Jesus’ most sobering words in the Sermon on the Mount weren’t directed at pagans or open rebels. They were directed at religious people — people who were actively doing things in His name. Understanding what He said, and what it means for ordinary believers today, is one of the most important formation tasks a Christian can undertake.
I remember the first time this passage really landed for me. I was teaching a Sunday School lesson on the Sermon on the Mount and we got to Matthew 7, and I found myself slowing down in a way I hadn’t expected. I’d read these verses before. I knew the passage. But reading it again that morning, I felt something I can only describe as a useful unease — not the anxious, destabilizing kind, but the clarifying kind. The kind that makes you sit up and ask an honest question.
The question isn’t a comfortable one. But it’s one of the most important questions a believer can ask.
What Jesus Actually Said
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'” (Matthew 7:21–23, ESV)
The people Jesus is describing in this passage are not casual Christians. They’re not people who checked a box at a revival meeting and then lived as though nothing changed. They are people who prophesied, cast out demons, and performed miracles — all in Jesus’ name. They were active. They were visible. By any external measure, they looked like they were doing the Lord’s work.
And Jesus says He never knew them.
That phrase — I never knew you — is doing specific theological work. The word Jesus uses for “knew” is ginosko — the kind of knowing that implies deep, personal, relational familiarity. Not factual knowledge about someone. Genuine acquaintance with them. Jesus isn’t saying these people didn’t know about Him, or hadn’t done things in His name. He’s saying there was no real relationship between them. All the activity in the world — even spectacular, supernatural activity — didn’t produce or reflect genuine fellowship with Him.
The diagnostic question this passage leaves with us isn’t “Am I doing enough?” It’s “Do I actually know Him — and does He know me?”
The Distinction That Changes Everything
There is a difference between doing things for God and knowing God. That distinction sounds simple, but it cuts deep — because the two can look identical from the outside, and can even feel similar from the inside, for a long time.
Doing things for God is oriented toward activity. It measures itself by output — by how much was accomplished, how many people were served, how impressive the spiritual résumé has become. It can coexist with genuine belief and genuine desire to honor God. But when activity becomes the primary relationship — when the work substitutes for the communion it was meant to flow from — something important has gone wrong.
Knowing God is oriented toward relationship. It measures itself not by output but by closeness — by whether the daily life of the believer is characterized by genuine, ongoing fellowship with God through prayer, Scripture, and responsive obedience. It produces activity too, but the activity flows from the relationship rather than replacing it.
The people in Matthew 7 had the activity without the relationship. Jesus calls them “workers of lawlessness” — not because the things they did were worthless in themselves, but because they operated independently of genuine submission to Him. They were self-directed in God’s name rather than genuinely directed by God. The activity was real. The relationship wasn’t.
Why Religious People Are the Most Susceptible
This passage is addressed to religious people specifically — and that’s important for believers to sit with. It’s possible to be thoroughly embedded in Christian community, thoroughly familiar with Christian language, and thoroughly active in Christian service while the actual relationship with God has quietly become thin.
It doesn’t happen all at once. It’s usually a gradual drift — the slow accumulation of activity without intimacy, of serving without listening, of doing without being. The exterior remains — the habits, the vocabulary, the community involvement — while the interior slowly hollows.
Jesus addresses this tendency directly elsewhere. In Revelation 2, He writes to the church at Ephesus — a church with impressive orthodoxy, genuine perseverance, and commendable discernment — and tells them: “You have abandoned the love you had at first” (Revelation 2:4, ESV). The activity was still present. The first love had gone. The correction He calls for isn’t more activity. It’s return: “Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first” (Revelation 2:5, ESV).
The antidote to activity-without-relationship isn’t less activity. It’s the restoration of the relational center from which genuine, fruitful activity flows.
What Doing God’s Will Actually Looks Like
If the Matthew 7 warning is about activity disconnected from relationship, then the positive vision of “doing the will of my Father” is activity that flows from relationship — from genuine knowing, genuine submission, and genuine responsiveness to God.
Scripture gives us two great themes that describe the shape of God’s will and that together form the goal toward which a life genuinely oriented toward Him moves.
The first is that God desires to be glorified — not for ego, but because He is the source of everything genuinely good, and because drawing people’s attention toward Him draws them toward life. “Let your light shine before others,” Jesus says, “so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16, ESV). The question this raises isn’t “Did I do something impressive?” but “Did what I did point people toward God rather than toward me?”
