The Judgment Seat of Christ: Loving Jesus with All Our Heart | EGS Classic | Mike Bickle

[Music] i want to talk about the judgment seat of christ most of you are familiar with that term it's the appointment that every believer has to stand before jesus as an individual and to give an answer to give an account of our life to him we give an answer for everything he's given us he's given each person a certain ability certain capacities certain blessings and then we answer back to him on the last day what we did with that which he gave us and the thing that he's most interested is in us offering our dedication as the gift of our love back to him and then on that day he rewards us which is not just about making us look good or great but really his rewards are an expression of how he feels about the way we lived he wants to openly declare to you the way that he feels about the way that you loved him and he cares so much about it that our eternal rewards are related to our garments in the age to come the glory the measure of glory we will have in our resurrected body and many other things we'll look at in a little while but he is so moved by the way that we love him that he wants to express how he feels and he wants you to wear it in everything that you do forever and that's called the judgment seat of christ it's the place of reward it's not the place of punishment but rather it's the place where he expresses what he thinks and what he feels about the way you lived it's a very positive thing because when we hear judgment seat sometimes we think of oh no judgment the word judgment it means evaluation but in this context it's the place of reward it's not the place where the criminal is sentenced to jail because we think of the judgment seat as that that's the great white throne in revelation 20 where the criminal is sentenced to jail the lake of fire forever this is not a sentencing this is not an a statement of punishment but rather an expression of his heart for us and it's the great appointment that the lord has with every one of us at the end of our life this is the most important appointment you will ever have in your life is that moment when you meet jesus christ eye to eye face to face what is in his mind in his heart about you is the most important thing about your life so i'm going to talk about that a little bit this morning we won't cover all the notes but just some of them and then even in the next several weeks i want to develop this theme a little bit more in detail first i'm going to start with an experience that i had in october 1978 i was only 23 years old it was the first supernatural experience that i ever had besides obviously being born again that's a supernatural experience when the holy spirit comes to live in us and our sins are wiped away what a glorious supernatural experience that every born-again believer has but it was in october 1978 i went to bed one night and just a kind of business as usual and in the middle of the night i had a visionary experience where it was more it was not a dream it was an actual encounter with the lord and at the end of it i wasn't asleep i was wide awake coming out of this experience and the point i'm saying is is that it was such a profound experience it marked my life and it shook my life and the reason i'm sharing it is that i want you to see yourself before the lord in the context of an experience like this i would like you to feel a little bit of what i felt just for your own edification and that's why i'm telling the story i was on my knees in this visionary experience before the lord i'm kneeling and i'm looking at jesus right into his face right into his eyes and i'm perplexed just just in in my humanity i didn't know where i was or how i got there or what was going on i knew i was before the lord himself i'd never seen the lord before and i'm looking at his face and i'm awestruck and i remember trying to figure out where where am i and how did i get here and what is happening this is the lord i'm looking at what is taking place but he had a very very serious look and then after a few moments of my perplexity and i kind of was staring at him as he was staring at me i was wondering what would happen he spoke a sentence that absolutely shocked me i did not understand it at all a little later i came to understand it and i'll explain it to you but he spoke to me right into my eyes and he said you are saved but your life was wasted i couldn't believe the words utter shock and i protested this in my thinking of course but my mind was very clear and very strong in what i was thinking this is a mistake this is not possible you have the wrong person i was saying these things really clear and he understood what i was thinking and the reason is because at that time of my life at age 23 i'd been reading biographies that my youth leaders encouraged me to read and i encouraged people to read biographies particularly young people and they told me to read biographies of men and women that had unusual dedication to the lord because that would inspire my dedication and give me a vision for high dedication because you read a biography and you see what's possible you see what can happen in the grace of god to a person's heart so i read several of them for about five year period from age 18 to 23 before this experience my favorite was jay hudson taylor the great missionary to china i read three of his biographies medical doctor in the 1850s that went to china and gave his life i'm not going to tell you the whole story but i loved it i wanted to be jay hudson taylor i would be just like him then i read the other biography then the other one and i want to be just like these guys so i had really set my heart in those early years to live radical as radical for god as i knew how and that's kind of the mindset i had and so when the lord said saved but your life was wasted i could not make sense of that at all an utter shock i was confused even a little bit offended going lord i know you're right but this one thing you have it wrong my little 23 year old mind was thinking that