What do we know about the coming judgments? When will we stand before the judgment seat of Christ? How do our choices in life affect us with regard to the coming judgments?
2 Corinthians 5:10…For we must all be made manifest before the judgment seat of the Christ, that each one may get his award for the things done through the body, according to the things he has practiced, whether it is good or vile.
There have been many time periods of judgment since the beginning of God’s creation. God has judged the fallen angels and reserved them for destruction at the time of the great judgment. Jude 1:6
He is also judged kingdoms through the times and ages, allowing kingdoms to rule over the earth and then judging them by bringing about their end. God has made them drink from the cup of his anger. Read Jeremiah 25:15-38
The Appointed Time
What is the appointed time and how will it affect us?
1 Peter 4:17-18… For it is the appointed time for the judgment to start with the house of God. Now if it starts first with us, what will the end be of those who are not obedient to the good news of God? And if the righteous [man] is being saved with difficulty, where will the ungodly [man] and the sinner make a showing?
The appointed time is a time of judgment that starts first with the house of God. That judgment leads to the greater judgment which all things will be discovered.
The apostasy is the next thing that gets judged and helps us identify that we are living in the appointed time.
2 Thessalonians 2:1-8… However, brothers, respecting the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we request of YOU not to be quickly shaken from YOUR reason nor to be excited either through an inspired expression or through a verbal message or through a letter as though from us to the effect that the day of Jehovah is here. Let no one seduce YOU in any manner, because it will not come unless the apostasy comes first and the man of lawlessness gets revealed, the son of destruction. He is set in opposition and lifts himself up over everyone who is called “god” or an object of reverence, so that he sits down in the temple of God, publicly showing himself to be a god. Do YOU not remember that, while I was yet with YOU, I used to tell YOU these things? And so now YOU know the thing that acts as a restraint, with a view to his being revealed in his own due time. True, the mystery of this lawlessness is already at work; but only till he who is right now acting as a restraint gets to be out of the way. Then, indeed, the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will do away with by the spirit of his mouth and bring to nothing by the manifestation of his presence.
Now that we have arrived at what is called the Hour of Judgment. What choices do we have to make?
Revelation 14:6-13… And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, and he had everlasting good news to declare as glad tidings to those who dwell on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people, saying in a loud voice: “FEAR God and give him glory, because the hour of the judgment by him has arrived, and so worship the One who made the heaven and the earth and sea and fountains of waters.” And another, a second angel, followed, saying: “She has fallen! Babylon the Great has fallen, she who made all the nations drink of the wine of the anger of her fornication!” And another angel, a third, followed them, saying in a loud voice: “If anyone worships the wild beast and its image, and receives a mark on his forehead or upon his hand, he will also drink of the wine of the anger of God that is poured out undiluted into the cup of his wrath, and he shall be tormented with fire and sulphur in the sight of the holy angels and in the sight of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever, and day and night they have no rest, those who worship the wild beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name. Here is where it means endurance for the holy ones, those who observe the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.” And I heard a voice out of heaven say: “Write: Happy are the dead who die in union with [the] Lord from this time onward. Yes, says the spirit, let them rest from their labors, for the things they did go right with them.”
False religion has now been identified and has fallen. We are next warned by the angel of God not to receive the mark of the wild beast. Notice that the holy ones have to endure this time. This would be a great tribulation for us to have to endure the wrath of God as it has become manifest.
Revelation 6:16-17… And I saw when he opened the sixth seal, and a great earthquake occurred; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the entire moon became as blood, and the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as when a fig tree shaken by a high wind casts its unripe figs. And the heaven departed as a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and [every] island were removed from their places. And the kings of the earth and the top-ranking ones and the military commanders and the rich and the strong ones and every slave and [every] free person hid themselves in the caves and in the rock-masses of the mountains. And they keep saying to the mountains and to the rock-masses: “Fall over us and hide us from the face of the One seated on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb, because the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”
Notice that the sixth seal is a celestial phenomenon that happens so mankind can identify that the wrath of God has come against them.
Matthew 24:29-31… “Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then the sign of the Son of man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will beat themselves in lamentation, and they will see the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send forth his angels with a great trumpet sound, and they will gather his chosen ones together from the four winds, from one extremity of the heavens to their other extremity.
The gathering of the chosen ones is a time of rejoicing for them. That will mean a day of torment for the ungodly and unrighteous and is called the day of Jehovah.
2 Peter 3:7-13… Yet Jehovah’s day will come as a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a hissing noise, but the elements being intensely hot will be dissolved, and earth and the works in it will be discovered. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of persons ought YOU to be in holy acts of conduct and deeds of godly devotion, awaiting and keeping close in mind the presence of the day of Jehovah, through which [the] heavens being on fire will be dissolved and [the] elements being intensely hot will melt! But there are new heavens and a new earth that we are awaiting according to his promise, and in these righteousness is to dwell.
We need to be concerned with how God thinks and feels about all subject matters. Because the choices that we make today will determine what form of judgment we will receive from God. So, choose wisely you people of God.
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