Is it a legitimate thing to say that “God will only declare that He knows you if you do His will”? Which, in itself, is a fairly startling statement in its own right. As the LORD was leading me in this, I had to stop and think about this for a moment. And as I pondered, I turned to the counsel of His irrefutable Word. And as I did, it struck me as astonishing that we can often read the very same scripture, over and over again, but only see that one thing for the very first time at that precise moment. It’s something like a diamond with many facets. You can stare at the same facet again and again, and think you are looking at the whole diamond, and then suddenly find yourself looking at a completely different facet, even though it is still the very same diamond you’ve always been looking at.

     And as I looked, there it was, hidden in plain sight, for me and all to see: ““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. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’ “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and DOES THEM, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”” – MATTHEW 7:21-28.

     For as long as I can remember, the prospect of being told by the LORD, “Depart from Me, I never knew you!” has filled me with an uneasy and heavy trepidation. And what alarms me even more is the substantiation of that unsettling uneasiness through the use of the single pronoun that follows immediately thereafter, which is namely “Many”. Jesus says: “MANY will say to Me in that day… I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you’”. What troubles me is the actual scale of that “many”. And that these collective “many” include those who have actually prophesied in His name, delivered others from demons, and have done many wonders in Jesus’ name. My initial view was that this eventuality would only be reserved for those who have outright rejected Jesus, and who have consistently denied His name at every turn, and not for those who have done wonders in His name. And yet, surprisingly, included in the accumulation of those deeds considered by Jesus to be “practicing lawlessness”, Jesus includes the deeds of prophesying in His name, casting out demons in His name, and doing wonders in His name. It would seem a given to me initially that all those deeds that include prophesying in the LORD’s name, casting out demons in His name, and doing wonders in His name would automatically “qualify in” as deeds that fulfill the will of the Father.

     Firstly, it is very clear from this exhortation that not only is it “by man’s behaviour” that man is thus known, thereby underpinning the age-old worldy adage that “man is defined by his behaviour”, but also, significantly, that “knowing a man by his deeds” is the very same yardstick by which the LORD shall deem He knows or doesn’t know each and every man. Which ties perfectly back to the exhortation of the same found in PROVERBS 20:11 that a man will be KNOWN by “his works”. “Even a child shall be KNOWN by his DOINGS, by whether his WORK be pure, and whether it be right.”

     Secondly, when it comes to that watershed day, and to those whom, on the one hand, the LORD deems He DOES know, these will be all those of the particular group who have been QUALIFIED IN by being those who have “done deeds”, but not just any deeds, but those deeds that exclusively and specifically “fulfill His Father’s will”. Which also narrows the scope of eligibility down very precisely and quite considerably of whom He declares on that day that He does know.

     Thirdly, for those who DON’T do His will, there is a specific eventuality in store for them. And that end is this: an almighty fall, which begins with “the great fall from grace” of being told by the Everlasting, “I never KNEW you, depart from me, you who practice lawlessness!” And of these, from this exhortation we can, therefore, also tell that Jesus will exclude from those whom He declares He knows two specific groups. The first of these two groups to be QUALIFIED OUT will include all of those who “don’t do any deeds”, a scenario as represented by the exhortation in the parable of MATTHEW 25:14-30. “After a long time the master of those servants returned and SETTLED ACCOUNTS WITH THEM… Then the man who had received one bag of gold came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘…I was afraid and went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.’ His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! ...So take the bag of gold from him and give it to the one who has ten bags. For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’”

     What is important to point out here is that all the human subjects of the parable are people whom God considers to be “servants”, and also those whom God has given to each “particular assets” described as “gold” to go out and carry out righteous deeds that glorify Him (that fulfil His will). Servants are those who are not strangers to the LORD. So, alarmingly, these are all believers. Those who don’t know the LORD are by definition already disqualified. As far as the “gold” is concerned, gold covers both the gold of “the divine nature”, being the gold we carry on the INSIDE (dunamis) which the Potter refines until pure seven times, and the gold of gifts, being the anointing we carry on the OUTSIDE (exousia). Both are currency that God bestows on man to go out into the world and be a light on a hill. It is through the gold of the second nature and the gifts that we are able to be both a witness to the world and a blessing, and thereby bring glory (represented by gold) to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

     The second group to be told “I never knew you; depart from me, you who practice lawlessness” is the particular group of believers who, by comparison, do carry out deeds, but whose deeds specifically do not “fulfill the will of the Father”. And so, too, will this group likewise also be QUALIFIED OUT on that day. And the reason for their disqualification is provided because, by Jesus’ declaration, their particular deeds are those deeds that “practice lawlessness”. In being “lawless” deeds, they are of those deeds that are, by definition, “not righteous” deeds. And by not being righteous deeds, we know they will automatically not “fulfill the will of the Father”. Furthermore, we also know that there actually is such a category of deeds for the scriptures tell us this in ISAIAH 64:6. “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags.”

     Having said this, it takes a second pass to understand just how such deeds could be considered as not satisfying the criteria of fulfilling the Father’s will. To qualify as deeds that fulfill the will of the Father, they need to be deeds that have been explicitly and expressly done to glorify God. And this determining qualifier we get from 1 CORINTHIANS 10:31. “Therefore whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do ALL THINGS to the glory of God.” If these deeds have been those prophecies, or those acts of casting out demons in the LORD’s name, or those of doing wonders, but they have not been done to glorify God, but have rather been done, instead, to glorify self or profit self, then they do not qualify as deeds that fulfil the will of the Father. In other words, it is not enough to do deeds “in the name of the LORD” to qualify as having fulfilled the will of the Father. They also need to be done with “the right motive”.

     Which is precisely where the admonition against false prophets comes into the frame as well. Which is exactly why the LORD tells us He is able to discern between the thoughts and intentions of the heart in HEBREWS 4:12, as well as that: “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.” HEBREWS 4:13. What Jesus did for love and for the glory of His Father, false prophets do for money, and for their own glory and fame, and for their own personal gain. Their motives are impure and, therefore, they practice lawlessness and lack righteousness. And since man is known by his deeds, for those who do not practice deeds of righteousness, 1 JOHN 3:10 tells us exactly by how they will be known: “By this we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.”

     Which now also explains how it is possible for Jesus to declare to those who do all these amazing and powerful things in the name of the LORD, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!” Which also explains how those who operate in the power of the gifts to do wonders with wrong motives are still able to do what they do since: “For all the gifts and the calling are without repentance.” – ROMANS 11:29.   

     The Word tells us in PROVERBS 9:10 that the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the LORD and that the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. God is not a God who will be mocked. “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked.” GALATIANS 6:7.  In MATTHEW 22:37-39 , the mandates of what is pure love are very clear. The gifts are not for our benefit. They are given for the benefit of others and for empowering us to love our neighbour as ourselves, and for demonstrating that we love God with all our heart, all our soul and all our mind. And if we are not using the gifts to benefit others, but rather to benefit ourselves, we use them with the wrong motive, and we mock the purpose for which they were given. And God cannot be mocked. And anyone who mocks the mandate to do all to the glory of God, not only lacks wisdom and understanding, but their righteous deeds will be “as filthy rags”, and will never satisfy the will of God, and they will all be defined as those whom Jesus declares on that imminent day, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!”

"Remember the height from which you have FALLEN! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come and remove your lampstand from its place." REVELATION 2:5

"Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honour and glory for ever and ever." 1 TIMOTHY 1:17.

God's richest blessings for always and forever, Wayne Biehn.