and he knew what i was thinking and he stared at me he did not change his countenance it was serious not stern but almost it was very weighty and very serious and then this the holy spirit spoke right to my spirit of this visionary experience and he said this it is impossible to manipulate the man christ jesus because i was trying to get him to have a different opinion i know you're wrong it's the i'm the wrong person wrong evaluation this is a mistake and this the holy spirit spoke clearly it is impossible to manipulate the man christ jesus the idea is there's no way to convince him of something other than what he thinks there's no new information that you can give him that will change his conclusion or his evaluation he is truth he said i am the way the truth the life he is the truth and in his presence that which is true becomes manifest so i was under this great weight of i can't change his opinion and his opinion is my life was wasted and i can't change it so i cried out he's looking at me the whole time i cried out can i have another chance because i it was like i was at the end of my life can i have another chance can i go back i didn't know exactly where i was but can i have another chance he still says nothing he only says one phrase the entire experience saved but your life is wasted but now the holy spirit speaks to me again in a very profound way just like he said you can't manipulate this man the next thing the holy spirit spoke hebrews 9 27 it's appointed unto man wants to die and then comes the judgment which means the evaluation the word judgment means evaluation does not have a negative connotation it can be negative but judgment is not intrinsically negative it's the evaluation to see how it lines up with truth i said can i have another chance and the holy spirit spoke and said it's appointed unto man to die once you only get one chance to live on the earth your natural life and then you must give an evaluation and so i was weeping it was a profound negative experience the sense of loss the sense of regret i was trembling i was just weeping and sobbing with so much regret oh i wish i would have lived different oh if i could go back but i knew i couldn't change his opinion and i knew i couldn't go back and get another chance and just the feeling the pain of that reality though he said i was saved so i'm i'm still before him in this visionary experience i'm kneeling i'm looking at his eyes i'm weeping and weeping the pain the regret oh if i could have lived different suddenly the vision lifts i'm not in bed in a dream state i'm actually over in a part of the room i'm kneeling down and tears are flowing down and my t-shirt is actually wet with tears in the natural so i wake up out of this on this vision i mean lifts and i'm actually in the same posture in the same uh uh uh exchange with him weeping with tears on my t-shirt it was a terrible but now that i look back wonderful experience but it was a terrible experience i was quite confused this experience marked my spirit profoundly but i was confused and i was grieved and i was saying lord now you know the vision is over i go i don't know what that was i'm back where i went to bed last night i'm 23 and wow what was that and the holy spirit made clear to me this is what i want you to avoid on the last day when you stand before jesus he let me know i gave you this experience so that it would not happen to you on that day and he spoke a very important principle to me he said to me that if you live in what is the common way of dedication and i understood in the western world the what we would what the common kind of a perception of what dedication is if that was the level of my dedication what is commonly esteemed is dedicated then the lord the holy spirit let me know then on the last day you will receive this sentence from the lips of jesus that i was not to look to the right or the left and see what you said was dedicated or he said was dedicated i had to understand what the word of god and what god meant by living dedicated and loving him with all of my heart because the measure of dedication is to walk out the first commandment to love god with all of our heart all of our soul all of our mind all of our strength that is what he wants most and that's what he cares about most on the day when our eyes meet how do we do that well many people around you will give you a definition of what that means they will give you a standard that is much lower than the standard that the holy spirit has for that passage for that that call to love god with all of our heart so the holy spirit was saying i want you to avoid this dialogue with jesus this negative conclusion over your life but if you live in what is commonly understood is dedication if that's the only level of dedication you have when you meet jesus eye to eye he will tell you what he just told you in that vision i mean i was terrified i had a sense of of a seriousness of the weightiness of god upon me again that experience marked my heart i've you know i i i'm thinking to say i've thought of that experience daily that would be exaggerated to say daily but i've thought of that experience several times a week almost every single week for the last 32 years i've thought of that experience i can picture it so clearly right now 32 years later kneeling looking at jesus's face the weighty sober look that he had his heart was sad that after all that he gave me i had nothing to give him in return as an expression of my gift of love back to him for all that he gave me his heart was grieved and my heart was deeply grieved i want to tell you and you know it already but what jesus is thinking on the day when you first meet him in the age to come eye to eye what he is thinking when you two lock eyes and you will lock eyes it is the great appointment of everyone's life what he is thinking is the only thing that's important about your life ultimately when i meet him eye to eye in that day and it's coming soon it does not matter if that appointment is decades from now or if it's days from now either way it's just