ANNOUNCER: This is Grace in Focus, the podcast and radio broadcast ministry of the Grace Evangelical Society. Thank you for joining us. Our question of today: will some believers really be ashamed at the Judgment Seat of Christ? Are not sorrow, tears and shame supposed to be done away with? Well listen straight ahead for some clarity on this as Bob Wilkin and Ken Yates have a discussion about this. Our website is faithalone.org. There you can read and research many of our hundreds of articles relating to the Free Grace message. And we want you to know about our free magazine, published six times per year. It is called Grace in Focus, a full-size, full-color magazine, suitable for your coffee table and great for reading. It is free, all except if you live outside of the 48 contiguous United States, you do have to pay the postage, otherwise absolutely free. We do want you to have it. Sign up for it today at faithalone.org. 

And now with today’s question and answer discussion here are Bob Wilkin and Ken Yates. 

KEN: This is Ken Yates and I’m here with the esteemed 

BOB: Bob Wilkin. I don’t know about the esteemed. 

KEN: Well the reason I did that was because I have a question here from Brett and he specifically mentioned you and your great scholarship. That’s what he says. I have very high regard for your scholarship. And here’s his question: However, there’s always the butt, right? Right. And here it is. In this article that you wrote, you speak about the fact that glorified believers, there will be some glorified believers at the Judgment Seat of Christ who are ashamed. And he goes, I just cannot see a glorified believer whether he is a leader in the church or not, being ashamed at the Judgment Seat of Christ. The reason why is because he’s glorified. So how can he be ashamed? How can that be?

BOB: Great question, Brett. And I have given this a lot more thought and my view strengthens. I remember and I think you may have, did you take Hebrews from Zane at Dallas Seminary? 

KEN: Yes, I did. 

BOB: You were probably in one of his last, 

KEN: I think I was in the very last one he did. 

BOB: Well, I remember when I took him, he kept talking about being Christ’s partners in the life to come. We’re going to rule with Him if we persevere, if we’re faithful. And I said, man, you see, I see an awful lot about rewards. I thought they’re only two major passages, 1 Corinthians 3:10-15, 1 Corinthians 9:24-27. His response was, no, rewards are on almost every single page of the New Testament. And I was struck by that. 

And I think this idea of shame at the Judgment Seat of Christ, it’s not on every page in the New Testament. But it’s found in a lot of places. Let’s just think of a few of them. Turn to 1 John 2:28. And you can find 1 John because it’s before 2 John. 

KEN: Oh, wow. I wonder who thought that up?

BOB: It was genius the way they’ve arranged this. But 1 John, 2:28, Hodges suggests this is the theme verse for the whole book. Could you read that, Ken? 

KEN: 1 John, 2:28, of course, John is speaking and he’s a believer and he says, “And now little children,” that’s significant. Who’s he talking to, talking to believers. “Abide in him that when he appears, we,” and we includes himself, “may have confidence and not be ashamed before Him at His coming.” 

BOB: Yeah, not be ashamed. This word ashamed means ashamed. That’s why it’s translated ashamed. There’s two options. And what’s interesting is, what’s the Greek word for “coming” here? 

KEN: Oh, well, you got, you got parousia. 

BOB: That’s it. That’s the word here. And do you know what happened to know the word for “confidence” or “boldness” here? 

KEN: Per-a. It’s very similar. Parresia or something. 

BOB: Yeah. Parresia. Well, that’s how I pronounce it. I don’t know the, I’m bad at pronunciation. But it’s parresia and parousia and there’s a play on words. We want to have parresia, boldness, at His coming. And the same thing occurs at the end of the main section of the letter in 4:17-19. But there’s an opposite option. 

KEN: We can either have boldness. That’s one option, 

BOB: Or shame. And so John is holding those out before us and saying, if we persevere, we’re going to have the boldness. But if we don’t, we’re going to have the shame. Now, the same thing is found in the parable of the minas in Luke 19:11-27, especially verses 16 through 26. The first servant hears, well done, good servant because you were faithful, level of authority over ten cities. The second servant who goes from one to five minas he hears you also be over five cities. 

KEN: You mean from ten to five, not one to five? 

BOB: No, one. 

KEN: Okay. Oh, I see what you’re saying. 

BOB: The first servant goes from one to ten. And the second servant could have had ten, but he goes from one to five. And so the second servant doesn’t hear well done, good servant. He doesn’t get the commendation, but he does get rulership over five cities. But the third servant is not called a good servant, like the first guy, well done, good servant. He’s called a bad or an evil or a wicked servant, depending on your translation. And so he judges him and rebukes him. Well, he’s going to have shame because he was unfaithful and he has his mina taken away and given to the one who has ten and those minas represent cities. So now the guy with ten cities gets a bonus city and the guy with one potential city gets no cities. So he doesn’t get to rule. 

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BOB: And this ties in with Paul in 2 Timothy chapter two verse 12, “If we endure, we’ll reign with Him. If we deny Him, He will deny us.” That is, if we fail to endure so that the end of our life, we’re denying Christ, then He’s going to deny us the privilege of ruling with Christ. 

KEN: And what will that experience be like, you know, if you’re denied this reward or this approval by the Lord as the question by Brett brings out, you’re a glorified believer, what will that denial do to you? 

