons, but to honor and to serve and to love you. Father, help us to keep those things in mind. I pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.