a minute from now from the point of view of eternity every one of us will be there in a minute maybe some decades for some of you but it's a minute from now and when the lord looks in your eyes what he is thinking that moment is the only thing ultimately that matters about your life even now i can't think of anything more tragic than jesus here he is fully god the eternal uncreated god jesus is the uncreated god never was there a day he did not exist he's like the father in the spirit eternity past there was a point in time he became human and you know that when jesus became human the deal was if he became human to save us he had to be human forever jesus didn't become a man die for us go to heaven cast off his humanity and say wow that was a weird ride that was a weird experience being human he had he will be human forever in order to gain our salvation i mean what a commitment what a strange thing for god to wrap himself in the garments of humanity this is this is a statement of humility and love beyond anything we can comprehend then he bears the wrath of god then he saves us freely gives us his salvation the holy spirit comes to live in us and then he gives us a life commission the fact that you have an assignment that he cares about is so glorious the assignment may be little in the eyes of man but the fact that he cares about that assignment and that assignment moves his heart makes your life profoundly powerful doesn't matter how little the assignment is in man's eyes the fact it moves his heart beloved that makes your life glorious and powerful because every hour of every day it matters to him he cares about you and his investment in you the fact that he gives us mercy new every day so here it is the eternal god becomes man wow this perfect man bears the wrath of god under death oh this sinful man me i get the gift of righteousness and the indwelling spirit whoa i get a life assignment that he cares about and he remembers and he invests in my life and participates with that assignment wow again and then he gives me mercy every single day that's new and then i stand before him decades later and to have nothing to offer him is an unthinkable tragedy no gift of love to offer him on that day i don't mean that we would not love him in that moment every believer will love him in that moment but they won't have 10 20 30 40 50 years of a statement of their love while they lived on the earth for him i can't think of anything more tragic than that moment in a believer's life if they stand before the lord that way now it's clear from the scripture that many will stand before the lord saved as the gift of god our salvation is a gift of god we can't earn it we can't deserve it it's fully given to us instantly as a free gift but our entrance into the city is free but our position in the city is based on our responses our works in this age we enter in the city free our place in the city and our rewards are based on our responsiveness they're based upon the things that we did before him there's nothing that i fear more in my life than regret on that day it is the number one thing that i'm concerned about i'm concerned about many things but more than anything else the thing that i'm most concerned about and i think about the most when i look at over the years is i don't want to have regret on that day because i felt that regret in that visionary experience it was terrible that i would offer nothing to him on that day for him becoming a man bearing the wrath of god giving me the indwelling spirit a life assignment mercy knew every day and then i would just offer him a statement of living selfish i can't fathom that exchange and the pain that that would cause his heart and the pain that would cause my heart and the investment that he made in me my only return is that i have nothing to offer from my years on the earth horrifying i can't imagine anything more tragic now i know a number of you in this room you're you're in touch with that and that's that's called loving god with all of your heart in the fear of the lord i'm not interested in calling people to loving god and mere sentimentality but it's loving god on god's terms rooted in the fear of the lord rooted in loving god in the way that god wants us to love him that's what we care about that experience it plumb lined my soul and i've thought about that experience many times and i and just honestly 32 years later i have not always walked in the dedication that i wish i would walk it when i look back i do have some regrets and i'm trusting that in the grace of god he will cover him because i've confessed them and repented of them so it's not like that experience things were set just the the tension was in my soul from that point forward and my purpose this morning is that that tension would be in your soul that awareness of that appointment and the awfulness and the tragedy of regret on that day if in fact you have it is the most unbearable thing a believer can experience yes i care about my money my ministry my health my marriage my family my friends i care about all those subjects but i tell you one thing your appointment on that day is far more important than all of those other important subjects and i want to urge you and i know a number of you do already to make this the premier occupation of your life not the only occupation but the premier one the primary one and this is this is what i'm putting before you that you would answer the question what does it look like to love god with all of my heart what does it look like to respond to god in wholehearted love that has obedience and faith in it because remember we can't love god on our terms it must be on his terms we love god rooted in obedience to god that's the kind of love that he calls us to so the question i had at age 23 after this experience what does it look like to love god with all of my heart because i know that's what he wants most on that day he will evaluate my life on that day in your life not by the size of your gifting not by the size of your ministry impact but the size of your heart in other