Facing the Judge!

This evening I want to talk about something that you have more experience with than I do. Perhaps you should be doing the preaching because you probably know more than I do. Each of you, by virtue of the fact that you are here, have had some experience of a bloke like this! [P] You know what it is like to stand before a judge. He holds your life in his hands. Was it an intimidating experience? Scary? What does a judge do? – he considers the facts set before him, makes a decision regarding right and wrong. He declares a verdict: guilty/innocent. Then he sets a sentence – the recompense for the crime. He is the arbiter of what and who is right and wrong. The role of a judge is to be just. The judges we have are not perfect, they make mistakes; maybe not deliberately perverting justice, they may not have all the facts or have perfect wisdom. But there is a judge who is just and who knows all the facts. Furthermore, we will all have to face Him! It may be of some comfort to you, that this judge, who you stood before, will himself be judged by the Judge, by God Himself! I will you, you will, everyone will. The Bible says: [P] [Hebrews 9:27 And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment.] There is a saying: “The only things certain in this life are death and taxes” – that may be the case but something is as certain as death and follows death: judgement! You can as much avoid judgement as you can avoid death. There is a Judge of all the earth and He will do right, be just. Furthermore, He has all the facts: [Hebrews 4:13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.] There is no fooling Him and we have to give account to Him! We all die, after this comes judgement. Judgement is certain! [P] We must give account! The Bible tells us that judgement is certain, we cannot avoid it. It is inevitable! The Bible says: [2 Corinthians 5:10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.] We will not only be judged for the bad and punished, but also for the good, and be rewarded. Do you see the imperative?: we “must appear”, we “must give account”. Judgement is inevitable. And it is “all” “each of us” – the judgement is universal. [P] You cannot escape it. Some avoid the judge here on earth; but ultimately, we will all face the ultimate judge. And did you notice who does the judging? It is “the judgement seat of Christ” – Jesus will judge: [Acts 17:31 For he has set a day when He will judge the world with justice by the man He has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.] That Man is Jesus! Jesus judges “the world” – it is universal. Everyone has to face judgement. Jesus died, He rose again, ascended back to heaven where He had come from. He will return to earth, He is coming, it tells us in: [Matthew 16:27 “For the Son of Man (that is Jesus) is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and will then repay every man according to his deeds.] Every man will be repaid – recompensed according to what they have done. It is on our deeds that we will be judged. [Romans 2:16 This will take place on the day when God judges people’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares.] God will judge us through Jesus; nothing will be hidden, even our secret thoughts and motives will be laid bare. [Hebrews 4:13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.] There is no escape: [Romans 14:10 For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat.] It is all of us! [Romans 14:12 So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God.] Each and every one of us! [Revelation 20:11–15 Then I saw a great white throne (a pure throne of judgement) and Him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from His presence, (they could not bear to face the Judge!) and there was no place for them (they wanted to flee the Judge but they couldn’t). And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, (it doesn’t matter if you are great or insignificant, even if you are dead – you don’t get out of facing the judge) and books were opened. (the books are the records of what you have done. When you went to trial, it may have been based on hear-say, a witness account which can be twisted by the prosecution or defence – but this is based on written records of what actually took place) Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. (Yep, all your deeds are recorded in written records! – unalterable!) The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. (consistently the Bible says that each and every one of us will be judged according to what we have done) Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. (judgement comes after death, but after judgement comes a second death) Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.] You will notice, that although we are judged according to what was written in the books of what we had done; the bottom line, on which the sentence depends; was not what was written in those books of deeds, but whether their name was written in another book. Not the book of deeds but the book of life! The question is: how do you get your name into that book?! The thing about Jesus being judge, God judging; is that He is absolutely righteous, completely just, totally impartial. [P] Abraham said this regarding God: [Genesis 18:25 Far be it from you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. (that would not be right, just, fair!) Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?”] This is what Moses wrote about God: [Deuteronomy 32:4 He is the Rock, His works are perfect, and all His ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is He.] He is utterly impartial, [Deuteronomy 10:17 For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes.] You cannot bribe Him, influence, persuade Him. [Romans 2:11 For there is no partiality with God.] Isn’t that a wonderful thing? That we have One who will judge utterly fairly impartially? Don’t we all want justice? Or do we?! You may not be very well disposed to judges; it may have been a bad experience for you. Well, is a judge a good thing or a bad thing? It is a funny thing, but we all want justice. It is deep-seated within us. For instance: if your guards turn mean on you, lock you down and never let you out of your cells, deny you all meals, start beating you – you would soon be crying out for justice! It is deep within us and starts real early – you have a couple of toddlers, give one some lollies and not the other – he will soon be crying, “It’s not fair!” Yes, we all want justice …. well, we want justice for those that wrong us and for when we are wronged. BUT ……, we are not so keen when, we are the one who has done the wrong. We long for justice, but we cannot stand it! [P] It is good to be vindicated, but it ain’t so much fun to be held to account; because we all know that we have failed, we have all done wrong. Deep down we know it! And we cannot bear to be held responsible! We do anything to being held accountable. That is the main reason why people try to avoid God, deny He exists. They can’t bear the fact that they will be held responsible. The old Anglican prayer book said: “the burden of our sins is intolerable!” We are unable to pay the recompense required for the wrong we have done. We cannot face an absolute just all-seeing Judge with a clear conscience I can’t! There is no one who can! We cannot bear to face up to the fact that fundamentally, at core, we are rotten through and through. What are we to do? We have to face the Judge: it is inevitable, it is certain, it is unavoidable, universal. It will be impartial, absolutely just! Am I prepared to meet the Judge?! Jesus gave some good advice for those in this situation: [Luke 12:58 As you are going with your adversary to the magistrate, try hard to be reconciled on the way, or your adversary may drag you off to the judge, and the judge turn you over to the officer, and the officer throw you into prison.] Your adversary is satan, his name means “accuser” – he is the prosecution, accusing you before God the Judge. The trouble is that he has a water-tight case against you – you are guilty! We are on the way to judgement; what is Jesus’ advice? Be reconciled on the way. Get it sorted before you come before the Judge and receive the inevitable verdict and sentence – not a life sentence but death-sentence – sentence of eternal torment. What did we read in Revelation: Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. There is a desperate imperative to get things sorted before we face the Judge! The funny thing is that the only people who have a problem with the judge, are those that are guilty. To the innocent He is a refuge, He will vindicate them. You are only fear the judge if you are guilty. But we all are guilty. That is our problem! If only there was a way to remove that which condemns us before the judge. What we need is not justice, we need mercy! [James 2:13 because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment.] Do you see that verse I have up there – I am going to read the verses either side of it: [Hebrews 9:26–28 Christ has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. (Hallelujah! That is what we need – to do away with sin, so that we are no longer guilty. And Jesus has done it! Praise His Name! How? By the sacrifice of Himself. He died on the cross to do away with sin! It goes on to say:) Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and He will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for Him.] There is a way to have our guilty removed, our sin done away with – Jesus has done it by bearing it in His body on the cross. Jesus will Judge but there is no fear in facing the Judge, because the Judge Himself, personally, has removed our sin. It no longer exists! Hallelujah! [Acts 10:42–43 He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that He (that is Jesus) is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead. All the prophets testify about Him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through His Name.”] Yes, Jesus has been appointed by God as Judge; however, if we believe in Him, in His sacrifice for our sins by His death on the cross; then we receive forgiveness of sins through His Name. When they are forgiven we can approach the Judge without fear but with confidence. We welcome Him, because He will vindicate us. Notice that we do not earn forgiveness of sins; but receive them – it is a gift, given freely to the one who believes. Are you prepared to face the ultimate Judge? Will it be a fearfully encounter or a joyful one? Are you trusting in Jesus, the forgiveness that is through His Name? If not, may I give you Jesus advice – get things sorted, be reconciled, before you are brought before the Judge!

Hebrews 9:27 NASB95

And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment,

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