Welcome to the InTouch podcast with Charles [music] Stanley for Wednesday, February 25th. Join us in the final message of our series, Countdown to Judgment, as Dr. Stanley [music] reveals the meaning of the crowns of reward and how they will be used in eternity. Now, if you’ll turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 3 for a moment, and you’ll recall in this chapter, in the first few verses that Paul uh is writing to the Corinthian church, and they’re having a little, shall we say, church skirmish over something, and that is some of them

said that uh well, Apollos is a far better speaker than the Apostle Paul. And oh, no, Paul is a theologian of theologians. And so, they were having a little dissertation about all that. And so here’s what Paul said in the fifth verse of this third chapter. What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? Servants through whom you believed even as the Lord gave opportunity to each one.

I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth. And then here’s what he says. Now he who plants and he who waters are one. But each will receive his own reward according to his own labor.

And we’ve spent time talking about that very fact that each one of us will receive the reward that we deserve. Listen, not compared to someone else or what they did or didn’t do, but each one will receive a reward according to our good deeds. Now, I want us to think about what these look like and what this reward is all about.

And I want you to think about it first of all in this light that one of the rewards is going to be the fact that you and I are going to have absolute total complete intimacy with Jesus Christ. He says in Romans 8:29 he says God has predestined us to be conformed to the likeness of his son. And how many times have we talked about this? That is an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ means one that is not just personal but it goes beyond that.

An intimate relationship is a deep abiding relationship. Jesus Christ desires that you and I living in an intimate relationship with him. And that intimacy, listen, when you understand it, it supersedes any physical intimacy known to man. Because listen, you’re relating to holy God who loves perfectly.