words the size of your responsiveness to walk out the first commandment when i stand before the lord he's not going to ask me how big ihop was how many books i sold how many conferences i went to how many people were participating in my ministry he's not going to ask me that he said say mike i want to know about your responsiveness to me how did you where did you how did you respond in loving me with all of your heart that's rooted in obedience and faith that's the question he cares about i want to say it again he's not going to evaluate you that's what judgment means by the size of your ministry he's not going to evaluate you by the size of your gifting he's going to evaluate you not the size of your impact but the size of your responsiveness to walk out the first commandment he said this is the first commandment this is the great commandment that you would love god with all of your heart all of your soul all of your strength and all of your mind this is the great commandment this is the thing i care most about in your life and so when we stand before the lord i want no regret on that day and in our weakness and brokenness there is a contingency in the grace of god for our weakness and brokenness the lord's standards they are doable they are reachable they are attainable to weak and broken people like us what he calls love his standards are kind and tender and they're workable for weak people his standards are not out of reach the love that he wants is within reach if we are vigilant and we're diligent we can walk in those standards they won't come to us automatically but they're within the reach of the weakest among us so the question i had that day and the question i've had for 32 years since that day the premier question of my life what does it look like to love god with all of my heart and all of my soul and all my strength that has been the primary concern of my life not the only concern i have many other legitimate concerns but the primary concern and there are times when i've lost sight of that and i had to realign myself and recommit to that as the primary dream of my heart the dream of my heart is not to have a big ministry ihop is not the dream of my heart it's my assignment it's not my dream my dream is the anointing to love god with all of my heart to feel his love and return it in a way that moves him if i have the ability to do that the dream of my heart is satisfied you know as people over the years i've told the story many times they've seen the growth of ihop in the last 11 years in the the way that it's reaching out and touching people in different parts of the world et cetera et cetera and just friends through the years because we waited 16 years after the lord said do i hop he spoke audibly in may 83 do this 24 7 prayer mandate so for 16 years we had the sign on the wall and people would say what is this and i would say i'm not sure it's 24-hour prayer with singers musicians i don't know what it looks like so for 16 years the members of our church they they they knew this and saw this sign and so then after the years go by 16 years of waiting ihop starts and so in the last 11 years a number of things have developed and so different ones will come from my past relationships and go wow your dream has come true and i said ihop is not my dream i ops my assignment i appreciate my assignment my dream is not affected at all by ihop if ihop gets real big my dream is not helped out at all if i hop falls apart my dream is not in any way threatened my dream is what happens on the inside of my heart with god by the anointing of the spirit and no demon and no man and no ministry can touch my dream it's completely between me and him that's the dream of my heart but there was a time where i consciously shifted the dream of my heart off of ministry and finance and my relationships and they became secondary and i began to be preoccupied with walking in the anointing to walk out the first commandment to offer a gift of love to him on the last day and my exhortation this morning is that though a number of you have made that shift in your thinking to where your primary dream is the ability to love god with all your heart because if you love god with all your heart you'll love people you'll do ministry all the other things will flow out of loving god with all of your heart but there's some of you your primary dream is your ministry your relationships your family your me your economics that is the dream that preoccupies you most i want to challenge you as a servant of the lord to shift that and make those your secondary dream make the preoccupation of your soul the ability to walk out the first commandment and to offer to him on the last day a gift of love that would move him and that he will reward you and express what he feels in the reward he will express what he feels about your dedication and again when he gives you gifts and rewards in the age to come they are all expressions of how he feels about the way you lived before him on the earth we'll develop that more in the in some of the weeks to come so the question is what does it look like to walk out the first commandment you know i began to be preoccupied with that i wanted to find out how i could get the grace of god experience the grace of god to be more abandoned to god than i ever knew before i wanted strength and insight to be more abandoned like those people in the biographies but even more i had this prayer lord whatever whatever measure of grace you will give the human spirit in this age for dedication i want that measure of grace i don't want to live in a dedication measured by other people whatever you will give the human spirit of this age that's the level of grace i want to be abandoned and the question became how far will you let me go how abandoned will you let me be just using the lyrics from one of misty songs well i was in my twenties and thirties i was a young pastor in those years in those decades those two decades i'm 55 now so that was a long time ago but i remember i would interact with pastors in the city-wide pastors meetings