YouTube: The Truth About Judgment Day
Question: “I would be interested in hearing your thoughts on the idea of judgment day. I have mixed feelings about it, and I would appreciate any light you might shed on the subject.”
There are several references concerning a judgment day. It is sometimes called the last days, the end of days, or the end times. In mainstream Christianity, it is the day of reckoning summarized in passages like this one:
“The Son of man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, and throw them into the furnace of fire; there men will weep and gnash their teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear” (Matthew 13:41-43).
Though these words are put on the lips of Jesus, this is a good example of one of the identifying themes of the early church. The Jewish mystic would not speak of a coming kingdom but of one that is found within one’s being at this very moment. The concept of a day of judgment involving fire and gnashing teeth is supported by theological not spiritual principles. In other words, it is a concept based on religious belief rather than spiritual truth.
There has existed the hope of people of every era that God would one day intervene in the mess we humans have made. The Essenes envisioned a day when the Children of Light (themselves) would one day enter a great battle with the Children of Darkness (everyone else) and the children of light would prevail. Unfortunately for them, the Roman army permanently upset their plans.
I feel very confident in saying that there will be no judgment day as commonly depicted. The quality of every individual’s life is determined by their own exercise of judgment. We are held accountable for the way we define reality. We create our own restrictions, and we have the power to erase them. In this sense, every day is judgment day. We each decide whether we will be victims or victors of our world.