I like to be praised. On those occasions when I am, I think finally somebody has realized my true worth. They’ve seen me as I am and given me the recognition I deserve.
—or at least, they’ve seen me as I think I am.
When I’m criticized, I’m almost always certain my critics are quite wrong: they don’t know me and they don’t know what they’re talking about.
But there are those rare occasions when I actually ponder my critics’ words—even pause to consider the possibility they may be right. And when I do, when I discover the truth of other’s judgments, I blush, even if I’m by myself in the dark.
One day, a day I’m sort of looking forward to while at the same time hoping to delay, I believe I’ll be judged by a Judge Who knows me like I’ve never known myself. When I stand (if I’m able to stand—I reckon the verb describing my posture will be closer to “grovel”) before Him, not only will He see me as I am—I’ll see me, for the first time, as I really am. On that day everything I’ve ever done or said will be recounted. The Lord Jesus has given me fair warning: “I say to you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the Day of Judgment.” In the Lord’s presence every idle word I’ve spoken, every sneer and snub I’ve given someone (“as you have done it unto the least of my brethren, you have done it unto me”), every malicious thought, every greedy impulse, or self-serving deed of mine will be remembered and exposed.
We’ve all had that Unhappy and Unforgettable Moment in our lives when we’d wished the floor would open and swallow us. Beloved, on that Day there will be no escape, no gaping earth to receive us, no place to hide. We’ll know ourselves as we are known. No wonder the old medieval hymn calls it the “Day of Wrath, O Day of Mourning”!
But for all that dreadful day threatens to be, our day of judgment is also our day of freedom. The One Who sees through our charades and shame is the One Who came to raise us up from all that. As I hear the soul-twisting words and deeds of my life recounted, what really matters at that hour is not what I’ve done but who I’ll blame.
Around the Table, on the night in which our Lord Jesus was betrayed, each of the Apostles asked Him “Is it I, Lord, who will betray you?” One of them knew the answer before he asked the question; only Judas left the Table justifying himself.
As we recite the words of the Creed, “…He shall come again, in glory, to judge both the quick and the dead,” remember now and then, that you’ll be there. When the gaze of the Just Judge fixes itself on you, what will you say? Again, the hymn shudders its words: “What shall I, frail man, be pleading? Who for me be interceding, when the just are mercy needing?”
The Prayer Book collect for Christmas Day petitions: “grant that as we joyfully receive Him [today] as our Redeemer, so we may with sure confidence behold Him [on that Day] when He shall come to be our Judge…”
The One Who will judge our sins is the One Who longs for our redemption. His Advent warning is our Christmas Hope.—Fr Gregory Wilcox
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