The Great White Throne Judgment (Chapter 20:11-15)

Chapter 14

This chapter will be short, but I thought it was important to handle the information found in Revelation 20:11-15 separately. The reason is both obvious and tragic. For those who have already died, there is no hope. If you have a loved one who has gone to his eternal resting place without acknowledging Jesus as Lord, he will spend forever in the eternal lake of fire. If your love for that person is stronger than your ability to love God, you will spend eternity in the same eternal lake of fire. Do not, however think that means you will spend it with that loved one who preceded you. There’s not an ounce of proof that is true. You will indeed spend eternity in hell. It is highly unlikely however that you will ever see a loved one who has preceded you when you arrive there. It seems trivial to point out that it will be a rather large place and finding anyone you knew in this lifetime will indeed be much like finding the proverbial needle in a haystack. It is not likely to happen.

For anyone who might be reading this book who has not yet chosen to accept God’s provision for sin in His Son, there is still hope. If the Spirit of God has not yet convinced you of your need for a Savior, I pray the verses of Revelation 20:11-15 will change your mind. The great white throne judgment will be the time when all men, women, boys, and girls in history who have refused to live godly lives will receive their eternal sentence. First, it should be noted that there are levels of hell just as there are levels of reward in heaven. Contrary to what some preachers seem to preach, everyone will not occupy the same abode in hell, no more than everyone will wear the same crown in heaven.

There are at least four crowns believers will wear in eternity (the crown of righteousness I Tim. 4:8; the crown of life James 1:12; the crown of glory I Pet. 5:4; and the crown of exultation I Thes. 2:19); and there are countless levels of eternal punishment those who have failed to accept God’s provision for sin will endure. Verse 12b of chapter 20 makes that clear, “. . . and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds.” This does not suggest for a moment that any part of hell will be a good place to spend eternity. It simply makes it clear for our finite minds that God is perfectly just. He will not throw the eighteen year old boy who never committed adultery, engaged any physical premarital sex, or spent years as a business man misrepresenting his product to millions of customers into the same eternal cell as a mass murderer. Each unbeliever will be judged according to his deeds which he committed in his unbelief. All who refused to accept God’s provision for sin will, in fact, be cast into the lake of fire that burns with brimstone. It will be a place of eternal torment. Nothing about it will be pleasant. If you have ever been really thirsty, imagine eternity in that state with absolutely no expectation of relief, . . . ever.

Once again, in verse 13 we are told the sea, death, and Hades gave up their dead and they were judged, every one of them according to their deeds. It is the most basic tenet of language to understand that if people are judged according to their deeds, they are not all judged the same. Today, people who steal a twenty dollar dress from a department store do not spend life in prison. They are judged according to their deeds. One who murders another sometimes actually gets asphyxiated in a gas chamber. Certainly they get that kind of justice when God’s justice prevails. Just as getting judged according to our deeds means standing before a judge and jury today and being sentenced when convicted for a crime (though because of our lack of eternal wisdom it often is not really just), it will mean everyone will be judged according to their deeds when they stand before the great white throne judgment seat of Revelation 20. Those who have never heard the gospel will not go to hell for my sin. They will go to hell for their own. Those who have not heard the gospel will not be accountable to it. All will be accountable for the fact that they chose to sin though they knew their sin was sin (Romans 1:18-32). Those without the law are a law unto themselves. They have the law of God written upon their hearts.

The point here is abundantly clear. If you have read this writing, you are now accountable for knowing where you will spend eternity if you do not accept God’s provision for your sin. If I am still here when you read this, you can probably contact me at purkey@midrivers.com. I will be happy to help you know what you must know before you can decide if you want to spend eternity with Jesus. I will not tell you God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. I don’t know if that is true. I will not tell you following Jesus will solve all of your problems. It will not. Following Jesus will result in pain, suffering, persecution, and possibly death (II Tim. 3:12). The gospel of self-gratification being preached today is not the gospel of Jesus. If you can’t contact me, find a bible and read the gospel of John. All you need to know about accepting God’s provision for your sin is found in that book. You must know that your failure to act upon God’s admonitions will result with you spending eternity in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone. The final words of Revelation 20 read, “and if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.”

Beloved, you do not want to be thrown into the lake of fire. From it there is no escape. It won’t matter how much influence you have here on earth. Unlike OJ Simpson, you are not rich enough to hire a lawyer wise enough to get you declared innocent or to get your sentence commuted. When you breathe your last breath, it will be a done deal. And trust me when I say to you, “None of us knows, even a millisecond before it happens, when we will breathe our last breath.” Of course, there are glorious pleasantries directly connected to being a child of the King. I suppose I could (but I probably won’t) write a book on that topic alone. I have simply chosen to leave that to those millions who completely ignore Jesus admonition as recorded in Matthew 10:38, 16:34; Mark 8:34; and Luke 9:23, where He makes it clear that anyone who does not live a life of self sacrifice for the benefit of others will not enter heaven. That is the lesson demonstrated in the figure used by Jesus when He spoke of one taking up his cross daily to follow Him. One cannot live for Jesus if he does not choose to die to himself. We must daily put to death those passions and desires that seem to be so indelibly stamped upon our fleshly bodies if we wish to live lives filled with those passions and desire that make us a powerful testimony to the majesty of our Lord.