Soul Winners Crown

For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Is it not even you in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming?   For you are our glory and joy. 

1 Thessalonians 2:19, 20 (NKJV)

The fact that we shall one day stand at the judgment seat of Christ ought to motivate us to be faithful in spite of difficulties.

Paul said that the believers themselves would be his crown when he met them at the judgment seat.  To be sure, some of the believers in the church were not living as they should, and some were a burden to Paul.  But when he looked ahead and saw them in glory, they brought joy to his heart.

However we will lose some of that joy if we go to Heaven empty-handed.  The Christian who has not sincerely tried to win others to Christ will not experience this glory and joy when Christ returns. 

Turning Point

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God (John 1:12, NKJV)

On May 24, 1738, a discouraged missionary went “very unwillingly” to a religious meeting in London. There a miracle took place. “About a quarter before nine,” he wrote in his journal, “I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”

That missionary was John Wesley. The message he heard that evening was from Martin Luther’s commentary on Romans. The gospel is still transforming people’s lives, just the way it transformed Martin Luther and John Wesley. The one scripture above all others that brought Luther out of mere religion into the joy of salvation by grace, through faith, was Romans 1.17 “The righteous will live by faith.” The Protestant Reformation and the Wesleyan revival were both the fruit of this wonderful letter.