Jeopardy: Losing Your Rewards, Part 3

Sharon Hardy Knotts: Greetings, friends and new listeners, and welcome to this program of the Archie Hardy Ministries. I'm Sharon Knotts. Thanking you for joining us today because we know faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. The message we bring you today is timely and trustworthy. Jeopardy: Losing Your Rewards. I hope you will hear with your heart and allow the Holy Spirit to reveal to you how you should respond to this inspired Word. Jeopardy: Losing Your Rewards.
Sharon Hardy Knotts: And so, Jesus gave us the parable of the talents. And I won't read that whole parable. You know it's in chapter 25 of Matthew. And he said how that he gave one one talent, another two, and another five. And he told them, now, this is your this is your assignment. I'm giving you your assignment on Earth to take care of. And when he came back to get an account for what they had done with their assignment, and he provided them what they needed to carry the assignment out successfully, we know one had increased his, the other had increased his, but the one had not only not increased his, he didn't even utilize it at all. And Jesus said, why haven't you used what I gave you to use? He turned to the ones that had been faithful. And what did he say? He said, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant. You've been faithful over a few things. Now, I will make you over ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of the Lord." Now, we're already in Heaven. Do you understand that? This is not a whether we're going to Heaven or not. We're in, we're in Heaven. We're on the other side of the Pearly Gates. But are we going to enter into the joy of the Lord? Now, I'm not talking about sadness like here on Earth. He's going to wipe our tears away. I'm talking about the joy of getting those rewards. You think those people that stand up on those stands at the Olympic games with those golds, and they medals, and they got joy and they're crying and they're laughing and they're singing. That's that's nothing compared to the joy that we're going to receive when we hear the Lord say, "Well done." And he's not going to stand up there with a sea of millions of people and say, "Oh, you guys out there, well done!" No. Brother Johnny's going to come up, and he's going to say, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." And Sister Suzy's going to come up, and he's going to say, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." And I don't know how long it's going to take him, but you know, I don't really care because I won't have anything better to do. How many say amen? And he's going to say to each one of us, "Well done. Well done. Enter into the joy. Enter into the joy!"
Sharon Hardy Knotts: Now I want to share with something with you that I recently came across. And, um, I heard this testimony, and it was being given. And I don't know if the if the original person, I don't know if he's still alive or not because he had this vision 20 years ago in the early '80s. There was a shepherd, um, well, he was a shepherd, he was a pastor. His name was Don Shepherd. And he pastored a church in California, and he became very ill and he was hospitalized. He had he had double pneumonia in his lungs, and he was really going down. And he really didn't know if he was going to survive or not. I mean, he was at death's door. So, while he was in the hospital, he had I guess it was a vision. He later said that he never was really sure whether he went out of his body or not, kind of like Paul said. I whether I was in the body or out of the body, I don't know, but I went to Heaven to the Third Heaven. This man, this pastor Don Shepherd, he said that he felt himself leaving his body. And when he left his body, he became aware of the fact that he was in a very long tunnel. And it was a long line of people as far as he could see. And he also became aware of the fact that there was an angel with him. And somehow he he understood that this particular angel had been an angel that was assigned to him while he was on Earth. And so, at first he was kind of complaining because he was getting tired of standing in this long, long, long line of people. But eventually, he was getting closer to the end of the tunnel, and he saw this beautiful, bright light at the end of the tunnel. And when he came out of the tunnel, it opened up, and it opened up into like a circular chamber. It was this huge chamber, but it was it was in in the shape of a circle. And there were tiers and tiers and tiers and rows and rows of people as far as he could see up to where he could see no more, just one like like a choir would stand on risers like this, only going way up as far as he could see around this whole circular chamber of all of these people. Just countless numbers of people. And all of them had in their hands books. Some only had one book. Some had a few books. Some had a lot of books. And all these people are standing in this these tiers in these circles with all of these books in their hands. Then suddenly in the center of the chamber, up came this golden throne. And Jesus Christ was sitting on the throne. This beautiful, glorious throne. And then the back of the throne opened up, and fire came out of it! And balls of fire began