SID: Hello. Sid Roth here. Welcome to my world where it’s naturally supernatural. What you do with Jesus determines where you spend eternity. Many know this. Most know this. But what you do with this little temporary thing called life now determines how you spend eternity. There is something that is a mystery that should not be a mystery. It’s called Academy Rewards, not Awards, Academy Rewards Night, or the believer’s judgment. Imperative, you understand it, and you are about to know the truth. I have to tell you, I’ve been looking so forward to talking with John Bevere. Every believer understands that if they repent and believe in Jesus they’re going to go to Heaven.
JOHN: Correct.
SID: But the most misunderstood thing is this thing called the believer’s judgment. Explain that.
JOHN: Well first of all, it’s an elementary doctrine, elementary teaching of Jesus Christ. Hebrews, Chapter 6 tells us that. Now what do you get in elementary school? How to read, write, add or subtract. Can you imagine building your college education not knowing how to read, write, add or subtract?
SID: It would be difficult.
JOHN: It would be really difficult. Well we’re trying to build our Christian lives without an elementary teaching of Jesus Christ. It’s called the judgment seat of Christ and that is where Jesus will examine us as believers. Now we will not be judged for our sins because the blood of Jesus has eradicated sin. We’re going to be judged by how we lived this life as believers. Paul, writing to the Corinthian church said this, he said, “We make it our goal whether present or absent.” So we know he’s talking to believers because an unbeliever, when they’re absent from the body, they’re not present with the Lord. So he’s talking only to believers. He said, “We make it our goal whether present or absent, to be well pleasing unto him.” Because we are all going to stand before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may give an account of the things he’s done in the body, whether good or bad. This is Second Corinthians 5:9-10. So all of us believers, Jesus is going to stand before us and he’s going to examine our lives. Now when people hear judgment they get really scared, Sid, because what they think of is they think of condemnation. However, the Greek word for judgment, 90 percent of the time it appears in the New Testament, is the Greek word “krino”, which simply means a decision resulting from an investigation. So an investigation is going to be made and he’s going to make decisions over our life. Now they’re called eternal judgments, so let’s substitute decision for judgment. They’re going to be eternal decisions. So in other words, once he—
SID: Now wait, eternal decision means no point of reversal.
JOHN: There will be no alterations, no changes, no revising. They will stand forever. So and this is what’s really amazing. First Corinthians 4:5 tells us not only is he going to judge our works and our words, he’s going to judge our motives, the secret motives of our heart and our thoughts. He’s going to exam it all and that which we have built on, if it is eternal we’ll receive rewards. If we built our lives on the temporal, we will suffer the loss of getting rewards. And so what that tells me is this. What we do with the cross determines where we’re going to spend eternity, Heaven or Hell. Most Christians know that. However, the way we live as believers determines how we’re going to spend all eternity. That’s riveting.
SID: As a brand new Jewish believer in the Messiah, John, I had a dream that I think about often. It was a dream from God and in this dream it was, now don’t laugh, it was, I call the dream Academy Rewards, not Awards, Academy Rewards Night because that’s where I was. I was at Academy Rewards Night in Heaven and there’s a big crowded auditorium. And you know like they have at Academy Awards Night they have a big envelope and someone rips it open. And the winner is, I was so full of myself, John, as a brand new believer. I came into the charismatic movement. I was a disciple. What do you expect? And they made a big deal out of me because Jewish believers were not that many at the time I became a believer. Now I was seated there and there was a very old woman. I happened to notice her, John. Little old woman, tiny, seated in the front row. And I am sure my name is coming out on that thing.
Man: You’re not going to believe this. Elizabeth!
SID: And guess who won? That little old lady. How could she win?
[applause]
SID: And then I heard a voice and it was the voice of God. And this is what God said to me: That could have been you.”
JOHN: I believe that.
SID: That’s a sobering thing and my life is driven by eternity because of that.
JOHN: It has. It has to be. I was just down in Brazil and I was speaking to 14,000 pastors and leaders in this auditorium. And the passion of these people was mind blowing. Well the next day I’m out at lunch with the senior leaders of this organization and the first riveting thing that I heard was that there was over 300,000 people in their churches.
Male Pastor: We have over 300,000 people in our churches.
JOHN: Wow that’s amazing.
Male Pastor: Yes, we started over 16 years ago with just one family.
JOHN: Wait a minute. Sixteen years and you have over 300,000 people in your churches?
Female Pastor: Yes, that’s right.
JOHN: How do you build churches, over 300,000 in them, in 16 years?
Male Pastor: We teach our believers about eternal rewards and eternal judgment. John, I’ve been to America. You Americans do not teach on this. Because of this, you in America only have a 70 to 80-year perspective. We have an eternal perspective.
JOHN: Sid, when you have an eternal perspective, when you realize how you’re living your life now determines the quality of life you’re going to have forever and ever in Heaven, you’re going to endure things you wouldn’t necessarily endure. You’re going to see things differently. Your vision is going to be different. You’re going to pursue things you wouldn’t necessarily pursue because James writes in his book, he says, “This life is a vapor.” James 4:14. If James was alive I do not believe he would have written it that way. I believe he would have said, if he was alive today, he would have written, “This life is zero.” What we do in this zero time determines how we’re going to spend eternity.
SID: How are you going to spend eternity? You will be amazed what rewards are based on. It’s different than what you think. We’ll talk about that when we come back.
Tags: It's Supernatural, Sid Roth
Tags: It's Supernatural, Sid Roth