Late Rewards
I have read from time to time about soldiers getting medals decades after they performed that acts that earned them. I am sure that they had figured that what they had done had been forgotten by this time as even their memories of the events were fading. Some soldiers had died so they never knew they were finally recognized but the award meant a great deal to loved ones and friends.
There are times as we serve the Lord that we wonder if anyone notices us, especially the Lord. We wonder if anything we are doing is making any impact at all. Then out of the blue someone comes up and makes a comment or we get a letter telling us how much something we said or did meant to someone and we are shocked, amazed, humbled and thankful that we did not quit when we felt so unappreciated or that we were a complete failure wasting our time.
Just recently, I got two rewards in one day. I had not been sleeping well due to a cough that would not allow me to lie down. I almost called in sick, but fell back on my military training and went in anyway. When people leave our organization they have to come by the computer room and sign out to be sure that we terminate their access. My temporary office is in that area. In walked a lady that I had not seen in two years. Back then she had been the physical therapist that was working with my pastor. He spoke so highly of her that I went to meet her and thank her for caring for him so well. I gave her a copy of my book, “The Power of Holy Women” and really did not get to see her again until she was clearing that day.
She saw me and said that she just had to give me a hug. She told me that she had just read my book a few months ago when she had been on bed rest and said it was right on time for her. She and her husband were going to be divorced, but after reading the book she realized that she had not guarded her husband’s heart and had made some mistakes. She said that they had reconciled and thanked me for the book that she had passed on to a single friend in DC saying that she needed to read it before she got married. I gave God the glory and called my wife and pastor to relate the story with tears of gratitude to God for using me when I had been feeling so useless and thought about quitting the ministry.
In my secular job, kudos are as rare as they are in ministry. The same day a lady from our higher headquarters was passed to me for assistance. The first words she said was I was told that you would know this. In, fact every time I call over there I hear that you will know. She asked if I ran the place and I replied that I am just a peon. She replied that isn’t the way she heard it. We talked a little and I found out that she was a Christian active in a local church and I did have the answer she needed. I have known that lady’s name for fifteen years but that was the first time we actually talked and I knew that she even knew I existed. It was nice to know that my name was spoken of favorably at a higher echelon and that my work was noticed.
Like those soldiers, we often receive rewards late or not at all. We may labor intensely for the Lord at the church and our job and wonder if anyone even notices or if we are really making any kind of impact. We wonder if we really do have the gift we have been exercising because nothing seems to happen and we get discouraged and just go through the motions out of duty. Joy seems to be lacking.
Duty is a good thing and more people need to know what that means because many Christians would be court-martialed for dereliction of duty were they in the military and were the goldbrickers they are in the Lord’s army. Duty is a good thing but having a vision will motivate you and satisfy more than duty ever will.
Prov 29:18 Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he. (KJV)
People need to be able to envision goals or progress whether they are doing their paid job or their ministry. If they lack direction, they get bored, irritable and lackadaisical and ultimately quit. At the workplace, it should be management that is giving you that vision though a Christian works for God 24/7 and needs to have the Lord direct him/her in the fine points of how to fulfill the will of God while at the same time pleasing the lesser Boss.
In ministry, you will never succeed unless you are sure that you are exercising the gifts God has given you. If you are doing a ministry because you feel guilty or someone badgered you into it you will feel more like a condemned man than a blessed one. At that point it is drudgery and even a sense of duty will not help you feel any better about it. When you are doing what God wants you to do in His power ministry is joyful.
OK, what if you know you are using His gifts and as best you know how you are exercising them in His power and yet there appears to be no fruit or reward? There are several answers to that.
One is patience. Are you growing oaks or tomatoes? If you are plowing, hoeing, watering, weeding etc. then the time of your harvest or reward depends upon the crop you are growing and if you are starting from seedlings or building upon someone else’s labor. Tomatoes mature pretty quickly and have to be harvested quickly or they rot on the vine. Getting shade from an oak seedling or sapling is going to take years, but they normally last for more than an average human lifespan. Quality and strength takes time. Be patient.
Another one is character building or protecting. Don’t you hate it when you are going through a rough time and someone hears your complaint and blithely replies, “It builds character?” Though it is not what we want to hear at the time, it is absolutely true. If everything happened instantly without any “struggle” you would soon just take things for granted and become an ingrate like the average American. A good soldier or farmer needs to learn endurance and commitment and so does the Christian soldier or sower of the seed. Those traits do not come easy, but must be refined and hammered out like a fine sword.
Sometimes it is a means of protecting character. We tend to be very vain very quickly. Sometimes God has to withhold the reward to keep us from getting the big head and then making us unfit for further service until He gets us humble again. It is a lot easier to stay humble than it is to go back to being humble after our head cannot get through the door. Deflating a big head usually involves painful embarrassment or physical disability. God will spare us this by delaying the reward until Glory if need be to keep you in service and protect your character.
Accruing interest could be another reason that we don’t get the rewards we think we should get. Sometimes we only get a small dividend or a partial annuity here because our total reward is not complete. The great men and women of the Word are still earning rewards for their work though they have been dead for centuries.
Every time someone gets saved by means of the Romans Road or from John 3:16, I believe that Paul and John get a “residual” reward for their obedience and faithfulness in winning souls in their lifetime and for being the servant God used to pen His infallible, Holy Word! If we get the reward of a prophet for receiving a prophet or a righteous man and even for a cup of cold water given in the name of a disciple is it too far fetched to believe that every time a person influenced by that prophet does something for God that the prophet doesn’t get a reward for that as well? (Matt 10:41, 42) It works for us as well. The ripples of our influence may go on years after we are dead even in we think we are a useless nobody. Thus we must take great care that we create the right kind of ripples for we may lose rewards from them as well as gain them.
So, if the prophets that have gone on to be with Lord still have not received all of their reward because they are still accumulating them we may be just getting a small down payment here since the tally is not complete yet. God knows whether we could handle the whole truckload or not so He makes deliveries according to our strength, faith or need.
Finally, maybe we just don’t see the rewards because they do not come in the format we expect. There is so much banter about health and wealth prosperity hype today that we only think God rewards in gold or stock shares. What about the times we were spared being in an accident or mugged and murdered? How about the times we didn’t die from a heart attack or cancer? Indeed, we may find when we get to the other side that we had so many invisible rewards or rewards in unexpected forms that we will just be boggled. If we weren’t already in our glorified bodies the rush of all that revelation might just melt or toast our puny brains.
We can maintain our vision if we maintain a proper attitude of God. Abraham asked, “Shall not the judge of all the earth do right?” The answer is a resounding YES!!! Paul tells us in Hebrews that we must believe that He is a rewarder of all who diligently seek Him. With that perspective we can fulfill the second half of our verse and keep or guard His law or His Words and be happy or blessed of God. We can work with joy knowing that He does love us and enjoys rewarding His faithful children.
If you are not a born-again Christian and are reading this I can also assure you that you will also receive a reward for your labors.
Rom 6:23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. KJV
Your sin will earn you a paycheck of death. You better take the gift and start receiving better rewards. You don’t want that paycheck.
My brothers and sisters, God will reward you for your labor of love for Him, His Word and His people. He is never late. You will get exactly what you need when you need it and the rest will be waiting for you in Heaven. We will rejoice to get them but they we will turn around and cast them at His feet for only through His enabling power, love and grace did we achieve them. Maranatha!!!