to shoot out of the back of the throne over the heads of the people, just as far as he could see. Fireballs were shooting up in the air. And as they shot up in the air, they would begin to fall down, and they would fall on the books that the people had in their hands. And as they fell on the books, some of them, when the fire hit them, it turned into ashes. There they were standing there with a heap of ashes. And others, when the fire hit it, it turned into all kinds of beautiful gemstones. Not like these colored glass things, the real thing. Beautiful gemstones. And some people were wailing and lamenting, and some were crying because they looked, and all they had were ashes. And others were laughing with joy! They were singing and laughing and happy because they had all these beautiful gemstones. And he looked and he saw in the line coming in, he saw who at that time, and I don't know the name. I mean, I could speculate, but that would all be all it would be would be speculation. So, you speculate if you want. The name was not told. Remember this is the early '80s. He saw a very well-known television evangelist who at that time was winning thousands and thousands of souls to Christ. And here he stood, and he had all these books. And next to him stood this little old woman. She had one book in her hand. And when the fire hit that tele-evangelist's books, just like that, they were consumed into ashes. And he heard the Lord say to him, "Enter thou into thy rest." Then he looked, and the fireball hit the little woman, her books, and immediately it turned into a pile of precious, beautiful gemstones. And he heard the Lord say to her, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant. You have been faithful in the least. Now, enter thou in to the joys of the Lord." And so this man who was having this dream, about that time, he got curious to see what was happening to his own books. And when he looked down, he went to look down to see what was happening with his books, immediately he was whisked away before he saw. And he was whisked away by the Holy Spirit. And when he was he came all of the sudden, he found himself in another place, in another line. And this time, he was closer to the front of the line. And when he got up close, again, he saw that same tele-evangelist, and he saw that same woman, and they had books in their hands again. But this time, the Lord stepped out, and he was behind a beautiful golden altar. And he stepped out from the altar, and he had in his hand a golden scepter. And when he would the people would walk up to him, he would take that scepter, and he would touch their books with his scepter. When that tele-evangelist came up, Jesus took the scepter, touched his books, the scepter spit out fire, and the books turned into ashes. He heard that man wailing, "All of it has been in vain. It's all been in vain." Next was the little woman's turn. And Jesus took the scepter and touched her book. And this time, when the fire hit her book, instead of turning into precious gems, it turned into liquid gold. And it began to pour out over the altar. The liquid gold began to just run down the altar. And Jesus knelt down, and he began to scoop up the liquid gold. And he began to scoop it up, and he began to mold it. And he with his own hands, he was molding that liquid gold. And he molded it in the shape of a beautiful golden crown. And then he reached over and got that original pile of gemstones she got the first time. And he began to pick up the stones and place them in the crown. And he handmade her this beautiful crown. And when he had finished the beautiful crown, he picked it up and he put it on her head. And he said, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Enter into the joys of the Lord." And again, this man who was having this vision, he quick looked again to see what would happen to his books. And he heard Jesus say, "Wait!" And the next thing he knew, he's back in that hospital room. He was back in that bed. He was back in his body. But the angel was there, and the angel said, "Now you, you get ready for that day." That man recovered. He got well. He tried in vain to get in touch with this minister that he saw in his dream. He tried to get in touch with him, he was never able to make contact. And a few years later, that same minister fell into a serious moral indiscretion that ruined his ministry. So, I told you that because when I heard this, it struck me. And I envisioned Jesus down there taking that gold and making that little woman's crown. And when I began to realize, and it began to hit me hard personally, what it's going to be like, I thought to myself, I want to make Heaven. Yes. I want to enter into the rest. Yes. I want God to wipe away my tears. Yes. But, oh, I want to hear Jesus say, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." And I'm going to read one last scripture, and then I'm going to stop for tonight, and I'll save the rest for next time. Let's turn to First Peter, the first uh, Second Peter, the first chapter. This is why we're told in the Word of God, "Examine yourselves." You examine yourselves now. Get ready for that day. Prove yourselves, see if you be in the faith, and see if Jesus Christ is truly in you. All right, we're in First Peter. I keep saying First