Living Worship

I have been studying the book of Hebrews for the last several weeks and in my study of Chapter 10, I learned something that I wanted to share.  The focus in Chapter 10 is to point out that Jesus is the one and only sacrifice.  There is no longer a need for continual sacrifices to be made for the sins of the people by the priest because Jesus was the perfect sacrifice made for us all.  Everything in the Old Testament was pointing toward Jesus and what He came to do.

Later in the chapter, the writer talks about judgement.  The bible repeatedly refers to the judgement of the wicked.  That can give us a sense of justice when the wicked can get away with murder while the godly suffer for doing right.  God is the judge, and vengeance is His, so we can leave that in God's hands and know that He is right.

The Bible also talks about the judgement of the righteous.  The righteous are not condemned because of their sins, those sins are forgiven and eternal life based on faith in Christ is granted.  The Bible is clear that the righteous shall live by faith, so in what sense are the righteous judged?

For believers, our judgment is clear.  It determines reward of loss of reward, not guilt or innocence.  We are all guilty of sin, but when we believe in Him we are declared not guilty because of the work of Christ on the cross.  He paid our debt and took our punishment. 

However, Jesus will return and His reward will be with Him.  We will one day stand before His judgement seat, and He will judge us according to the deeds we have done-how we lived in faith.  We may receive rewards or we may lose them.

The rewards are described as crowns.  In Revelation 4:10 the elders fall down before the throne of our Creator and cast their crowns before His throne.  This is a beautiful picture of wholehearted worship.  We live our lives in faith, we persevere, and we love the Lord's appearing.  We can give the crowns we receive to our Lord to show Him our allegiance and our submission.  We acknowledge that all we have came from Him and belongs to Him, so we give it back to Him in worship. 

We aren't perservering in order to get; we're perservering in order to give.  Our faithfulness is an act of worship that culminates in giving everything to God.  That's what our everyday lives should be like-living worship of the living Word.

from The Key to Living by Faith by Kay Arthur and Pete DeLacy