Before the throne of God
Part 11 of the series
“His Stairway to Heaven”
Previous posts are
published on this blog.
God’s
Word will expose your lifestyle, for “Nothing in all creation can hide from
him. Everything is naked and exposed
before his eyes. This is the God to whom
we must explain all that we have done.”69 God revealed to the apostle John what it
will be like when you face your Judgment Day as a believer:
And I saw a great white throne,
and I saw the one who was sitting on it.
The earth and sky fled from his presence, but they found no place to
hide. I saw the dead, both great and
small, standing before God’s throne. And
the books were opened, including the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to the
things written in the books, according to what they had done. The sea gave up the dead in it, and death and
the grave gave up the dead in them. They
were all judged according to their deeds.
And death and the grave were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death—the lake of fire. And anyone whose name was not found recorded
in the Book of Life was thrown into the lake of fire.70
When you—as a believer whose name is recorded in the Book
of Life—are before the Great White Throne to be judged for your actions in the
flesh,71 what reward will you receive? How far did you reach with the steps of His
Stairway to Heaven, your climb of sanctification? What heavenly prize—a crown of eternal
victory—will be rewarded to you that you will cast before Him?72 For He is “the Alpha and the Omega, the First
and the Last, He who lives and was dead, and behold, is alive forevermore.”73
The apostle Paul whose personal encounter with the risen Lord Jesus transformed
his life from a persecutor of Christians to a preacher for Christ74
relates temperance, self-control and discipline to the training of an athlete
focused on obedience to Christ:
Remember that in a race
everyone runs, but only one person gets the prize. You also must run in such a way that you will
win. All athletes practice strict
self-control. They do it to win a prize
that will fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. So I run straight to the goal with
purpose in every step. I am not like a
boxer who misses his punches. I
discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to
others I myself might be disqualified.75
For what prize are you striving? Will it be a heavenly crown of righteousness,
to which apostle Paul refers in his farewell?
As for me, my life has already
been poured out as an offering to God.
The time of my death is near. I
have fought a good fight, I have finished the race, and I have remained
faithful. And now the prize awaits me—the crown of righteousness that the
Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on that great day of his return. And the prize is not just for me but for all
who eagerly look forward to his glorious return.76
a
Praise
to Our Father for the words He has given me. ~Jeff Cambridge
Written
June 10, 2004
Copyright
© 2004, 2005, 2016 by Jeff Cambridge, Stellar Rhema Ministry
Footnotes
All
Scripture quotations unless otherwise noted are from The Holy Bible, New
King James Version, copyright © 1979, 1980, 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc.,
Publishers.
Verses
marked NLT are Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New Living
Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by
permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.
Verses
marked NIV are Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International
Bible Society. Used by permission of
International Bible Society. “NIV” and
“New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States
Patent and Trademark office by International Bible Society.
Stairway to Heaven - 11
69.
Hebrews 4:13 NLT
70.
Revelation 20:11-15 NLT
71.
Romans 2:1-16
72.
Revelation 4:10
73.
Revelation 1:17-18
74.
Acts 8:1-3, 9:1-22
75.
1 Corinthians 9:24-27 NLT, italics added
76.
2 Timothy 4:6-8 NLT italics added
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