The aim of this article is to clearly point out to us how God rewards, especially His own children, thereby correcting the impression and the mindset that some have about God, why they have been doing what they do and yet haven’t seen any tangible thing they could call a reward from God. The Scripture says in Galatians 6:7, Do not be deceived God cannot be mocked, whatever a man sows, that will he reap. So we can see that Gods reward is directly commensurate to what you do. See what Jesus said in Revelations 22:12, And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be. Did we see that? According to his work, not more than his work or less than his work but according to his work. So whatever you had received or you are yet to receive as reward is directly proportional to the kind of works you had done. This means that measure of Gods reward you experience today is a function of how much work you have done in the past that was approved by God.

   

I would like us to begin our meditation from a Scripture in Hebrews 11:6. It says; “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”  I am sure you are wondering, or perhaps asking; what has faith got to do with reward?  I just want us to quickly point out a sequence from this verse. It says but without faith it is impossible to please God. Note that word “please” you must please God to receive from God, and if you must please God then you must walk in faith, but that is not just it, remember we are looking at how to attract reward from God, and how Gods reward system works. So, before you can get any reward from God, you must first please Him, how? By walking in faith. The Scripture says; By faith the elders obtained their testimony, they obtained their rewards. No one receives gets rewarded for being doubtful, until you please God by believing God, you can never receive anything from God.

 

Believers have been taught and have learnt over the years that faith is all you need to get what you want from God, that is true, it is the pre-requisite. You must be a God pleaser. What Apostle Paul is trying to say here is that a child in whom the father is not pleased with will never receive anything good from the father. The Scripture says; If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him! (Matthew 7:11) It is not enough that you ask the Father, it is important that you ask in faith. And if you ask in faith, you have pleased the Father, and if the Father is pleased with you, then you can receive from Him. So what is the lesson we should learn from this verse? Children ask for bread, they ask for fish, they ask for what will satisfy them now! But it is not so with sons. So let us continue, the remaining part of that verse says; for he who come to the Father must first believe that “He is” this talks about the existence of God.

 

“That He is” in other words, that He hears, He listens, He is mindful of you, His ears are not deaf, this talks about the fact that you are serving a living God not a dead god. That is why faith is necessary. You are talking to a God you do not know, yet you believe that He exist and He listens to your request. Now the concluding verse of that Scripture is what baffles me, it says He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. Gods reward system is designed to favor the seekers. What do I mean by that? When you continue to make request or ask and you always receive, there is a tendency that you may not know that person who provides as you ought to. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 7:7, ask and it will be given to you, seek and you shall find; knock, and it will be opened to you. I want you to note that word; “SEEK” and the first Scriptures says; “seek diligently.” Now The sequence is this; ask in faith, and it will be given to you, your Father in heaven will give to you why because you have pleased Him, but that is a level or a kind of prayer.

 

There is another kind of prayer you pray and all you desire is not to receive but to seek diligently. God has so many rewards, it depends on the type you want to go for. No wonder apostle Paul said “that I may know Him, the power of His resurrection the fellowship of His sufferings being conformed to His death” Did we see that? It goes beyond asking for bread and butter. He said I want to know you more, I want to experience the resurrection power, I want to fellowship with your sufferings; dear reader this is what provokes a higher dimension of Gods reward. This reminds me of a Scripture in Jeremiah 29:13, And you will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. This kind of prayer is not seeking for material reward, but seeking for God Himself. So what kind of prayer have you been praying lately? It is good to ask God for needs, but that is a level, I would want you to seek for something higher. This level of prayer adds faith and the heart to the sequence, which also talks about diligence. You are focused and all of your attention is on God. Just to find Him. If you are wise this is the prayer you should start praying. Finding God is the whole essence of our creation, men have been seeking for God in one way or the other after the fall in the garden of Eden, and since then the search continues. This is beyond religion, pretense and self. Because If you can find God then you have found everything else in life.  So what kind of reward do you want to get from God, do you want God to give you material possession? Or you want God to give Himself to you as a possession.

 

The second factor that influences Gods reward system is what you do with your secret life. Let us take a look at Matthew 6, I will begin from verse 1. It says; “Take heed that you do not do your charitable deeds before men, to be seen by them. Otherwise you have no reward from your Father in heaven. ² Therefore, when you do a charitable deed, do not sound a trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory from men.” This is what I mean by how you handle your secret life. Do not be hypocritical, you must take heed. We have seen here that Hypocrites never get rewards from God, why because they prefer to get accolades from men. So whatever they do, they don’t care about how God sees it, but how men see it.

 

So they paint a good impression before men but standing as hypocrites before God. If you want God to reward you, you must prefer to be a God pleaser rather than be a people pleaser. So, what is the other way of pleasing the Father apart from Faith? The answer is simple; “that you do not do your charitable deeds before men, to be seen by men.”  If Jesus is saying here that we should do charitable deeds before men but it should not be seen by men, what does this mean? Your deeds must only be seen by the Father, and what is the nature of the Father? The Scripture describes Him as the Father of Spirits. So works and deeds that attract rewards from the Father of spirit must be spiritual. Now when you read down to verse 4, Jesus made an amazing statement that I want us to carefully look at. It says; that your charitable deed may be in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will Himself reward you ^[a]openly. It says “My Father who sees in the secret”, the Bible says in 1 Samuel 2:3. for the LORD is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed. Did we see that? Daniel 2:22 says; He knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with Him. So, nothing is hidden from His sight, He sees in the secret, maybe the reason why men are being hypocritical is because they think God does not see the things they do in the secret. But this is what you must understand, when God wants to reward you by what you do in the secret He makes it open.

 

So what are you doing in the secret that, if God should reward you in the open; will you will be proud of yourself or would you rather feel ashamed and embarrassed? You must reflect on this. Now another word that deserves to be given attention as we conclude on this thought line is what is written in verse 6. It says; But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you ^[c]openly. Does my secret place affect Gods reward system? Yes! it does, the reason is obvious, it was stated clearly here. Jesus gave two characteristics of the Father He said He is in the secret place and He sees in the secret place. Let me conclude by saying this and I hope it finds you well? God does not see in the open, He only sees in the secret place, whatever you take out of the secret place is taken out of the sight of God, and if God does not see it, how will He reward it? God does not reward the hypocrite; Gods reward is for those that diligently seek Him in the secret.

Thanks for the gift of your time, I am Apeh Francis Abah!

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