The Lord Is Coming Quickly with His Reward: Take Heed to Your Work & Service to God

According to Revelation 22:12, the Lord comes quickly, and His reward is with Him to render to each one as his work is; at His coming, this reward will be rendered to each one of us at the judgment seat of Christ, and some will receive the reward while others will receive punishment, depending on their works in and by the divine life done in the body.

Lord Jesus, thank You for regenerating us with Your life. Praise the Lord, we are children of God, and we are eternally saved! Thank You, Lord Jesus, for being our Saviour and our life. We want to serve You today. May our daily life and our service to You be in and by the divine life so that we may receive a reward at Your coming. Oh Lord, You come quickly. We want to live in the light of Your coming. May our daily life and serving the Lord be pleasing to You so that we may receive the reward at Your coming! We love You, Lord, and we love Your appearing! Amen!

This week we come to the last morning revival portion on the matter of experiencing, enjoying, and expressing Christ, and we will focus mainly on Revelation chapter 22 and also on 2 Peter 1:19.

Our topic for this week is Christ Coming with Reward and Punishment, a Lamp Shining in a Dark Place, and Christ Appearing Privately to His Overcomers as the Morning Star.

The Lord comes quickly. His coming is both an incentive and a warning to us.

On the one hand, because we love the Lord, we desire to see His coming, and we want Him to return soon, for we want to be with Him and we want Him to be with us for eternity. He is our Beloved, and we pursue Him in love.

On the other hand, the Lord’s coming is a warning to us, for even though He will rapture us at one point or we will die and go to meet Him, He will judge us according to what we have done in our lifetime.

We need to realise that, on the positive side, we have been saved and we are saved eternally; there’s nothing we have to do in ourselves to be saved except to repent and receive the Lord as life.

As long as we repent and receive the Lord as our Saviour and our life, we are eternally saved.

But whether we are rewarded at the Lord’s coming back at His judgment seat, this depends on the kind of work we do and the kind of living we have here on earth.

He will come with His reward and punishment, and we want to be those who receive His reward, not being those who will be disciplined for a certain period of time.

The Lord is Coming Quickly with His Reward to Render to Each one as His Work is!

We believers in Christ love the Lord Jesus and desire for Him to return. In Revelation 22:12 He said, Behold, I come quickly, and My reward is with Me to render to each one as his work is.

On the one hand, we need to enjoy the Lord and love Him; on the other hand, He is coming with His reward, which also has the implication of reward and punishment.

The Lord will come to judge not only the people in the world who are sinful and reject Him but also His believers, His own people.

Matthew 7:21-24 is very clear concerning this; not everyone who says to Him, Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of the heavens, but he who does the will of His Father who is in the heavens.

Many will say to the Lord on that day, Lord, Lord, was it not in Your name that we prophesied, and in Your name we cast out demons, and in Your name we did many works of power.

We would expect that the Lord would deny such works, but actually He does not; rather, He declares to them, I never knew you; depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness.

Not all those who are saved will be rewarded with the kingdom of the heavens, but all those who do the will of the Father who is in the heavens. This means that we must do the perfect will of God.

There are millions of Christians all over the earth, and many of them do a work for God; some even do a great work, a life-changing work, even a work that changes the course of people’s life or the course of a nation.

Surely, one would say, such a work must be rewarded by the Lord. But here we see that the Lord does not acknowledge such ones unless they do the will of the Father.

We may raise up churches, help many to be saved, expand the kingdom of God, do great works of power, and speak many great things in the Lord’s name, but unless we do the perfect will of God, the Lord may not acknowledge us at His judgment seat.

We may do all these great works, but these are not God’s perfect will but His permissive will; He allows all these to be done. They are nice things, positive things, and many of us would love to do such work.

But the Lord speaks to such ones that He never knew them, so they should depart from Him. He will not acknowledge those who did not do the will of the Father, and they will not be co-kings with Christ in the next age.

From God’s point of view, so many works done in His name are not according to God’s perfect will and will therefore not be rewarded by Him.