Peter, I mean Second Peter, and the first chapter. This may must have been one of the bookmarks that Noah took. Okay, here it is. Now, I'm going to skip all the way down to verse 10. Actually, not too long ago, about two weeks ago, Brother Hardy preached on the first few verses. I think he'll preach it again Sunday, but I want to skip to verse 10. "Wherefore the rather," and I would like to take the wherefore and refer to everything I've taught from out of First Corinthians, the third chapter, about the fire trying our works. "Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and your election sure. For if you do these things, you shall never fall." And verse 11, "For so an entrance, an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ." Every time that you make a sacrifice, every time that you crucify the flesh, and every time that you bite your tongue, and every time that you pray when you'd rather sleep, and every time that you come to church when you'd rather rest. And I could go on and on and on, but that's another night. But I want you to know that when you do that, that there is it's being written down. And if you think that uh, they got supercomputers on this Earth that can keep track, they got, you know, you go online, they say, "You want a cookie?" And they're following you around, and they know what you buy and where you've been. I mean, how many know what I mean by that? I don't know a lot, but I do know that much. How much more do you think that the Lord is keeping an accurate record? And if he cared about the screws and the sockets and the thread in the Temple, how much more does he care about what I'm made of and how I'm building on this foundation? That when I stand before him, and he reaches out that scepter of fire, that it'll turn into a bunch of beautiful and it'll look a lot better than this crown. I'm telling you. How many say amen? So, that is why we have to give diligence. And that's why we've got to be faithful in the most. Ah, somebody's listening. We've got to be faithful in the least. I tell you what, I'd rather have mine in Heaven. What about you? You know, no wonder Paul said, "Having food and clothing and raiment, be content." You know why? That's all the sinner has down here. Let them have their pretty houses and their nice cars and all that stuff. That's all they're ever going to have. But I want mine in Heaven. What about you? I want the eternal rewards. What about you? And I'm going to do everything I can to make my calling and my election sure. And next time I minister, I'm going to tell you the seven things, I put up 10. It might be 10 by then. Right now it's seven. The seven things that are going to be the criteria that God is going to try us on, not to be saved, but to see whether or not our works will be silver and gold and precious stones. How many want to know? All right. Next time. Let's everyone stand on our feet. Father, we just thank you for your word tonight. We thank you, Lord, that you're doing a work in us that we cannot possibly understand. And when we argue with ourselves in our head, and when our spirit rises up in our pride, when we get stubborn and we we get angry and we have this warfare going on, help us to visualize. Let us get an image in our mind of what it's going to be like when we stand before you. And the books are opened, and everything we've ever done, everything we've ever thought and said is going to be recorded and be revealed in that day. Lord, I know that we will strive with diligence like your word says. We will give more diligence to make our calling and our election sure. And if we've been saved for many years, all the more reason why we've got to be careful that we don't become complacent, that we don't do things just because we've been doing them so long and that's what we do. But we do it for the glory and the honor of Christ because we know, we know, Lord, that that day it will be joy unspeakable and full of glory. And the half has never yet been told. Because as much as we try, our eye has not seen and our ear has not heard. It's not even entered into our hearts, the things that you've prepared for them that love you. But, oh, what a day of rejoicing that's going to be. I thank you, Father, for these faithful saints of God. And I ask you, Lord, to keep your hand of blessing and protection upon them. And those, Lord, who were hungry and thirsty to come out to the House of the Lord tonight, and have an ear to hear and open their heart to the Holy Spirit, that you have deposited something in their heart that will they will munch on and meditate upon, that you will anoint it and you will bring it to their heart again and again and again, that it will give them strength and it will give them courage and it will give them joy, and it will cause their faith to be ignited. Lord, that we will serve you with all of our heart and all of our might. Now, keep us while we're away one from another. Protect us, deliver us. Let your healing touch be in every sick body. Let the hand of God be upon everyone here tonight. Let the peace of God and the blessings of the Lord rest upon these people in Jesus' name I pray. Amen. God bless you. We'll see you next time.
R.G. Hardy: Hallelujah! Oh, just thinking about it lifts my spirits. What about you? Amen. You may be seated.
