[Footnote 138: St. Matt, v., 12.]
Our Lord, you see, uses the word reward which I have used. "Every one shall receive his own reward according to his labor." [Footnote 139]
[Footnote 139: 1 Cor. iii., 8.]
St. Paul here adds another idea to that of reward, namely, that it shall be given according to one's labor, or good works. This is what our Lord says in the words of my text: "Behold I come quickly, and my reward is with me, to render to every man according to his work." "For the rest there is laid up for me a crown of justice, which the Lord the just Judge will give me in that day; and not to me only, but to them also who love his coming." [Footnote 140]
[Footnote 140: 2 Tim. iv., 8.]
In this passage St. Paul tells us another truth about the principle of final rewards. He says they shall be given by way of justice. The time for mercy will then have passed, and we shall be weighed in the balance of justice, and our reward shall be in strict proportion to the weight of merit we have cast into the scale. "Therefore, my beloved brethren (he writes to the Corinthians), be ye firm and immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord; knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord." [Footnote 141]
[Footnote 141: 1 Cor. xv., 58.]
Then, there is that passage of which I have already spoken, where St. Paul illustrates the diversity of rewards. "For there is one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for one star differeth from another star in glory. So also shall it be in the resurrection from the dead."