i was in st louis for seven years and then the early years here in kansas city i would interact with visiting pastors and lots of friends the guy the old guys that were in their 40s and 50s and 60s and they would talk to me and i was trying to get more strength to fast and pray i was trying to find a way to give more of my money to the kingdom a way to live more simple to live in greater humility greater self-denial i didn't want legalism i wanted abandonment on jesus terms by what the bible says and different guys not all of them by any means but i heard it regularly for about you know 10 or 20 years guys would come the older guys and say well mike you need to kind of settle down a little bit you don't really need to pray that much you don't really need to give that much away matter of fact god wants you to have more god wants it easier for you god wants you to play more do less relax more enjoy more and what they were really telling me god wants you to live like they were living but i was not impressed by their dedication i liked them i enjoyed fellowshipping but i didn't want to be like him i wanted to live in an abandonment to god that was as much that that god would give the human spirit in this age how far will you let me go so i would say no no and they would counsel me to draw back and to chill out and to go you know not be so intense in seeking the lord and trying to give more to them they said you know this is unnecessary just chill out and relax and and they all had plenty of verses in the bible to back up living passive in the grace of god beloved if you want to live passive and superficial in the grace of god there are many bible verses that people can use they use them wrongly but they will use them boldly and they will talk you into their level of dedication i didn't want their level of dedication i wanted as much as god would give the human spirit in dedication because that's all that's going to matter when me and jesus meet i to i he is not going to ask me about anything but the measure of my abandonment to the grace of god to walk out the first commandment that's what he's going to ask me you know some people are real focused on how big their ministry impact would be he's not going to measure you on the size of your gifting or the sizing of your impact you know when billy graham stands before god jesus isn't going to say father look billy graham oh my that's not going to happen he filled stadiums for 50 years hundreds of times stadiums are filled because you can only have a big impact if god gives it to you he's not impressed by the size of the impact that's a gift of god he's not he's what god has moved by is your responsiveness of your heart to him not by how big your impact and how many other people were moved he's moved by your responsiveness now nobody knows that better than billy graham he's a man of profound humility he does he's not impressed with his impact but a lot of others are and that's what they dream about i tell you dream about it if you want but make it the secondary dream make it second to the dream to be wholehearted for god so young people come and they've asked me over the years i want to do this with all of my heart how do we do it they say what are you doing how do you do it and they're asking me for the application of what i do with my time and my money and and all whatever my resources are physical emotional spiritual financial what do you do with what you have that's a very natural question they want to know the application of what i do and i won't tell them for years i just won't tell them i said no and i'm not going to tell you that i said because here's why the application in my life is not the application for your life it's different for every person every one of us have a different assignment so i will spend more hours and more time doing this and you will spend more hours doing that every one of us have a different assignment in the lord and every season of our life the application of our dedication will look different what i did in my 20s my 30s my 40s i there was different allocations of time and resources because not only do i have to answer it according to my calling also according to the season so i have found in these 32 years since that experience and every season of my life every three or five year season whatever the amount would be i have to ask again what does wholeheartedness look like in this season and i don't always have the answers and there's a pain in my heart with that question lord i want to have certainty about what wholehearted looks like wholeheartedness looks like in my 30s then in my 40s and in my 50s i need to know what it looks like and i don't get crystal clear answers i get the lord inspires me he goes how far do you want to go i want to go all the way and so you know i lord i want to be absolutely clear i want no regret on that last day and the lord's answer is you just keep asking the question and you keep seeking grace to give more of yourself to me and you'll be in good shape so young people come and they go tell me the answer i go no the application for my life is different than yours and the application in every season of our life is different than the season before but here's one thing i can tell you we have the same question to ask same question different application ask how far will you let me go how abandoned will you let me be ask that question and then i can give you the question to ask but i just can't tell you what it looks like every season of your life but struggle with it because you love him it's a struggle because you don't want to mess you don't want to miss it you don't want to miss this one issue of your life because to miss this is a great tragedy if you get the wrong answer to that question and the lord doesn't play games with us he lets us know we can have peace in those in the seasons of our life though we may not have crystal clear answers to exactly how much time this and how much money that we give away but we can have a general piece of it but i have found this struggle has emerged many times in