Ecclesiastes 3:1, 2 “To every thing there is a season. And a time for every purpose under the heaven: 2) A time to be born, and a time to die.” In this verse, and all the way through verse 8, Solomon deals with contrasts in life, starting with birth. He then says (my loose translation); “Just as sure as you are born, you are going to die!” Hebrews 9:27 in the New Testament restates that fact: “And as it is appointed unto man once to die, but after this the judgment.” We see by these verses that, unless we are taken up at the rapture, every one of us will die. Because of that fact, it should cause us to make sure that we are prepared for that time. Many folks live as though they have all the time in the world to get ready, and therefore live their lives as though there is neither God nor judgment to face.
If the Word of God is true in these two verses, and experience and history proves that it is, then the last part of Hebrews 9:27 must be true as well: “but after this the judgment.” It is a 100% fact that there is nobody alive right now who was born 130 years ago. They have all died. If that is true, then the Bible is true that there is a time to die, and after this there is a judgment. Everybody who dies (100% of them) will stand before the judgment of God, ready or not!
The difficulty that we face with these facts is, nobody knows the time of death.
Proverbs 27:1 “Boast not thyself of tomorrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.” Also, we find in James 4:14 “Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.”
Because life is short and death is certain, we best be careful how we live. The Psalmist says in Psalms 90:12 “So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.”
Then Paul speaks of the judgment of the Christian in 2 Corinthians 5:10 where he says, “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” So, we see that as sure as there is a death, there is a judgment; for the saved as this verse says, but also for the unsaved, found in Revelation 20:11-15. Two different judgments and two different sentences passed.
Don’t be caught unawares. What if today was your appointment with death? Are you ready to stand before God the way you are right now? Jesus can make you ready. He said in John 14:6, “I am the way, the Truth, and the life, no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”