The Final Judgment
Every soul that has ever drawn breath will one day stand before God—and the Judge of all the earth will do right.
There is a day appointed when the long story of every human life will be read aloud before the throne of God. No deed will be forgotten, no word unaccounted for, no secret desire of the heart hidden from the searching eye of perfect justice. The Final Judgment is the great consummation of the plan of salvation—the moment when the mortal probation closes, the books are opened, and each of us receives the wages of what we have truly become. It is at once the most sobering and, for the faithful, the most hopeful doctrine in all of scripture, because the One who sits in judgment is the same One who bled in Gethsemane and died upon the cross to redeem us.
All Will Stand Before God
The scriptures testify with one voice that no one is exempt. The proud and the lowly, the king and the beggar, the believer and the scoffer—all will be summoned together before the bar of God. John the Revelator was shown this universal assembly in vision, and he described the opening of the record by which mankind would be judged.
“And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.”
The phrase “small and great” sweeps away every distinction of rank and station. The records of heaven are no respecters of persons. Nephi’s brother Jacob, prophesying of this same day, spoke of it as the judgment of the Holy One of Israel—a judgment from which there is no escaping and which is administered by infinite knowledge.
“And it shall come to pass that when all men shall have passed from this first death unto life, insomuch as they have become immortal, they must appear before the judgment-seat of the Holy One of Israel; and then cometh the judgment, and then must they be judged according to the holy judgment of God. And assuredly, as the Lord liveth… they who are righteous shall be righteous still, and they who are filthy shall be filthy still.”
Resurrection Precedes Judgment
Before any soul is judged, it must first be made whole. God does not arraign disembodied spirits; He raises men and women in resurrected, immortal bodies—every limb restored, every faculty perfected—so that the whole person, body and spirit reunited, stands accountable. Amulek taught this truth with striking precision.
“The spirit and the body shall be reunited again in its perfect form; both limb and joint shall be restored to its proper frame… and we shall be brought to stand before God… and be arraigned before the bar of Christ the Son, and God the Father, and the Holy Spirit… and be judged according to our works, whether they be good or whether they be evil.”
Alma similarly explained that the resurrection gathers up all that death has scattered, so that nothing is lost and the soul is presented complete before its Maker, ready to receive an everlasting reward or condemnation.
“The spirits of all men, as soon as they are departed from this mortal body… are taken home to that God who gave them life… the spirits of the righteous are received into a state of happiness… And then shall it come to pass, that the spirits of the wicked… shall be cast out into outer darkness… thus they remain in this state… until the time of their resurrection.”
The Standard of Judgment: Works, Words, and the Desires of the Heart
By what measure are we judged? The scriptures answer comprehensively: not by our outward deeds alone, but by our words, our works, and the very thoughts and desires of our hearts. The judgment penetrates beneath the surface of behavior to the secret intentions of the soul. Alma the Younger taught his son Corianton that the principle governing this judgment is restoration—that whatever a person sends out returns to him in kind.
“It is requisite with the justice of God that men should be judged according to their works; and if their works were good in this life, and the desires of their hearts were good, that they should also, at the last day, be restored unto that which is good… The one raised to happiness according to his desires of happiness, or good according to his desires of good; and the other to evil according to his desires of evil.”
This is why the judgment is perfectly fair: it gives each person exactly the nature he has cultivated. Abinadi declared that even our words and works are witnesses, and Alma taught that our own thoughts will rise up to accuse or to defend us in that day.
“For our words will condemn us, yea, all our works will condemn us; we shall not be found spotless; and our thoughts will also condemn us; and in this awful state we shall not dare to look up to our God.”
Abinadi confirmed that the Redeemer Himself stands as the standard, for He came to be judged of the world and to redeem His people, that those who do iniquity might answer for it. Yet the most consoling expansion of this doctrine came through a vision granted to the Prophet Joseph Smith, in which the Lord revealed that He judges according to the desires of the heart—so that those who had no opportunity to receive the gospel in mortality, but would have received it with all their hearts, are not lost.
“For I, the Lord, will judge all men according to their works, according to the desire of their hearts.”
Who Sits in Judgment
The Father, in His wisdom, has not reserved this office to Himself. He has committed the whole of judgment into the hands of His Son—the One who descended below all things, who walked among men, who knows mortality from the inside, and who alone has earned the right to judge by His infinite Atonement.
“For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son.”
Christ, in turn, calls others to assist in the judgment of particular peoples. Those who have been chosen as His authorized servants will share in this sacred work. Nephi saw that the Twelve Apostles of the Lamb would judge the house of Israel in the Old World.
“Thou rememberest the twelve apostles of the Lamb? Behold they are they who shall judge the twelve tribes of Israel; wherefore, the twelve ministers of thy seed shall be judged of them.”
This accords with the Savior’s own promise to His Apostles in Jerusalem, that in the day of restitution they would sit upon thrones and share in His judgment—“ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel” (Matthew 19:28). Beneath the Son, the judgment is thus orderly and delegated, yet every verdict traces back to the perfect knowledge and mercy of the Redeemer who presides over all.
Mercy Through Christ: The Only Escape from Justice
Standing before this judgment, every honest soul must confess that, measured by the bare demands of justice, he is undone. For the law of God is exacting, and the wages of sin is death. King Benjamin declared that without the Atonement, no flesh could be saved—that salvation comes only through the name of Christ and through repentance.
“And thus saith the Lord: They shall stand as a bright testimony against this people, at the judgment day… if they be evil they are consigned to an awful view of their own guilt and abominations, which doth cause them to shrink from the presence of the Lord into a state of misery and endless torment… whose torment is as a lake of fire and brimstone, whose flame ascendeth up forever and ever.”
Justice cannot be robbed; the law must be honored. But Alma revealed the glorious resolution: the Atonement of Christ satisfies the demands of justice and opens the way for mercy to claim the penitent. Mercy does not overthrow justice—it pays its price in full.
“But there is a law given, and a punishment affixed, and a repentance granted; which repentance, mercy claimeth; otherwise, justice claimeth the creature and executeth the law… And the atonement bringeth to pass the resurrection of the dead; and the resurrection of the dead bringeth back men into the presence of God; and thus they are restored into his presence, to be judged according to their works, according to the law and justice.”
The Judge Is the Redeemer
Here is the crowning truth that transforms the Final Judgment from a doctrine of dread into a doctrine of hope. The very Being who will sit upon the throne, before whom the books are opened, who knows every word and work and secret desire—that Judge is none other than the Lamb who was slain. He does not judge as a distant magistrate consulting a cold ledger. He judges as the Redeemer who purchased us with His own blood, who carried our sorrows, who knows our weaknesses not from above but from within, having descended below them all.
Because He is perfectly just, no sin will be excused and no good deed overlooked; the wicked who would not repent will receive the reward of their own desires, and the universe will be set right. And because He is perfectly merciful, every soul who has fled to Him in faith and repentance will find that justice has already been satisfied at Calvary, and that the wounds in His hands and feet plead their cause. The same nail-pierced hands that will hold the scales of justice are the hands that were pierced to redeem us.
Therefore the Final Judgment is the great vindication of God’s character—perfectly just, so that evil never finally triumphs; perfectly merciful, so that the repentant are never finally lost. In that day, the righteous will not shrink but will look up with confidence into the face of their Friend and Advocate, and hear the only verdict their hearts have longed to hear. For the Judge of all the earth will indeed do right—and the Judge is the Redeemer who bought us.