Welcome to His Encouragement Thursday! I don’t know about you, but Thursdays are my struggle day of the week. By Thursday, I have already been working hard at school and at home, and I just wish it would hurry up and be Friday already. LOL! I definitely need a little extra Jesus time on Thursdays.
Look, I am coming soon, and My reward is with Me to repay each person according to HIS (God’s) work.
Revelation 22:12 (ESV) [emphasis mine]
One of my biggest pet peeves with modern translations of Bibles — well, all translations really — is that they do not capitalize the H in he and him whenever a verse discusses or refers to God. I believe there are two possible reasons for this. It is either because translators are unsure exactly how to read the he words in certain lines so to be consistent and to not make a potential mistake they just lower-case ALL he/him pronouns. OR it is because translators have an agenda and are trying to get Bible readers to believe a certain thing about God and His Word. Remember, the devil’s goal is to get God’s kids away from Him by getting them to believe lies about God.
The first reason I mention above is a more innocent thought and I pray this is actually why we don’t capitalize he/him when referencing God. The second reason is pure evil — it is a modern-day attempt at stain-glass windows. In case you don’t know, stain-glass windows were one way to keep illiterate masses under control. Depicting very specific and strategic messages about God to a group of humans who couldn’t read for themselves and who did not have access to a Bible was one way to control the behaviors of the masses. Are translators today purposely attempting to control how you interpret God’s Word, and, therefore, God Himself?
Just to give you an example of translations being used to control the people, consider the ten commandments, specifically Exodus 20:13. In most every translation of this verse, we are told, “You shall not kill,” BUT in Hebrew is it, “You shall not murder.” Killing and murder are two completely different concepts. The word kill has a HUGE spectrum of meaning. If I kill anything then I am breaking one of God’s commandments according to this translation. This actually seems like a commandment we are all set to fail — I mean, I’ve killed bugs countless times. And what about self-defense? If I kill a person who has come at me to attack and kill me, does this mean I have just broken one of God’s commands? Or what about accidents where someone dies accidentally? Does that make people accidental sinners? What about the countless number of soldiers we send off to war? Are they ALL breaking God’s Word? See the issue with translations?
When it is realized that God said, “You shall not murder,” the idea of killing comes into correct context. God’s command tells me that I should never murder someone. Murder is when someone purposely chooses to hurt someone and take his/her life. It’s meditated on, it’s planned.This is MUCH different than accidents, self-defense, or war.
So, why am I telling you this?
This past Saturday during church my pastor brought something to my attention and it really changed my perspective on things and I really wanted to share it with you, dear reader.
In Ephesians 2:8-10 Paul states, “For by grace you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Messiah Yeshua unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them.” In other words, WE do nothing to save ourselves. There is NO single work we could do that would save us from sin and damnation. Rather, it is through Jesus Christ and HIS works that we are saved.
But, in Revelation 22:12 it sounds like Jesus will judge us according to our works. In all translations the he at the end of the sentence is lower-cased. It can easily appear that Jesus is talking about coming back to reward us for all the good things we’ve done. In actuality, the word his at the end of the line should be capitalized. It should read, “according to His work.”
We have to remember that it is NOT about us. It is always about Messiah and His work. It is always about His sacrifice. We are Jesus’s reward and work. If we do anything it is solely Jesus’s accomplishments through us.
One day, we will all stand before God, the Father. Jesus, our Mediator, will show us off to His Father, so to speak. He will tell God all the ways He was able to work through us, and then we will be rewarded based on those works. If we have a soft, warm heart for Jesus and He is able to accomplish much through us, we will receive our crowns. BUT, if we have stone-cold, stubborn hearts that kept Jesus from accomplishing much, we will be the worthless servant who is cast into outer darkness where we will weep and gnash our teeth (Matthew 25:30). I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be super open to Jesus working through me rather than telling Jesus how best to do His job.
The takeaway is this — we are Jesus’s accomplishments. Are we allowing Him to accomplish much?
The Christian Fiction Girl 
That is amazing. Thank you so much for sharing.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Aw! You are welcome. 😊
Thank you for reading my post.
LikeLiked by 1 person