the last 32 years it's like the caterpillar that's in the cocoon struggling fighting wrestling you tear that cocoon open that caterpillar will never become a butterfly the struggle the wrestling match lord how much money should i give you you've given me x amount of money time energy influence how much of it do i sow this way how much do i sow that way wrestle because of love wrestle with it the turmoil because you care so much that's called blessed are they who mourn in sp who are uh blessed are those who mourn in spirit poverty of spirit blessed are those with poverty of spirit those who mourn before god those are questions based in love wrestle wrestle but whatever you do don't look to your buddy over there and let him give you the answer because he'll give you an answer of how to live comfortable in a passive christian response i don't want your answer i need the answer from the lord you know when i'm in my 20s and 30s these older guys would give me these answers but again not every time but many of the times were pray less keep more money humble yourself less fast less enjoy more play more chill out more that was the general trend and i began i was i was provoked because i wanted answers that would touch my spirit and help me so i came up with this answer that i used to say back to them over these years because different ones would say this to me in their own different way and i quit saying the answer because it offended so many of them but i still believe and i still say it in my heart and here's what i used to tell them i said if you could convince me that your opinion will matter where i'm going to stand before that man with eyes of fire if you can convince me your opinion will matter then i will live the way you tell me but if your opinion will not matter with where i'm going if jesus doesn't look over and ask your opinion when he judges my life i don't care what you have to say about the standard of my obedience i want wisdom from people but i'm talking about the standard of obedience i go if if your opinion counts i want it but it has to count on the last day and i don't think it does and i've found over the years there's plenty of young and old alike who will find bible verses to back up how to live a superficial life and how to live a passive spiritual life i'm not interested in bible verses to make me feel good while i live carnal i'm not interested in those verses it's a it's a misapplication of them anyway i'm looking for bible verses that help me be abandoned to help me give everything and more besides out of love that's the kind of empowerment i'm looking for to actually walk out the first commandment i fear regret more than anything i have other fears but my biggest fear is that i would have regret on that day that i would experience in reality what i experienced in that vision and i say to the lord this and i encourage you to pray this prayer i say i've said it many many times lord shock me now don't shock me then in other words if my dedication is deficient tell me now and disturb me don't wait till i get there because i won't be able to change you and manipulate you i won't be able to persuade you to change your evaluation and i won't get a second chance this i'm sure of shock me now don't shock me then break it now and the lord's answer search the word and ask the question how far will i let you go and i will shock you now by where your dedication is lacking i'll tell you now if you want the answer but again don't look to the right and left and get it from others they will always dumb it down to make it comfortable with how they live let's look at roman numeral two paragraph a we'll just just talk just a couple more moments here we won't cover the notes we haven't even started on them hardly but that's what next week's about in the week after romans 14 verse 10 to 12 for we will all stand before the judgment seat of christ then each one of us will give an account of himself to god every single individual believer will stand before and you will give an account your dedicated wife will not be able to speak up for you your dedicated husband won't answer for you your dedicated children can't answer for you parents or children your dedicated parents their vote doesn't count on that day it's you and jesus eye to eye and what he thinks is all that matters and it's the thing that defines what is important in your life it's really good it's wisdom to get into that question and then get into the tension of that question right now don't wait until then it says here that we will give an account god gave every single believer a specific assignment for their life as many stages many seasons every one of us have a specific assignment and that assignment is based this paragraph two it's based on the capacities that he gave us physically mentally emotionally financially and life circumstances your life circumstances and your emotional and mental abilities are very different than the other persons the lord's not going to evaluate you on how smart you were how big your gift was but simply how you responded that's the only way he'll evaluate you you may have the smallest assignment in the earth in the eyes of man your assignment in god may be so small in the eyes of men that no one even knows anything about it and you may feel you have no giftings no abilities that's not true but you may feel that way they may be so little but when we stand before the lord he's not asking us about the size of our gifting or the size of our impact but the size of our responsiveness the size of our heart i call the judgment seat of christ the great equalizer it's the great equalizer the great men of the earth and the paupers and the uneducated of the earth they stand on equal terms only one thing matters responsiveness the most uneducated ungifted totally forgotten human being can have a response far greater than the greatness of the earth even in the kingdom of god the famous ones is what i mean and they will be rewarded far more than the famous ones i call that day the great equalizer when we all stand before the lord