'He that judgeth me is the Lord.' Now it is obvious that 'the Lord'
here is Christ, both because of the preceding context and because of
the next verse, which speaks of His coming. And it is equally
obvious, though it is often unnoticed, that the judgment of which the
Apostle is here speaking is a present and preliminary judgment. 'He
that _judgeth_ me'--not, 'will judge,' but _now_, at this very
moment. That is to say, whilst people round us are passing their
superficial estimates upon me, and whilst my conscience is excusing,
or else accusing me--and in neither case with absolute
infallibility--there is another judgment, running concurrently with
them, and going on in silence. That calm eye is fixed upon me, and
sifting me, and knowing me. _That_ judgment is not fallible, because
before Him 'the hidden things' that the darkness shelters, those
creeping things in the cellars that I was speaking about, are all
manifest; and to Him the 'counsels of the heart,' that is, the
motives from which the actions flow, are all transparent and legible.
So His judgment, the continual estimate of me which Jesus Christ, in
His supreme knowledge of me, has, at every moment of my life--_that_
is uttering the final word about me and my character.
His estimate will dwindle the sentences of the other two tribunals
into nothingness. What matter what his fellow-servants say about the
steward's accounts, and distribution of provisions, and management of
the household? He has to render his books, and to give account of his
stewardship, only to his lord.
The governor of a Crown Colony may attach some importance to colonial
opinion, but he reports home; and it is what the people in Downing
Street will say that he thinks about. We have to report home; and it
is the King whom we serve, to whom we have to give an account. The
gladiator, down in the arena, did not much mind whether the thumbs of
the populace were up or down, though the one was the signal for his
life and the other for his death. He looked to the place where,
between the purple curtains and the flashing axes of the lictors, the
emperor sate. Our Emperor once was down on the sand Himself, and
although we are 'compassed about with a cloud of witnesses,' we look
to the Christ, the supreme Arbiter, and take acquittal or
condemnation, life or death, from Him.
That judgment, persistent all through each of our lives, is
preliminary to the future tribunal and sentence. The Apostle employs
in this context two distinct words, both of which are translated in
our version 'judge.' The one which is used in these three clauses, on
which I have been commenting, means a preliminary examination, and
the one which is used in the next verse means a final decisive trial
and sentence. So, dear brethren, Christ is gathering materials for
His final sentence; and you and I are writing the depositions which
will be adduced in evidence. Oh! how little all that the world may
have said about a man will matter then! Think of a man standing
before that great white throne, and saying, 'I held a very high place
in the estimation of my neighbours. The newspapers and the reviews
blew my trumpet assiduously. My name was carved upon the plinth of a
marble statue, that my fellow-citizens set up in honour of my
many virtues,'--and the name was illegible centuries before the
statue was burned in the last fire!
Brother! seek for the praise from Him, which is praise indeed. If He
says, 'Well done, good and faithful servant,' it matters little what
censures men may pass on us. If He says, 'I never knew you,' all
their praises will not avail. 'Wherefore we labour that, whether
present or absent, we may be well-pleasing to Him.'