Christ is the Judge! By Chris McCann It says in Matthew 25:31-34: When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory: And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: Then He will say to the ones on His right hand, “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” And the ones on His left hand are cursed. It is the end of everything for this world. It is the time when God gives the rewards to His people and pronounces the curse and destruction for those that are not His people. And Christ the Son is carrying it out. I do not think this can be stated any more clearly than in Romans 14:10: But why dost thou judge thy brother? or why dost thou set at nought thy brother? for we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Christ is seated on the judgment seat. You know, we do not read this kind of specific statement in the Old Testament, and that is understandable because Jesus is revealed to be the Messiah in the New Testament in a very direct way, without any “cloud” over it, as the veil is taken away and we see Him as “God in the flesh,” manifested. Also, we see that He is the God of the Old Testament Bible, but in the Old Testament, it is not that clear. It just tells us of this great God who will judge mankind in the future. But, here, there is no mistaking that this Judge is the Lord Jesus Christ. It goes on to say in Romans 14:11-12: For it is written, As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. And this passage is quoting from Isaiah where JEHOVAH God is in view. He is the One every knee will bow to, and He is the Lord Jesus Christ. It is just amazing that some people cannot see that the Bible teaches that Christ is God. It is dripping with that truth throughout the whole of the Scripture, and this is another way of proving it. When we look at the Old Testament declarations, we see that God is Judge, and when we look at the New Testament, we see that Christ is the Judge. Just, as the Old Testament tells us, “I, even I, am JEHOVAH; and beside me there is no saviour,” the New Testament tells us in Luke 2:11: For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. So JEHOVAH God is Saviour, and Christ is Saviour, and both cannot be true unless Christ is JEHOVAH God. Likewise, as God is a jealous God and will not share His glory with another in salvation, there is no way that God would give up His role as Judge of man to some lesser being or high form of angel. No – it is still God who is judging, but God is revealing a little bit more about His Person or Being, and which One within the Godhead is assigned the task to judge. Let us also turn to 2Corinthians 5:10: For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. It is the judgment seat of Christ. With the revealing of Christ as the One seated upon the judgment seat, clarification has come concerning the Old Testament references to “the Ancient of days” who sat to judge “ten thousand times ten thousand” standing before Him. The Ancient of days was Jesus Himself. And Jesus is also in view seated upon a great white throne in the book of Revelation. It says in Revelation 20:11: And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. We know the One seated here, in Revelation 20, is Jesus upon His judgment throne.