The Bible truth that has been obscured and buried and forgotten as a result, is the doctrine of probation. We seldom hear anything about it any more and a man who wants to consider it and talk about it and turn back to the Bible teaching is made to feel very much like a heretic.
Let us consider what we mean by our Christian lives here being a probationary period. We mean that this life is a preparation for the next and that preparation is not concluded when we come to the Lord Jesus Christ for our salvation.
...That is why I have said that it is possible to emphasize a good doctrine to the point that it may overshadow and cause another truth to disappear. In this case, it has gone so far that leading teachers now take the position that the doctrine of probation and spiritual preparation is not Biblical. They insist that everything is cared for by one act of faith and there is no such thing as an expectation of judgment to come.
Certainly we are all agreed that faith in Jesus has settled many important things forever...Our faith in Christ has settled forever our justification before the Father in heaven. It has settled forever that our names are written in the Lamb's book of life. It has settled forever that we are regenerated men and women and the seed of God is in us.
...But the great mistake in our day is the total disregard for the fact that believing Christians are on probation from day to day, proving the character of our faith and testing and preparing us for the world to come...The Apostle Paul plainly taught the believers in Rome that 'every one of us shall give an account of himself to God.' He wrote to the Corinthian believers that 'every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work.'
The quality of our Christian life is sure to be affected if we do not feel that we are going to give an account to God of how we have used our time and abilities and money and possessions He has entrusted to us.
...The results of this time of testing will be seen in that great and coming day before the judgment seat of Christ. Someone has written that the Apostle Paul surely lived with one eye on the judgment seat of Christ and the other eye on the perishing world.
Every Christian is saved - but many have forgotten that they are still on trial. They have forgotten that the Bible has much to say about that 'great day' when every man's work shall be made manifest. They are so happy that they are saved that they have forgotten that God is testing moral wisdom and moral courage, testing faithfulness and vision and stewardship for the kind of times in which we live.
We could spend hours describing the dark side of the times in which we live - but I would remind you that they are God's gift to us. We know that crime and corruption are found throughout the nation. We know that many conditions make our country a top-heavy country, and that we could come crashing down as other nations and empires have in the past.
But I do not wish myself in any other period of the world's history. These times are God Almighty's gift to me as a Christian and I consider myself on probation, sensing that God is really interested in what one of the least of His servants is going to do about the times in which he lives.
Justified and saved - but on trial: that is where the Christian should hold himself. But we are so eager to get out from under all responsibility we kick up our irresponsible heels like an unbroken colt and snort our defiance of all judgment.
We are not living in a period of God's expressed judgment at this time, and that is why man thinks he can get away with almost everything now...But this is a period of probation...This period in which we live is not the trial - it is the preparation for the trial. This is not the last examination - this is getting ready for the examination.
I remind you that this whole doctrine has been long obscured, but our Lord Jesus set it forth fully in Matthew 25. Jesus tells the story there of the man who went into a far country and before leaving, called in his three servants. He gave them talents to be held in trust during his absence...Then he said, 'I will be coming back - remember that I have delivered unto you my goods'...Consider that while he was gone they could have done just as they pleased. They could have done what they pleased with the responsibility. But two of them realized that they were actually on probation while the third did not...The master said to the first two, 'You have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many.' The third servant, who did not realize that he would actually be on trial during the master's absence, was cast out as an unprofitable servant.
What are you going to do with that passage? I know the ultra-dispensationalist just gets rid of it by saying, 'Matthew does not belong to us in the church.' Well, I would just as soon believe the modernist when he says Isaiah does not belong to us as to believe the dispensationalist who tells us that Matthew does not belong to us.
...How can we argue that our day-by-day service to God and to our fellow men is not being sharply scrutinized and that it will not be severely judged before the feet of Jesus Christ in that great day?...Brethren, there will be no place to hide then. You tried to settle everything in the spiritual life by one act of believing but there are some things that are never settled until death cuts us off or until the Lord comes..."
****************** COMMENTS by J.D. Faust ****************** Tozer must now be added to the growing list of courageous, insightful Christians that the Lord used to warn His people about the world to come and the judgment that precedes it. Men such as W.F. Roadhouse, I.M. Haldemane, R.E. Neighbor, D.M. Panton, Oswald J. Smith, Watchman Nee, R.T. Ketcham, and others in the 20th century were able to see that even most of the "fundamentalist" Christians had fallen into a dangerous denial concerning the Judgment Seat of Christ and the Millennial Kingdom (world to come). I agree with Tozer, that salvation by grace through faith alone has been taught in a manner that obscures the Judgment Seat of Christ. However, I would add that by obscuring the warnings as applicable to the saints, many teachers gradually perverted the freeness of eternal salvation. Therefore, we are in such a sad state today that multitudes of professing Christians believe that the Millennial Kingdom is absolutely free, by grace, through faith alone, but that assurance of eternal salvation is gained by long years of struggling in "hard believism," hoping that one day "it will stick" and that they will "really mean it." Such "Christians" will madly proclaim with a red face that there is now no judgment to come, and that they can sin without stripes or exclusion at the Judgment Seat of Christ. Yet, they will then argue that eternal salvation is gained through keeping God's commandments (as long as you do not call keeping God's commandments "works"). Therefore, what God says is a prize, they now see as a free gift. And what God says is a free gift, they now define as a prize! Only the Devil can sow such tares of madness among God's people. Who will awake in the face of the warnings?
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