Based on Psalm 36 (New King James Version)
“An oracle within my heart concerning the transgression of the wicked: There is no fear of God before his eyes. For he flatters himself in his own eyes, when he finds out his iniquity and when he hates. The words of his mouth are wickedness and deceit; he has ceased to be wise and to do good. He devises wickedness on his bed; he sets himself in a way that is not good; he does not abhor evil. Your mercy, o Lord, is in the heavens; your faithfulness reaches to the clouds. Your righteousness is like the great mountains; Your judgments are a great deep; o Lord, You preserve man and beast. How precious is Your lovingkindness, O God! Therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of Your wings. They are abundantly satisfied with the fullness of Your house, and You give them drink from the river of Your pleasures. For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light we see light. Oh, continue Your lovingkindness to those who know You, and Your righteousness to the upright in heart. Let not the foot of pride come against me, and let not the hand of the wicked drive me away. There the workers of iniquity have fallen; they have been cast down and are not able to rise.”
Finally, what is this life about for most? From a general human point of view, this life is to live as you see fit, basically everything that has to do with our self-indulgence. The majority of people today live for themselves, for their own benefit. And at the moment, every human being can live as they wish. Now, there is no verse that literally says this phrase, but its meaning and implication is throughout the Bible, which we call: free will. And, with this free will comes the weight of consequence, and there is a general consequence for when a person lives their own way, sooner or later.
Human beings must always keep in mind that they can live as they wish, but everything has consequences. Notwithstanding, a person who chooses to do evil very interestingly wishes that their evil does not have any bad consequences, but on the contrary, they desire that their evil be rewarded with well-being. Let's look at this for a moment. The thief steals because they want to live well and obtain everything they want with the least possible effort, and of course, not suffer the punishment of prison. And no thief likes to be robbed. The adulterer's desire is the same. their desire is to have their sexual encounters with other people without anyone knowing, and without bad consequences, so that everything goes the way they want. And also, no adulterer likes to be cheated on, even the most daring and shameless ones. The same thing happens with everyone who seeks to do evil, those who devise wickedness on their bed, as the Word says, to plan to do everything they want to do and have no negative consequences. They want to use their free will to attain and do whatever they want without any consequences, especially after they die. Their wish is that all their bad deeds go completely unpunished. It will sound illogical to some of us, but this is the wish of most people. And if not, why do you think there is so much evil in the world? Do you think that those who do evil think that their evil ways will come upon their own heads one day? Of course not.
Now, can evil go unpunished if a person chooses to believe this way? As it has been said many times, neither our opinions nor our desires have any kind of power to dictate or control reality. Many may think they are getting away with things because nothing bad seems to be happening to them at the moment, as the Scriptures say: “So now we call the proud blessed, for those who do wickedness are raised up; they even tempt God and go free,’” (Malachi 3:15), but the truth is that every person will suffer the consequences of their evil deeds, whether now in this world, or in the coming judgment, if they do not repent from the heart and seek the Most High in time. The Word is very clear on this, as it says: “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is man's all. For God will bring every work into judgment, Including every secret thing, Whether good or evil.” Ecclesiastes 12:13-14.
So, if things are like this, is it then all about the works we do? Yes and no. Works alone are not the focus of the matter, although there must be a product. The first thing we must understand is that we are beings created by God, and as such, we were made to serve and obey Him. So, if we have a product, they must be things that He looks for, and not what we think. If we look at what happened at the beginning, when God made man, He gave him tasks to do (works), as we read: “Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it.” Genesis 2:15. And it also says: Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam called each living creature, that was its name. So Adam gave names to all cattle, to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him. Genesis 2:19-20a. So, doing these things was not man's idea, but rather, God gave them to man to do. But what did man do with their free will? When temptation came, they sinned against God, and instead of doing God's will, they disobeyed God and paid more attention to the serpent who gave them nothing, than to God to whom they owed absolutely everything to. And why did they disobey God? Because they liked the proposal of being like God. So, this separated man from God, and their purpose for existing was lost. They became useless and lost the purpose of their existence, far from any divine purpose. But blessed be God that His grace abounded and gave a way for man to return to life again, and to the purpose of existence for which they were made for. This is what happened: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” Ephesians 2:8-10.
So, some will argue, if we are saved by grace alone, where does the importance of works come in? If we understand the previous passage well, we would understand that God saved us by His grace, but as a product of faith and the grace that was given to us, so that man could begin again to do the good works for which God created them, as it was from the beginning. So, through this we understand that faith and grace must yield a product so that there is eternal life, as it also says: “Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, ‘You have faith, and I have works.’ Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe—and tremble! But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?” James 2:17-20. So, what ultimately distinguishes good and bad work? There is only one thing and that is doing the will of the Father. If things are not done seeking to obey the Father, then everything that is produced is bad work, even if they appear to be good things. This is what the Lord said: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.” Matthew 7:21. So then, are you living to do the Father’s will to receive His reward? Lord bless! John. God bless Israel!