Sharon Hardy Knotts: When you tell someone that your message is going to be the seven things that we're going to be judged on, you can't tell them five or six. You got to tell seven, so we got to move quickly. Amen. And as I said to you before, last week, that this I knew as I got into it, it would be a two-part message. And really, though, both parts can stand alone even though they dovetail together. However, very quickly, because I know some of you weren't here the last time, and if you want to get the whole message, it is available on tape. But just to get started, we will reread our main text in 1 Corinthians the third chapter, because it's from this text that the message will flow. And we're in 1 Corinthians 3, verse 9. "For we are laborers together with God. Ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building. According to the grace of God which is given unto me as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now, if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be made manifest. For the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire. And the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive what? A reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire." Very quickly, I'll just make the major points. When Paul said that the foundation is already laid that is Christ, and there can be no other foundation laid, it's in the Aorist tense, which means it was an action that was completed in the past, once and for all. The foundation is permanent. It will never change. However, when he said, "take heed how you build thereon," it's in the present tense, which means the building project is continual. It's going on from dispensation to dispensation, generation to generation. The building process upon the permanent foundation will continue unto the day of Jesus Christ. And then we find out there's individual responsibility. "Let every man," that's me, that's her, that's him, etcetera, individually, take heed how he build thereon. Because there's going to come a day, the day, because it has a definite article before day, it's speaking of a particular day. God knows that day, when that day is. There is a day that is set when there will be a judgment of the works that we have done in our body. And it will be somewhere between the Rapture of the Church and the Second Coming of Christ. During that period, while tribulation is being poured out on the Earth, the saints of God will be in Heaven. We'll be enjoying many things that we don't even know much about yet. We do know about the marriage supper of supper of the Lamb, and we know that part of those events will be this judgment seat that we're talking about tonight. So, we will stand before the Lord and we'll bring our works before him. And the fire is going to try them. Meaning the fire is going to be put to them, and if they remain and come out of the fire without disintegrating, they will have a reward. And we will not know until then. It will be manifest then. Were they wood, stubble and hay? The fire went [sound effect] and it was gone. Or was it silver, gold and precious stones? The fire hit it, and it just came out just as pure as before. I again, I'll reiterate the point, we are not talking about being saved or lost. We're not talking about going to Heaven or Hell. This is the judgment of the saints. It has nothing to do with sinners or backsliders. We're in Heaven, we're in Heaven. But now we're going to the decision will be made, do we get rewards or not. And whether that's important to you, that's something you'll have to decide for yourself. But it's important to me. I made up my mind, I'm going to Heaven. And if I'm going to go to Heaven, I want to get everything that God says I can have. I'm willing to forfeit a lot of stuff down here because it's temporary and at best, it's only good for one season or two. But everything in Heaven is eternal. So, I want the rewards that the Bible says I can have. But I got to take heed. And that's a very strong word. Anytime you see that in the New Testament, it's strong. It's it's it's an alarm. It's, "Be careful," because it's it's alluding to the fact there are many pitfalls, and there are many opportunities for you to slip up. That's why you've got to continually be on guard because we are going to stand before the judgment seat of Christ, and we're going to have our works tried. Now, very briefly, I will mention the vision that I brought out last week for the sake of those who weren't here. This vision was given to a pastor in the early '80s. He was a pastor in California. He he became very ill and was hospitalized. He had double pneumonia, and there was a point when he didn't think he would live. While he was in this condition, he had a vision. He later said he never was really sure whether he was in the body or out of the body, but he had this this vision. He saw himself going through a long dark tunnel, and it was a long line of people, and it was way, way far down. He actually said he was complaining because the long the line was so long. He was aware of the fact there was an angel with him, and he also was aware of the fact that this angel was the angel that had been assigned to him on Earth. And so, he saw this beautiful bright light at the end of the tunnel, and finally he made it to the front of the tunnel, and it opened up into this glorious, beautiful place, and it was like a circular chamber. And around the walls of this circular chamber, there were tiers of of people. And there was tiers and rows ascending up into Heaven as far as his eye could see. And all the people were standing there had books in their hands. Some had lots of books, big books, some only had a few, some only had one. He also became aware of just in front of him. He saw who was at that time, I don't know, they didn't give the name, so I won't give we just can speculate, it doesn't really matter, but he saw that who was at that time in the early '80s, a very prominent television evangelist, who at that time was winning thousands of souls to