all on equal ground responsiveness is all that matters not gifting not looks not social impact not popularity not abilities none of that will matter on that day we will give an account for the assignment that he gave us beloved the fact that you have an assignment from god one that moves him that he cares about do you know how glorious that is that you have an assignment he cares about nobody else maybe cares about it you might say nobody cares about my assignment jesus says oh i do it's my investment in you and i take it personally what you do with what i gave you i only gave you a little bit but what you do with it moves me i've invested in you and i want a return of your heart and as you've loved me i will reward you to make known how deeply i feel about the way you loved me you know some people they don't like this idea of living with eternal rewards in mind they go you know living for return rewards i just want to live i want to love god on pure ground because what they're thinking of eternal rewards is that you're going to get rewarded in the age to come and then you're going to trump over you're going to triumph over other people to show your superiority no rewards in the age to come are not so you can show your superiority to other human beings it's a completely carnal paradigm of rewards when the lord gives us rewards in the age to come it's an expression of how he felt about our dedication and our love and he's going to cause us to wear that expression everywhere you go with the garments and the glory will break this down in the weeks to come of the ways that he rewards us he will be expressing and declaring jesus will be through the rewards he gave you he will be declaring how dear your dedication was to him and secondly it's not about being over people our rewards are about our proximity to jesus in the age to come we all have equal ground of salvation it's free and we have full salvation but we will all have different proximity to jesus in our work assignments and our kingdom assignments in the age to come i want to be as near to him as possible and i want him to shout through me and to me how he feels about the secret dedication and the way i've given myself to him in private and that's what you want beloved nobody in the world may know anything about your secret life in god but he sees it and it makes every day of your life powerful it's amazing let's look at second corinthians chapter five we'll end with this passage second corinthians 5. it says we must all appear before the judgment seat of christ that each one of us will receive here it is the phrase the things done in the body according to what he has done whether good or bad now this is an amazing statement we are accountable that's what he told us in romans 14 now he paul breaks it down more he said it's not just the motive of your heart the motives are a part of the judgment the evaluation at the end but it's the motives are not the main thing they are important the main thing is what you actually do with your time with your money with your deeds it's the deeds done in the body it's not the intention to be dedicated but it's dedication walked out it's not the intention to develop a prayer life of developing relationship with him it's the prayer life walked out it's not the intention to give our money to the kingdom it's giving it to the kingdom it's not the intention to humble ourself and to serve in secret it's actually humbling ourself and serving a secret the intention is good but he will reward us according to the deeds done in the body jesus made that he emphasized that a number of times in the scripture matthew 16 verse 27. matthew 16 verse 27 while he was talking to the disciples look at you the powerpoint i don't have it on the notes he said for the son of man will come in his glory then he will reward each according to his life plan no according to what he committed to do no he will reward each jesus is talking according to what you actually did with your words your time and your money what you did that's what i will reward you these are the words of jesus we get into the city we get into the salvation experience as a free gift our position and our place of in the glory of god our rewards are based on our responses which is called works it's what jesus called them let's look what jesus said again revelation 22 12 same jesus he's talking he says behold i'm coming quickly my reward is with me i will give to each one according to what they do the words they say the money they give the time they invest the humility they walked in according to what they do not what they plan to do what they do well look what it says let's read second corinthians 5 10 again for we must all appear before the judgment scene again the judgment seat i forgot to mention that point the judgment seat was a uh a term that was very familiar in the ancient world the judgment seat was a a platform a raised up platform where the judges would sit together to judge the athletic contest it was a raised platform several seats the judges sat there and the olympic games would go on or the athletic events and the judges would then be seen by everybody they would give the wreaths or in modern day the gold medal the silver and the bronze they would give the trophies to those who won so the judgment seat was not a place where criminals were sentenced to jail the judgment seat in the ancient world was the place where the athlete received the trophy the gold medal so to speak jesus has put in in his uh government of the kingdom he wants a day where he gets to give a trophy to you in front of everybody it's his plan he wants to show everybody how he feels about the way you lived in secret he wants everyone to see it because he cares so much about what you've invested now look what it says here in second corinthians 5 10 it says will all appear before that judgment seat the greek word is the bema seat that raised up platform where the judges gave the trophies out each one will receive the things they did not the things they planned but what they actually did in their body