What does the Bible say on the importance of accountability?

Is man responsible? Yes, just as certainly as God is sovereign. Whatever we think of it, God has declared that "every one of us shall give an account to God" (Ro. 14:12). In fact, the Lord Jesus Himself is quoted in Matthew 12:36, "I say to you, that every careless word that men shall speak, they shall render account of it in the day of judgment." At that time no one will dare to say he was obliged to do the evil works he has done, nor to speak the evil words that came from his lips. He will have to confess himself guilty of wilfully shirking his responsibility. Even now his own conscience tells him this. lf one really believes that God is sovereign, is he not thus admitting that his own place therefore is that of a subject who is to submit to God? Faith in a sovereign God stirs the heart with a sense of responsibility to be obedient to Him.

Second, the discovery that man owes his existence to God, leads to the truth of his accountability to Him. We read, “Every one of us shall give account of himself to God” (Rom. 14:12). “We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he has done, whether it be good or bad” (2 Cor. 5:10).

To the solemn fact that all men must have to do with God abundant testimony is borne by the gospel. We read in Romans 14, “As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall how to Me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.” And not only the overt acts, which men might be able to take account of, but the hidden motives, from which the actions spring, must all be brought to light, for “all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do” (Heb. 4:13).

I am not aware that this expression, "the judgment-seat of God" or "the judgment-seat of Christ," is found anywhere else than in Romans 14 and 2 Corinthians 5: in the first of these two passages with a view to prevent individual judgments; in the second with a view to provoke to do good. The subject in itself is one of the most solemn and at the same time most blessed, and this so much the more as we understand it rightly. I believe that each act of our lives will be manifested then before the tribunal, according as the grace of God and His ways with us in connection with our own acts will be known then. We read (Rom. 14) that "every one of us shall give account of himself to God"; and the word, in this passage, mentions the tribunal in connection with the exhortation to brethren not to judge one another in respect of days, meats, or any other such thing.

With this humility and brokenness, the apostle connects heart-searching and examination of one's ways. "But let every man prove his own work, and then shall he have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another. For every man shall bear his own burden" (Gal. 6:4-5). Gal. 6:5 in no way contradicts Gal. 6:2. In the earlier verse it is a question of sympathy with one another's infirmities. We are to be helpers of each other, bearing one another's burdens (bare). Here it is responsibility where each must stand alone; "every man shall bear his own burden" (phortion). Responsibility cannot be shifted to other shoulders; each individual saint will have to render his own account to God. Solemn consideration! We are apt to lose sight of the judgment-seat of Christ where all that we have done in the body will be gone into by the Lord. But to overlook it is dangerous. Grace does not do away with responsibility, but rather deepens it.

In that solemn hour, "every one of us shall give account of himself to God" (verse 12), In these words we get a dogmatic statement of our second principle. Each shall give account of himself, and not of another. Our responsibility is direct and personal, solitary and alone. Upon this is based the exhortation, "Let us not therefore judge one another any more; but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling-block or an occasion to fall in his brother's way" (verse 13) .

Look back upon your life. Think of the thousands of idle words that have carelessly dropped from your lips. Carelessly they have been dropped, but carefully recorded. Did not the Lord say, “I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment” (Matt. 12:36). “Every one of us shall give account of himself to God” (Rom. 14:12). We “shall give account to Him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead” (1 Peter 4:5).

