The judgment seat of Christ—the Bema seat—is not a footnote in God’s prophetic timetable, nor is it a vague threat hanging over the heads of believers. It is a mystery revealed through Paul, reserved for the Church, and stands as a monument to the finished work of Christ and the triumph of God’s grace. If you misunderstand the Bema seat, you risk undermining the very foundation of your assurance, your inheritance, and your sonship.
The Bema Seat: Not a Tribunal for Sin
Let it be stated without compromise: the Bema seat has nothing to do with the believer’s sins. To suggest otherwise is to trample the cross underfoot and call into question the sufficiency of Christ’s sacrifice. The matter of sin was fully, finally, and forever dealt with at Calvary. Christ was judged in your place. When He appears the second time, it is “without sin unto salvation” (Hebrews 9:28). He is not returning to settle old accounts or dredge up forgiven failures. Any teaching that makes the Bema seat a place of fear or punitive reckoning is a direct assault on justification by faith and the cleansing of the conscience.
A Celebration of God’s Building Work
The Bema seat is fundamentally celebratory. It is the public unveiling of what God has accomplished in and through His people by the New Testament ministry. This is not a day for the exposure of shame, but for the manifestation of Christ’s workmanship in the saints. The “trial by fire” is not a threat to your standing, but a means of revealing what is truly of Christ in your service.
“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.”
(1 Corinthians 3:13)
The fire consumes all that is corruptible—wood, hay, and stubble, the products of fleshly effort and false teaching. These are not rewarded, nor do they endure. But the gold, silver, and precious stones—those works wrought by the Spirit and grounded in faith—remain and are rewarded. This is not loss in the sense of condemnation, but the merciful removal of what was never of eternal value.
Glorification: The Fulfillment of Predestination
At the Bema seat, the transformation of the believer is completed. “We shall be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump” (1 Corinthians 15:52). This is the fulfillment of God’s predestined purpose: “to be conformed to the image of His Son” (Romans 8:29). All that pertains to the flesh—its weakness, its corruption, its shame—is burned away. What remains is the glorified, incorruptible son or daughter, standing in the full liberty of the children of God.
Christ: Both Judge and Advocate
Do not miss this: Christ Himself presides at the Bema seat as both Judge and Advocate. The One who evaluates is the very One who died for you, who clothes you in His righteousness, and who presents you faultless before the Father. “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1). There is no possibility of condemnation for those in Christ; to suggest otherwise is to deny the gospel itself.
The True Nature of Reward and Loss
Paul warns against building with “wood, hay, stubble”—ministry done in the flesh, or through false doctrine. These works are burned up, and rightly so. They do not endure, nor do they bring reward. But ministry that flows from faith in Christ and is empowered by the Holy Spirit—“gold, silver, precious stones”—endures and is rewarded. This is not a matter of salvific security, but of the display of God’s grace and the vindication of His workmanship.
If you accept the error that the Bema seat is about sin, you lose everything that makes the gospel good news. You forfeit the assurance of justification, you undermine the promise of inheritance, and you cast doubt on your adoption as a son. You trade the liberty of grace for the bondage of fear, and you make Christ’s advocacy of no effect.
The Display of Grace and the Fulfillment of Adoption
Ultimately, the Bema seat is the moment when “the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God” (Romans 8:21). It is the public fulfillment of our predestination “unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace” (Ephesians 1:5-6). This is not a day to dread, but a day to anticipate with joy—a day when your faith will “be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7).
The Bema seat stands as a testament to the efficacy of Christ’s finished work and the power of His life in the believer. It is the crowning moment of grace, the unveiling of the sons of God, and the consummation of our hope. To approach it with fear is to deny the gospel; to anticipate it with joy is to honor the One who justified, sanctified, and will glorify you.
Verses Referenced:
- Hebrews 9:28 – “For unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.”
- 1 Corinthians 3:13 – “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.”
- 1 Corinthians 15:52 – “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”
- Romans 8:29 – “For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.”
- 1 John 2:1 – “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”
- Romans 8:21 – “Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.”
- Ephesians 1:5-6 – “Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.”
- 1 Peter 1:7 – “That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.”