it's according to what they have done whether good or bad you say good or bad where does that bad come in well anything that you repent of is under the blood of jesus and it's washed away never to be brought up again but here's the problem that many believers be included we do things that god does not approve of but we rationalize it with our thinking and our fellowship we get a few people to agree with us we find a few bible verses to back up why what we did was okay and we don't repent of it it does not affect our salvation our salvation is clear it's solid it's sure it affects our reward so i'm in the meeting and i give a defensive statement an arrogant statement at the meeting the team meeting i walk out of the meeting i ask the brother i go hey was that okay what i said he goes oh yeah yeah that was okay i mean the lord that was fine so he agrees with me i agree with it i rationalize it i don't repent of that arrogant statement so the lord says okay if you have the confidence not to repent of it we will talk about it again on that day if you repent of it we'll never talk about it again this affects the way we talk to our wife our children this affects what we do and what we say in the most intimate relationships where we are most comfortable being carnal our anger our impatience the lord says if you will say to her that was wrong i'll delete it if you won't say it we'll talk about it again if you want to bring it with you bring it with you it's your call so when in doubt go to her look her in the eyes and say i'm sorry i said that get it deleted for sure again it won't affect your salvation your salvation is not based on that but it will affect your reward at the trophy you know at the trophy giving at the time when the medals were given so to speak they're not medals and they're not trophies let's look at page two just one more paragraph i just gotta i know we're out of time but i gotta bring the point of how i want you to respond here just take two to three minutes paragraph f i've already said it so i'll say it brief you shall love the lord your god matthew 22 37 this is the first of the great commandment this is what jesus is looking for at the judgment seat of christ this is the lifestyle he calls great this is the heart response he wants that you would love him with all of your heart this is the first emphasis of the holy spirit it's what god cares most about it's what is first on god's priority list the greatest grace you can walk in is the anointing to love god and to feel the love of god from him that is the greatest anointing that is the most precious possession you will ever have ever the anointing to receive the love of god and to return it beloved that's far more powerful than anything you'll do in ministry paragraph g the success and power of our life is found in walking in this anointing this is the gold of the kingdom jesus said buy gold for me this is the gold that you would walk in the anointing to love god with all your heart so what i'm calling us to here in the ministry time i just have the worship team coming up now we need to readjust the primary dream of our heart we readjust the dream of our heart the dream of our heart is to have a powerful ministry i mean it's okay to have that dream but it's second the primary dream of your heart is the anointing to walk in the grace of god to love god to fulfill the first commandment to the fullest degree that god will empower you how far will he let me go when we have this radical paradigm shift we change the way we picture our future we don't picture our future you know with great honor and power in the most powerful the most money the most honor the most is we picture our future i mean in this age we picture our future operating and the anointing to love god that's the thing we're going after more than anything else and when we intentionally choose that as the primary dream of our heart it affects the way we spend time and money and our words everything is affected when that primary dream is the anointing to walk out the first commandment to love god that's how we picture our future in the days to come so i want you to stand if you would i'm going to invite different ones of you to come up and here's what you're saying you're saying you know i i i want to walk in the first commandment that's in the top 10 in my list that's one of my top 10 priorities it's not number one but i want to shift it to make that number one i want my family my ministry my money my health i want all those to go down a notch your family should obviously be above your ministry but i want those second i want to make number one within an intentional way to picture my life as being anointed in the first commandment i'm going after that that's the primary question i will be preoccupied with all the days of my life that's what i want to do i want to shift today and make a difference some of you say well you know i wish you'd have told me this 30 years ago but you know what now it's better now than never maybe it's late for some of you but it's better to make this choice now you may have some years maybe some decades left who knows but it's better to make the choice now if you would like to make that response i want you to come forward if you want to i mean everyone needs to be renewed in this that's not what i'm asking i'm saying that you're saying i am wanting to make a radical shift in what is number one it's this anointing i'm going for it i want you to come and stand before the lord if you would like to do that i tell you you want to do this in this hour this is when the exchange rate is high the exchange rate is high in this age if you obey now you get tremendous response from heaven the exchange rate is really high right now while you're alive in the flesh [Music] you're saying to the lord lord this is how i want to respond i want this to be the dream of my heart my number one dream you

Channel: International House of Prayer

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Length: 58min 11sec (3491 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 31 2020