Here we have a most solemn and weighty truth to which men of all ranks and conditions would do well to take heed. God is the Sovereign Ruler of the world. He gives no account of any of His matters. He puts down one and sets up another. Kingdoms, thrones, governments are all at His disposal. He acts according to His own will, in the ordering and arrangement of human affairs. But, at the same time, He holds men responsible for their actings, in the various positions in which His providence has placed them. The ruler and the ruled, the king, the governor, the magistrate, the judge, all classes and grades of men will have, sooner or later, to give account to God. Each one, as if he were the only one, will have to stand before the judgement-seat of Christ, and there review his whole course, from first to last. Every act, every word, every secret thought will there come out with awful distinctness. There will be no escaping in a crowd. The word declares that they shall be judged "every man according to his works." It will be intensely individual, and unmistakably discriminating. In a word, it will be a divine judgement, and therefore, absolutely perfect. Nothing will be passed over. "Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof at the day of judgement." Kings, governors and magistrates will have to account for the way in which they have used the power with which they were entrusted, and the wealth which passed through their hands. The noble and the wealthy who have spent their fortune and their time in folly, vanity, luxury and self-indulgence will have to answer for it all, before the throne of the Son of man, whose eyes are as a flame of fire, to read men through and through; and His feet as fine brass, to crush, in unsparing judgement, all that is contrary to God.

All this must be sedulously avoided. The grace that has delivered us from judgment should exert a more powerful influence upon our ways than the fear of that judgment. And not only so, but we must remember that while we, as sinners, are delivered from judgment and wrath, yet, as servants, we must give account of ourselves and our ways. It is not a question of our being exposed here or there to men, angels, or devils. No; "we must give account to God." (Rom. 14:11-12) This is far more serious, far more weighty, far more influential, than our being exposed in the view of any creature. "Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not to men; knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance; for ye serve the Lord Christ. But he that does wrong shall receive for the wrong which he has done: and there is no respect of persons." (Col. 3:23-25)

What immense gain will our manifestation now be to ourselves! We shall know as we are known. If now, when perfect peace is possessed before God in a purged conscience, the Christian looks back at all his past life before and since his conversion, what a lesson of grace, patience, holy government for his good, that he may be partaker of His holiness — of care against unseen dangers, of instruction and of love will his new history afford the Christian! How much more, when freed from the very nature which produced the evil in him, he knows as he is known, and can trace now perfectly God's ways with him! It will immensely increase and enhance his appreciation of what God has been for him, and of His patient, perfect grace and purpose of love. It is surely a solemn thing, but of immense price and value to us. It is all wrought out in the conscience, as we learn from Romans 14:12. Here it is the fact. Remark the true effect on a right state of mind. First, not a thought of judgment as to righteousness has any place whatever. The judgment-seat only awakens that love which thinks of those still exposed to it. "Knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade men." Secondly, it is realized so as to put him who realizes it responsibly in the presence of God. Now, "we are manifested to God." Oh, what a healthful and blessed thing this is for the soul! The rest is a mere effect readily hoped for — "I trust that we are manifested in your consciences." The other considerations produced a conduct proper to have this effect; but if a man was before God it was of little matter, did not affect the soul, save in the desire of others' good and Christ's glory. This double effect will certainly be produced in any such manifestation before others, and we then shall as certainly desire nothing else. The shame of a nature we have left will not be there then; the just judgment of evil will. I say this, however, in respect of the present condition of the soul. Anxiety on this point is a proof that the soul is not wholly in the sight of God. There it disappears because we are wholly there. Scripture never brings in the thought of brethren as concerned in this manifestation, and could not; but it does maintain, in the fullest way, manifestation in the light, so that if the heart reserves anything, has not brought it wholly out before God, it should be ill at ease. We are certainly perfectly manifested to the Lord, consciously I mean, (for we always are so,) and to ourselves. If it be for His glory that anything should be known to the saints also, we shall not regret it then; but our proper, full manifestation is certainly to God, and in our own souls. All that is needed to verify the government of God will, I doubt not, be made manifest. All that has been, through evil, sought to be hidden, so that the heart was false, the counsel of the heart evil, will be brought to light; but where men have walked in the light, the counsels of the heart, however man may have judged them, will be made plain; for in that day God will judge the secrets of men's hearts. His grace and His government may have wrought all this in the world, and some men's sins and good works go before to judgment, but those that are otherwise cannot be hid.