Who We Meet at the Judgment Bar

Many passages in the Book of Mormon warn us about the fact that we will one day stand to be judged of God at his bar for our works.  Amulek warned the people of Ammonihah: “but every thing shall be restored to its perfect frame, as it is now, or in the body, and shall be brought and be arraigned before the bar of Christ the Son, and God the Father, and the Holy Spirit, which is one Eternal God, to be judged according to their works” (Alma 11:44).  Moroni declared, “they shall come forth, both small and great, and all shall stand before his bar, being redeemed and loosed from this eternal band of death, which death is a temporal death. And then cometh the judgment of the Holy One upon them” (Mormon 9:13-14).  Abinadi warned the people of King Noah: “Even this mortal shall put on immortality, and this corruption shall put on incorruption, and shall be brought to stand before the bar of God, to be judged of him according to their works whether they be good or whether they be evil” (Mosiah 16:10).  The message of the Book of Mormon is clear: we will all one day have to account for our works on the earth and stand before God at His judgment bar. 

That reality of the judgment is likely not surprising to most Book of Mormon readers, but what might be is to know who is scheduled to be there to join us at this judgment.  In his final words in the Book of Mormon, Nephi declared with boldness that his testimony that he wrote down was indeed true: “And if they are not the words of Christ, judge ye—for Christ will show unto you, with power and great glory, that they are his words, at the last day; and you and I shall stand face to face before his bar; and ye shall know that I have been commanded of him to write these things” (2 Nephi 33:11).  This is quite the powerful message: each of us individually will stand face to face with Nephi in the day of judgment.  We will, these words seem to say, have to account for how we have treated Nephi’s testimony in the Book of Mormon, and we will know at that day that he indeed was telling the truth. 

But Nephi is the not only Book of Mormon prophet whom we shall see at the bar of God at our judgment.  Interestingly, the final writer in the Book of Mormon left the same warning to us.  Moroni declared in his last chapter: “And I exhort you to remember these things; for the time speedily cometh that ye shall know that I lie not, for ye shall see me at the bar of God; and the Lord God will say unto you: Did I not declare my words unto you, which were written by this man, like as one crying from the dead, yea, even as one speaking out of the dust?” (Moroni 10:27)  And Nephi and Moroni aren’t the only ones either.  After warning us not to reject the words of the prophets in the holy scriptures, Jacob warned, “Know ye not that if ye will do these things, that the power of the redemption and the resurrection, which is in Christ, will bring you to stand with shame and awful guilt before the bar of God?”  He then wrote what he thought were his final words (before he decided to add what happened with Sherem): “Finally, I bid you farewell, until I shall meet you before the pleasing bar of God, which bar striketh the wicked with awful dread and fear. Amen” (Jacob 6:9,13).  We will see Nephi, Jacob, and Moroni when we stand at the bar of God to be judged.  We will have to give some kind of accounting for how we have treated the words of Christ written for us by them in the Book of Mormon.  If we have not believed and followed those words, the Lord may point to them as we stand before Him and ask us, “Did I not declare my words unto you, which were written by [these men]?”