This should cause us to stop and check with the Lord, asking Him,

Lord, is the work I am doing for You the will of the Father? Am I doing the will of the Father as I am labouring for You? I don’t want to do this or that work for You or in the church life yet without being one spirit with You. I want to be a faithful slave who enters into the joy of his Master, not a slave that is disciplined by You. Shine on my work. Expose my reliance on the self. Expose the lack of dependence on You. Save me from doing a great work for God yet without doing the perfect will of God! Amen!

What we want to hear on that day is, Well done, faithful slave, enter into the joy of your Master.

The Lord is coming with His wages, giving a reward or punishment to each of His believers after their rapture at the judgment seat of Christ.

He will reward those who are not workers of lawlessness but who allow His authority to touch the depths of their being and do a work under His government.

Matthew 12:36-37 is another enlightening portion regarding the judgment seat and our reward or punishment before the Lord.

Here, the Lord tells us that every idle word which men have spoken, they will render an account concerning it on the day of judgment.

By our words we will be justified and by our words we will be condemned. Oh Lord Jesus! Our speaking will be judged by the Lord.

If we speak in an empty way, a casual way, or in a gossiping way, our speaking will be judged.

This doesn’t mean that we should be silent so that we don’t sin as we speak; rather, we need to pray, be filled with Christ, and speak words filled with life.

As 2 Corinthians 10:13 says, we should not boast beyond our measure but according to the measure of the rule which the God of measure has apportioned to us.

We need to allow the Lord to rule in us and measure us.

We need to accept God’s limitation, not going where we want to go, doing what we want to do, and speaking what we want to speak, but allowing the God of measure to measure us in our work, living, speaking, and function.

The Lord repeats His warning “I come quickly” (Rev. 3:11; 22:7) so that we will consider His reward to be rendered at His coming back.

Even those who are serving the Lord in the church life, we need to be warned concerning this. We ned to bring this to the Lord, telling Him,

Lord Jesus, we give ourselves to You to live and work one spirit with You today. Thank You, dear Lord, that You are coming quickly, and Your reward is with You to render to each one as his work is. We want to do a certain kind of work today that will be rewarded by You. Save us from being presumptuous when we do things for the Lord. May we seek to do the will of the Father. May we not work if You don’t work, and may we not speak when You don’t speak. May we take Your imminent return as a warning and an incentive in our Christian life and work today. Come quickly, dear Lord, for we love You and we love Your appearing! May we be prepared to meet You and be judged by You as we live our Christian life today and do our Christian work. Oh Lord, we give You our working for the Lord, our speaking, and all the things we do for You and in Your name. We want to be one with You and do the perfect will of the Father, not HIs permissive will. May our speaking be full of grace, ministering Christ to the hearers, not speaking idle words. Prepare us for Your return!

Taking Heed concerning our Work for the Lord, for He will Judge it at His Coming

Each one of us will be rewarded according to our labour for the Lord and in the Lord (1 Cor. 3:8). When the Lord Jesus comes back, at His second coming, He will reward us according to our doings (Matt. 16:27).

On the one hand, we believers in Christ have received eternal life, and we are eternally saved; we do not need to worry about our eternal being with the Lord.

On the other hand, whether we will be rewarded with being a co-king with Christ in the next age, the age of the kingdom, depends on how we live, serve God, and work for God in our lifetime today.

Salvation is not through works; it is by faith alone, and we praise the Lord for saving us. Reward, however, is according to our works, and our works do not need to be many but rather, they need to be approved by the Lord.

Every saved person will be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ so that each one may receive the things done through the body according to what he has practiced, whether good or bad (2 Cor. 5:10).

Those who practice good will receive a reward, and those who practice evil will receive punishment.

This is why the apostle Paul said that he would not examine himself but He who examined him was the Lord (1 Cor. 4:3-5). Oh Lord Jesus!

It is not sufficient for us believers in Christ to merely have a conscience that is without offense before God and before man; we must go further and see that the Lord will still judge the way we serve Him.

