REWARD
The word “reward” carries different meaning. A favorite pet is lost or perhaps a child is missing and there is a reward offered. The dictionary defines it as something given either for good or bad, services of one kind or another. When it comes to the spiritual realm, most think of reward in terms of something good. The religious world has so long fought against the idea of salvation by works that the idea of reward is quickly rejected. Let us however turn to the scriptures and see its different uses.
Speaking about those who allowed their moral behavior to disappear, God states that they would in effect receive the recompense of their error (Romans 1:27). They would receive the payment for the choices that they had made. The context of Romans 1 is that women and men both changed the natural use and went into something foreign to the will of God for their lives. It is interesting to note, that God reveals that the women and the men CHOSE to change the natural use or that which was intended. If they chose to so change, they were not BORN that way.
The Scriptures point out that these individuals did not want to retain God in their knowledge. Is not such an effort, a choice? If one has red hair or black hair, such is not a choice from birth. Things that, then, we are not born with become a matter of choice. Those people of Romans 1 did not have the written revelation. Yet God held them accountable. They knew the choices they made and where those choices would lead. He closes the chapter by saying that they knew that people who lived this way are “…worthy of death.”(Romans 1:32). The spiritual end of people like that is the ultimate payment for sin in the life.
Several chapters later we are told that each of us must give account of ourselves to God (Romans 14:12). Likewise, the Scriptures show that we will stand before the judgment seat of Christ to receive the things done in our body (II Corinthians 5:10). Both Scriptures speak about payment or reward for what we have done with our life’s choices.
There is for all of us a day of accounting which is coming. We will be judged not by our families, wealth, or friends. We will stand before the Lord to be judged by His Words that are revealed in Scripture (John 12:48). We must search the Scriptures to see how it is that we are to conduct our daily lives. We may choose to remain neutral but such is not the case.
Even though we may think we are neutral, we are not. Each day’s choices are but a reflection of the belief system that directs our life. All individuals then choose what their life is becoming. Things such as drugs (alcohol included), pornography, gambling or other such things may be cited as things that have control over us. The common word used today is addiction. What is addiction but the arrival at and the fruit of choices which we have made. A person who cannot control their appetites for things of this world need not expect God to let them pass because “they cannot control it”. I do not argue that people have addictions, because they do. My concern is for all of us to know that addictions of whatever kind are a result of personal choices that we have made.
Our journey here should be spent in trying to please God (I John 3:22). One cannot please God without faith in God (Hebrews 11:6). What then is this kind of faith cited here in verse 6? It is a faith in which one must believe in the existence of God. The existence of God can be clearly seen in the abundance of evidence in the physical world in which we live (Romans 1:20). As beautiful as nature can sometimes be, it does not have the potential to tell us Who God is. That requires revelation from Him. That revelation informs us then we are to diligently seek Him. Why should we spend our life’s journey seeking or striving to find God. The answer in Hebrews 11:6 is because God is a “…rewarder of them that diligently seek Him”. Is this striving to be saved by my own power or is it working so that God will have to pay me for my labors for Him?
Such is the corrupt view by many who do not understand the will of God. God will reward those who diligently seek Him. Reward is payment. It is not man being able to save himself by his own devices. No amount of work could bring that about. We will be rewarded by God if our lives have been lives of obedience. Salvation then is not by works, but by obedience to God who commands us to work for Him.