When church officers receive a church member, who has trusted in the Lord, and who makes a profession of faith and says, ‘I believe in Christ, and I believe he has changed my life’; well, they are fallible people, they can make mistakes. They have to say, ‘We’ll wait a little while and see how you live.’ In some churches, they insist that an elder, or officer, will visit the home, and have a look round to catch the atmosphere, see it there is evidence that this person really is the Lord’s. Maybe you might like to ask a member of the family – ‘do you think that boy is really saved?’ ‘No,’ will say mum, ‘you should see the way he behaves at home.’ But Christ didn’t need to do that because he knew all men. He didn’t need to take references.
Christ scans every heart and he knows about every one of us. Are we Christian? Have we sought and found him? Have we trusted in him? Have we then somehow turned to some secret sin, some dreadful secret viewing, some things that have got hold of us? Christ knows. He knows whether in his estimation our worship has been an act of hypocrisy and there are things undealt with in our lives. He also knows if we are striving to obey him despite sinfulness, and repenting of it, and seeking his help to attain personal holiness. If so, he has a blessing for us because he reads our hearts.