He has entrusted each one of us with at least one talent; some have received two, while others five, but each one of us has received at least one talent (see Matt. 25).

Each one of us has received at least a spiritual gift from the Lord. He has given us the divine life, the Holy Spirit, and a spiritual gift; we should not neglect these things but rather, use our talent properly and gain a profit for the Lord (vv. 14-30).

If we are lazy or lax and bury our talent in the ground, thinking the Lord is a strict Master who will punish us if we don’t bring a profit, the Lord will dispense punishment to us for a time according to our works.

But if we are faithful to use our one talent and gain more profit for the Lord, He will bring us into His joy, the joy of our master, and we will be rewarded by Him at His coming.

This means that, even though we are saved, we still need to serve the Lord and work for Him, and our work and service need to be pleasing to Him, even approved by Him.

We need to serve the Lord faithfully to do the will of our Father, and we need to use the divine life, the Holy Spirit, and the talent we have received from the Lord in our service to Him.

We shouldn’t think that now that we’re saved, we have no problems; the way we serve the Lord and work for Him are a great matter. Each one of us needs to take heed how we build (1 Cor. 3:10).

We need to take heed of our work. If we build with gold, silver, and precious stones, our work will stand the test of the fire of God’s judgment.

But if we build with the wood, grass, and stubble of our natural man, our flesh, and our self, our work will be consumed, and we will suffer loss. Oh Lord!

If our work which we build upon the foundation remains, we will receive a reward (v. 14). This is not a matter of our salvation, which is eternal and secure; it is a matter of being rewarded by the Lord to rule and reign with Him in the coming age.

Our reward depends on how we serve the Lord after we are saved. At the Lord’s coming, this reward will be rendered to each one of His believers at the judgment seat of Christ (see 2 Cor. 5:10; 1 Cor. 4:5; Rom. 14:10; Matt. 16:27).

He will give us our wages. May we be before the Lord concerning our work for the Lord and our serving Him. May we open to Him and depend on Him in all things, even be one with Him in what we work for God and do for the Lord.

Lord Jesus, thank You for giving us at least one talent for us to serve You and bring profit for Your kingdom. Thank You for giving us Your divine life, the Holy Spirit, and one talent for us to serve the Lord. We want to be diligent in doing business for the Lord. Amen, Lord, we want to serve You in such a way that we will receive Your reward at Your coming. May we use our talent properly and gain a profit for the Lord. May we be those rewarded by You at Your coming to enter into Your joy! May we build with gold, silver, and precious stones, and not with wood, grass, or stubble. Oh Lord, we want to take heed of how we build today. May we build up the church and serve the Lord in oneness with the Lord and by ministering Christ to others. We give You our daily living before the Lord and we give You our work for God! We humble ourselves, we open to You, and we allow You to judge us today, stopping us from what we want to do and leading us to do what You want us to do.

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Ron Kangas on this topic, and portions from, The Conclusion of the New Testament (pp. 4452-4453) by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Experiencing, Enjoying, and Expressing Christ (4) (2025 December Training), week 48 (msg. 12), Christ Coming with Reward and Punishment, a Lamp Shining in a Dark Place, and Christ Appearing Privately to His Overcomers as the Morning Star – day 1.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – O Lord, give us grace for Thy Kingdom to live, / To be trained that Thou may the reward to us give; / Make the Kingdom’s reality our exercise, / That its manifestation may be our great prize. (Hymns #947 stanza 7)
  – O come, our King, O come, dear Lord! / Receive us by Thy promised word, / And give the victors Thy reward, / O praise the Lord! / O praise the Lord! O praise the Lord! / And give the victors Thy reward, / O praise the Lord! (Hymns #965 stanza 6)
  – Yet there’s a word for God’s own sons, / Which is a warning from the Lord: / For those not ready when He comes, / “Worse punishment” and not “reward.” / Reward is not eternal life, / It’s based on how we run the race; / It all depends on what we build, / It’s not a matter, here, of grace. (Hymns #1298 stanzas 3-4)