The second is that God desires the restoration of every person to fellowship with Himself — that none should remain separated, that all might come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). This is the heartbeat of the whole biblical story — the pursuing love of a God who made humanity for communion with Himself and has been working toward that restoration since the Fall. A life genuinely oriented toward God will, over time, reflect that same orientation toward the people around it.
These two themes together — God’s glory and people’s restoration — form the basic shape of a life that is doing the Father’s will rather than merely doing things in His name.
The Honest Examination
Matthew 7 invites an honest look — not a panicked one, but an honest one. And the questions worth sitting with aren’t “Have I done enough?” or “Am I impressive enough?” They’re simpler and harder at the same time.
Is my spiritual life primarily characterized by activity, or by actual communion with God? Is prayer a genuine conversation or a functional habit? Is Scripture forming me or just informing me? When I serve, is the motivation drawn from the overflow of a relationship with God, or from a need to feel useful, significant, or spiritually adequate?
None of these questions are meant to produce despair — Jesus told this parable not to frighten people away from Him but to call people into genuine relationship with Him. The same Jesus who says “I never knew you” to those who operated independently of Him is the Jesus who says “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28, ESV). The door isn’t closed. The relationship is available. The invitation is real.
But it is a relationship, not a résumé. And the most important spiritual formation work is the kind that keeps the relationship central — that returns to genuine communion when activity has crowded it out, that holds the doing and the knowing together rather than letting one substitute for the other.
Key Takeaways
- Matthew 7:21–23 is addressed to religious people, not unbelievers. The warning is for those who are active in Jesus’ name — which makes it directly relevant to every committed Christian, not just obvious hypocrites.
- “I never knew you” is a relational statement. Jesus isn’t describing insufficient activity. He’s describing the absence of genuine fellowship — a relationship that was never formed despite the activity.
- Doing things for God and knowing God can look identical from the outside. The distinction is internal — whether the activity flows from genuine communion with God or substitutes for it.
- The drift from relationship to performance is gradual. It rarely announces itself. It accumulates through the slow replacement of intimacy with activity, of listening with doing.
- The correction is not less activity — it’s restored relationship. The antidote to religious activity without genuine communion isn’t stopping the activity. It’s returning to the relational center that genuine activity was always meant to flow from.
Questions Worth Sitting With
It should produce honest examination, not fear-driven anxiety. The passage is designed to clarify, not to terrorize. Jesus addresses it to people who are operating independently of genuine relationship with Him — using His name as authority without actually submitting to His lordship. For a believer who is genuinely seeking to know God and walk with Him, this passage is an invitation to examine the quality of that relationship, not a threat to their standing. The same Jesus who gives this warning also says “whoever comes to me I will never cast out” (John 6:37, ESV).
The clearest sign is usually what happens when the service isn’t seen, celebrated, or effective. Service from genuine relationship continues steadily because it flows from love for God and people — it doesn’t require external reward to sustain itself. Service from performance tends to be motivated by the recognition or significance it produces, and becomes harder to sustain when those rewards are absent. Neither is always clearly distinguishable in the moment, but over time the motivational difference reveals itself.
Yes — and this is precisely what the warning to Ephesus in Revelation 2 addresses. The Ephesian church had not abandoned orthodoxy or Christian practice. They had abandoned the love they had at first. Genuine believers can experience seasons of drift where activity continues but the relational center grows thin. The good news is that Jesus’ prescription for Ephesus wasn’t condemnation — it was a call to remember, repent, and return. The relationship is restorable. The drift is reversible.
By treating the ordinary means of grace — prayer, Scripture, community, honest confession — as relational practices rather than religious requirements. Prayer that actually listens, not just speaks. Scripture that is allowed to search and challenge, not just confirm. Community that holds you accountable to genuine formation rather than just visible participation. And honest, regular self-examination that asks not “did I do my spiritual duties today?” but “did I actually encounter God today?” That question, taken seriously over time, tends to keep the relational center alive.
The point of this passage isn’t to unsettle settled believers. It’s to keep every believer honest about what their spiritual life is actually built on. Activity in Jesus’ name is not the same as a life built on knowing Him. The invitation is always to the relationship — to genuine communion with the God who made us for exactly that. Everything else grows from there.
Christ reigns. Christ restores. Christ will return.
Longing for Christ, learning to wait faithfully.
Your brother in Christ,
Duane