Christ. And this man was in was going into the line, and he had a whole pile of a bunch of big books. Next to him was this little unknown woman, and she just had one small book in her hand. While he's looking at all these things, all of a sudden in the center of the chamber, up out of the ground comes this glorious, beautiful golden throne. And sitting upon the throne was Jesus Christ. And then suddenly out of the back of the throne, the throne opened up, and fire began to shoot out of the throne. Huge balls of fire began to shoot way up in the air, and then they would fall down. And as they fell, they fell upon the books that all these people were holding in their hands. And as they fell upon the books, some of them immediately turned into a pile of ashes, and others immediately turned into a pile of beautiful, precious gemstones. And he saw people that were wailing and crying because all they had were ashes. He saw people that were rejoicing because they had these beautiful stones. And he looked at the tele-evangelist, and when the fire hit his books, they just disintegrated into a pile of ashes. And he began to lament, "All was in vain, all this was in vain." Then he saw the fire hit the little woman's book, and when it did, it turned into a pile of precious stones. So at that time, he thought, "Woo!" And he went to look to see what happened to his books, but he was whisked away before he got to see. And the Holy Spirit took him away, and he found himself in another line, a little shorter this time. And as he got up to the close to the front, he saw the same tele-evangelist there with the with books, and he saw the same little woman there with books. This time, Jesus was standing behind a golden throne. I excuse me, a golden altar. The first one was a throne. This time he's behind an altar, and he had a golden scepter in his hand. And as people would come up, one at a time, individually, Jesus would take the scepter, and he would reach out and touch their book, and fire would shoot out of the scepter. And so this time he looked, and the tele-evangelist came up. Jesus took the scepter and touched his books, and again, they disintegrated into a heap of ashes. And he was lamenting. But Jesus looked at him and said, "Enter thou into the rest of the Lord." Then he turned to the little woman as she came up, and Jesus took the golden scepter and touched her book. And when it he did, the fire shot out. But this time instead of turning into gold uh to the gemstones, it turned into liquid gold. And it began to pour over the altar. It just began to pour over. And Jesus began to kneel down and scooped up the liquid gold. He was scooping it up with his hands. And as he scooped it up, he was molding it and shaping it and making it till he had made this beautiful golden crown. And then he reached over to the pile of gemstones that she had gotten in the first test, and he began to pick them up and one by one, he began to place them in that beautiful crown. And then he took the crown, and he set it on her head. And he said, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant. You have been faithful in the least. Now, you will be ruler over much. Enter into the joy of the Lord prepared for you." Again, the minister that was having this vision quickly looked to see what was happening to his books, and he heard Jesus say, "Wait!" And like that, he was whisked away again. And this time, he found himself back in the hospital, back in that bed, back in his body. But the angel was there, and the angel said to him, "Now you get ready for that day." Now, this is a vision, but it's based obviously on a revelation to this person, or you might if we don't want to say revelation, illumination, but it gives us an idea of what we're talking about that I've just mentioned in these scriptures.
Sharon Hardy Knotts: Amen. What an eye-opening, heart-transforming word of the Lord. Jeopardy: Losing Your Rewards. Saints, I must tell you truthfully, when God revealed to my spirit how much everything I do, and how I do it, and why I do it for his kingdom, will determine what eternal rewards I will receive or forfeit. It revolutionized my Christian walk. My whole life, all my life, has been serving God. But I didn't always do it with the best attitudes. I had tendencies to pride and self-righteousness, and even pouting that I did not see as problems. We're not talking about one's salvation or going to Heaven. We're talking about our works being tried once we're in Heaven. Paul said that every man's work shall be made manifest and revealed by fire to see what sort, not what size, what quality, not what quantity, it is. Paul said that we all individually will stand before the Bema, the judgment seat of Christ, to give an account for the deeds done in our bodies, whether good or bad. He referred to Christians, not sinners. And he said that if our works survive the fire, we shall receive a reward. They will come forth as gold, silver, and precious stones. But if they do not survive the fire, they will be burned as wood, stubble, and hay, and he shall suffer the loss of his rewards. For me, this is a sobering reality. I don't only want to go to Heaven, I want all the rewards I'm eligible to receive, and I believe you do too. Find out seven things the scripture say that will be tried from our words, to our works, our giving, how we act and endure in trials, our motivations. You know, there's even a reward for those who love and look for the Lord's coming in the rapture. I call it the Maranatha Reward. Today's message, "Jeopardy: Losing Your Rewards," is available as a two-CD set for your love gift of $15 or more for the radio ministry. Request SK104. Mail to Archie Hardy Ministries, PO Box 1744, Baltimore, Maryland 21203. Or go online to archiehardy.org. That's archiehardy.org where you may also order on MP3. But to order "Jeopardy: Losing Your Rewards" by mail, offer SK104, send your minimum love gift of $15 to PO Box 1744, Baltimore, Maryland 21203. Till next time, this is Sharon Knotts saying, "Maranatha!"