This matter of the judgment of the believers and of their being hurt by the fire is neither Calvinism nor Arminianism. According to Calvinism, once we are saved, we are saved forever, and there can be no further problem. In a sense, Calvinism is correct, for once we are saved, we are saved for eternity. However, we should not say that there can be no problems. There is the possibility of being burned in the fire. According to Arminianism, some may be saved in the morning and lose their salvation that night. Their salvation goes up and down like an elevator. Neither Calvinism nor Arminianism is according to the pure word of the Bible. The Bible reveals that we are saved for eternity, but that after we are saved, we need to overcome every sinful thing. If not, we shall be disciplined, punished. If you do not repent and confess your sin, but stay in adultery, in the next age you will be put into the fire and burned, not for eternal perdition, but as a dispensational punishment.
Our age is an age of fornication and adultery. Every country is filled with immorality. Concerning this matter, so many have been drugged by “garlic” and have lost their sense concerning this sin. May this word sober us! We must stay away from today’s trend. Nothing insults God more than fornication, which damages the man created by God in His image. We all must flee our temper and our lust. Flee your temper! Flee your lust! It is not an insignificant thing to lose our temper or to give in to our lust. Indulging in these things may cause us to be burned. Thus, we need to heed this sober word, a word that will force us to stay close to Christ. We need to pray, “Lord, I have temper and lust within me. But, Lord, I thank You that I have You in my spirit. Lord, I don’t want to stay with my physical lust or my psychological temper. I want to stay in my spirit with You, dear Lord Jesus.” Here is our salvation, our rescue, our holiness. Day and night we must stay with the Lord Jesus in our spirit, looking to Him, contacting Him, and trusting in Him.
Temper, a problem to every Christian, is like a gopher: it is hidden, subtle, and prevailing. We all must be on guard concerning it. Lust is also a great problem. I am sorry to say that even among saints there have been a number of cases of fornication. What a shame! Nothing is more shameful than fornication or adultery among the saints. This damages the people created by God, the church life, and the testimony of the church. Again and again the Apostle Paul warned us that no fornicator would share in God’s kingdom (1 Cor. 6:9-10; Gal. 5:19-21; Eph. 5:5). Those believers who commit adultery or fornication are through with the kingdom of the heavens. The kingdom people must have the highest standard of righteousness. Do not lose your temper or look at a woman to lust after her. Be careful! You need to consider these matters seriously and deal with the motive at the very root. This word is not a threat; it is a warning that forces us to stay close to Christ.
Thank the Lord that we have both the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of John. We need to trust in the life revealed in the Gospel of John. Hallelujah, we have such a life! This life is the resurrection life, the overcoming life. Christ has already overcome and now in resurrection He is living in us. This is the life by which we fulfill the highest requirements of the kingdom of the heavens.
We must be very clear about the fact that actually we are not keeping the law. Rather, we are walking according to the spirit. Romans 8:4 says that when we walk according to the spirit, we spontaneously fulfill all the righteous requirements of the law. We are not trying to keep the law, for the more we try to keep it, the more we break it. This is fully revealed and recorded in Romans 7. Today we are neither under the law nor obliged to keep the law. We are free from the law, and now we are walking according to the spirit. Within the spirit, there is the King, Christ, who is our resurrection life. As we walk according to the spirit, we fulfill even the requirements of the highest law.
I believe that now we are clear about the law. We can tell others that the principle of the law is over, but that the commandments of the law remain and have been uplifted. Although we are not able to meet the standard of these higher requirements, we have the resurrection life in our spirit. Therefore, we need not keep the law in the sense of striving in ourselves, but we must walk according to the spirit. When we walk according to the spirit, we spontaneously fulfill all the requirements of the law and have the highest standard of morality. This is the testimony of Jesus, the testimony of the church. This is the proper church life, the reality of the kingdom of the heavens.