BOB: Well, it’s going to be something which is painful. In fact, Matthew 24:24-25 is the Olivet Discourse, all about the Second Coming of Christ, looking forward to the Rapture, then the judgment of the sheep and the goats, which is the end of Matthew 25. And in 24:45-51 is the parable of the just and the unjust servant, which I believe is one servant who starts out doing well. He’s feeding his fellow servants. He probably illustrates a pastor or a leader in local church like an elder. And then he says, my Lord delays his coming. And he begins to beat his fellow servants according to the Lord Jesus and he begins to drink with the drunkards. And the Lord comes at a time when he doesn’t expect him and he cuts him in two. 

Well, nobody believes that at the Judgment Seat of Christ or the Great White Throne Judgment, anybody’s going to be literally cut in two. 

KEN: His words will cut in two.

BOB: His words because His tongue is like a sword, like a two-edged sword. This is going to be a verbal tongue lashing. And it’s going to hurt. And so that’s what the shame is going to be like, it’s going to be like getting cut in two, it’s going to be painful. But the question that Brett has is, how can a glorified saint experience shame? Part of the problem is Brett is thinking that glorified saint equals a person incapable of any negative emotions. 

I believe that at the Judgment Seat of Christ, it’s clear that unfaithful believers are going to experience negative emotions. There’s going to be pain at the Bema for the unfaithful servant. And that’s clear in many passages, in Matthew 25:1-13, the parable of the ten virgins, all ten represent believers. 

KEN: All ten go to sleep. 

BOB: But only five have sufficient reserves of oil to keep their lamps burning. Only five persevere. Now, I think this looks at tribulation saints because the midnight cry is probably the abomination of desolation. 

KEN: In the middle of the Tribulation. 

BOB: In the middle of the Tribulation. But the point is the same, five of them fail to persevere to the end of the Tribulation. And so as a result, they’re not going to be allowed to do the torch dance which symbolizes, I think, ruling with Christ in the life to come. 

KEN: Definitely a privilege, a reward. 

BOB: And they’re going to have shame. And so Brett needs to recognize that at the Judgment Seat of Christ, there will be shame, there will be pain. However, it’s going to be short lived. I talked to Zane Hodges about this on multiple occasions. And he said, we in this life, when we have grief, it can last hours or days or months or years, right? If we lose a loved one, you lost your daughter, what three years ago now? That grief, you’re still not completely over, right? But it got better over time. When she passed, although you’re joyful that she’s with the Lord, there’s great grief you have to experience. But you get over it to some degree and you will get over it fully when you’re glorified, right? 

Well, Hodges argued that a glorified saint would get over this grief in a matter of minutes. It’s not going to last for the Millennium. You know, some people interpret Revelation 21:4, he’s going to wipe away every tear, to refer to saints who are glorified who have shame during the whole Millennium. 

KEN: Because of the Judgment Seat of Christ, right? 

BOB: No, that’s the tears of all the people in natural bodies. All people, there’s going to be no more tears forever. That’s the point of that because forever, there’s going to be no more death, no more pain, no more suffering. In my view, we in glorified bodies are going to have negative emotions. We’re told that the tree of life will be for the healing for the nations. Might it be that people in non glorified bodies would experience some injuries that wouldn’t cause pain, but certainly they would be annoyed by the blood or annoyed by the injury or whatever. And so it seems to me we in glorified bodies might experience some things that we call on the negative side. In fact, Hodges suggested if we had only positive emotions, the positive wouldn’t be as great as they could be. 

KEN: I think the bottom line for this whole discussion is we know Scriptures tell us that it will be shame at the Judgment Seat of Christ for some believers. What that will mean in glorified bodies, we can’t know exactly, but we know it will occur. 

BOB: And so there’s no question there will be negative consequences of the Judgment Seat of Christ. And by the way, some of this carries over because if we don’t rule, we’re never going to rule. If we don’t get the hidden manna and we’ll never get the hidden manna, if we don’t get the special white garments, we’re never going to get the special white garments. If we don’t get the white stone, we’re never going to get the white stone with the special name on it, etc. 

And so those things will carry over, but keep this in mind, Brett, every glorified saint is going to be joyful forever. They’re going to have abundant life forever, but their life won’t be as abundant as it could have been if they miss out on ruling with Christ. Or let’s say I rule over five cities instead of ten. And so in terms of negative things, I might have regrets. I mean, sure, David’s going to regret forever having killed Uriah, wouldn’t you think? 

KEN: And his adultery with Bathsheba, sure.

BOB: Wouldn’t you think there’d be regret there? But as a glorified saint, it’s not going to bum him out. Well, I hope that makes sense. And remember, keep grace in focus.

ANNOUNCER: Be sure to check out our daily blogs at faithalone.org. They are short and full of great teaching, just like what you’ve heard today. Find them at faithalone.org/resources/blog. We would love to hear from you. Maybe you’ve got a question, comment, or some feedback. If you do, please don’t hesitate to send us a message. Here’s our email address. It’s radio@faithalone.org. That’s radio@faithalone.org.

Please join us again for our next episode: what does it mean that we are created in the image of God? And until then, let’s keep grace in focus.