The one man gets wages. That is not the bare notion of salvation, for
both builders are conceived of as on the foundation, and both are
saved. He gets wages. Yes, of course! The architect has to give his
certificate before the builder gets his cheque. The weaver, who has
been working his hand-loom at his own house, has to take his web to
the counting-house and have it overlooked before he gets his pay. And
the man who has built 'gold, silver, precious stones,' will
have--over and above the initial salvation--in himself the blessed
consequences, and unfold the large results, of his faithful service;
while the other man, inasmuch as he has not such work, cannot have
the consequences of it, and gets no wages; or at least his pay is
subject to heavy deductions for the spoiled bits in the cloth, and
for the gaps in the wall.
The Apostle employs a tremendous metaphor here, which is masked in
our Authorised Version, but is restored in the Revised. 'He shall be
saved, yet so as' (not 'by' but) 'through fire'; the picture being
that of a man surrounded by a conflagration, and making a rush
through the flames to get to a place of safety. Paul says that he
will get through, because down _below_ all inconsistency and
worldliness, there was a little of that which ought to have been
_above_ all the inconsistency and the worldliness--a true faith
in Jesus Christ. But because it was so imperfect, so feeble, so
little operative in his life as that it could not keep him from
piling up inconsistencies into his wall, therefore his salvation is
so as through the fire.
Brethren, I dare not enlarge upon that great metaphor. It is meant
for us professing Christians, real and imperfect Christians--it is
meant for us; and it just tells us that there are degrees in that
future blessedness proportioned to present faithfulness. We begin
there where we left off here. That future is not a dead level; and
they who have earnestly striven to work out their faith into their
lives shall 'summer high upon the hills of God.' One man, like Paul
in his shipwreck, shall lose ship and lading, though 'on broken
pieces of the ship' he may 'escape safe to land'; and another shall
make the harbour with full cargo of works of faith, to be turned into
gold when he lands. If we build, as we all may, 'on that foundation,
gold and silver and precious stones,' an entrance 'shall be
ministered unto us abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our
Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ'; whilst if we bring a preponderance of
'wood, hay, stubble,' we shall be 'saved, yet so as through the
fire.'