Let me set the scene. This is during the last month, probably the last weeks of Jesus’ ministry. It’s almost time for him to head to the cross. He’s just ridden triumphantly into Jerusalem on a donkey. Thrown over the money-changers tables in the temple. Cursed a fig tree. And now he’s back hanging out at the Temple. And the Pharisees and the Sadducees keep taking turns asking him questions and trying to make him stumble on his words so that they have a reason to arrest him, because they know the crowd would get really ticked if they did.
So they question him about his authority, and about paying taxes, and the resurrection of the dead, and the greatest commandment in the Law. And all their attempts to prove him wrong backfire on them, and they’re getting super annoyed. And in the midst of all of this, Jesus is telling all of these parables, these stories about usurping tenants, and ungrateful wedding guests, and lazy servants. And they know that he’s talking about them. And he tells them that prostitutes and tax collectors are getting into the Kingdom before them, and that the first will be last and the last will be first. And then he goes off on them, calling them hypocrites, blind guides, snakes, brood of vipers. He tells them that they’ve completely missed the point. That their following the law is useless without true justice, mercy and faithfulness. And at this point, Jesus is getting super passionate, and heartbroken, and he cries out to Jerusalem, longing to gather her into his arms, like a hen gathers her chicks. And he’s just broken that his people have strayed so far away from his Father.
And then he leaves, probably to be alone and rejuvenate with his Father. But as he’s going his disciples come up to him, and they’re all, “Hey look at the Temple! Isn’t it awesome?” And Jesus says, “Do you see all these things? Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.” And I can just imagine how Jesus must be feeling. He’s been bombarded with questions from the religious leaders, and has just gotten really angry with them because they were more concerned with tithing from their spice rack than showing love to a leper. And all his disciples can think of is how beautiful this building is, their center of worship is. They’ve completely missed the point.
And so Jesus is sitting on the Mount of Olives, and his disciples come and ask him when the end of the world is going to be, and how they’ll be able to tell when Jesus is coming back. And he tells them to be on their guard, and to watch out for false messiahs, and that there will be an increase of wickedness, and that the love of most will grow cold, but that they are to hold strong in love.
Then he tells two parables in a row. And they both say the same thing. The first is the parable of the Ten Virgins who take their lamps to go wait for the bridegroom to come. And he says to be like the wise virgins who brought extra oil, because the ones who didn’t bring enough missed the bridegroom while they went to find more oil because their lamps were going out. And when they knocked on the door, they weren’t allowed in. The bridegroom said, I don’t know you.
The second parable is about three servants who’s master gave them each varying amounts of money to look after while he went away. And two of them doubled the money they were given and were rewarded greatly. And one buried it in the ground because he was afraid of losing it. And he was seriously punished. All he had was taken away and given to the servant with the most, and he was cast out into the darkness.
Then comes the story of the sheep and the goats. This is the climax. He’s been talking about all the stuff that is going to happen and how we should behave before he returns. And now he says what will happen when he returns. He says,
“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’ They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’ He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’ Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
I think that this passage can be misunderstood sometimes. First misconception: that he’s only talking about unbelievers. But he says “all the nations”..and I don’t think he’s exaggerating here or anything. I’m pretty sure he means all nations. In Matthew 12:33-37, Jesus talks about how all people will have to give account on the day of judgement. I think this passage is a picture of what will happen. Again, there’s this separation between wise and foolish, faithful and unfaithful. Except this time he’s a lot more explicit. In the other 2 parables, it’s all imagery. But this section is really concrete. It’s not between some obscure master and servant, but between Jesus and all the people’s of the earth. And what it all seems to come down to is were you just? Were you merciful? Were you faithful? Because however you treated to lowest of the low, and the most broken, that is how you treated Jesus. He came down really hard on the religious leaders of the day for clinging too much to their religious structures, so much that they forgot about justice, mercy, and faithfulness. What they clung to wasn’t bad. They were very meticulous about the Law, and the law in itself is not bad. But it became a distraction from what the true essence of worship was. And it makes me wonder what we, as a modern, somewhat anti-establishment, church have begun to cling to that has caused us to wander from what our Father has called us to. Micah 6:8 says that this is what the Lord requires of us - to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God. How can we be more just as a community? How can we be more merciful? How do we need to humble ourselves before God? What have we, as a community and as individuals, put before him? What have we made so religious that it is preventing us from truly serving God?
You know something really scary that I’ve been realizing? It’s that we all worship, all the time. Everyone does. But some of the time, we’re not aware of what we’re worshipping. Some of the time, we’re not worshipping God, because we’ve consciously or sub-consciously chosen to put something else in the place of most importance in our lives. That’s scary. I wanted to bring this to your attention, because most of the time what we’re worshipping instead of God are not bad things in themselves. But when we put them first in our lives, we become idolators, and we break the most important commandment to love God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind, with every inch of our being, with every breath that we take. I think we need to become more aware of the fact that we are constantly worshipping. We should celebrate it! We have the potential to worship God in every situation, from walking the dog and doing the dishes, to feeding and clothing the poor and looking after someone who’s sick. This is fantastic! It means that all the mundane things in our lives can become life-giving, breath-taking things. Our reason for living is to glorify God, and he is most glorified when we are most fully alive and satisfied in him. Saint Irenaeus said that the glory of God is a human being, fully alive. Paul puts it really great in Ephesians chapter 2. He says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” We are called to be partners with God in the Kingdom. God is Creator - we get to be SubCreators; God is King - We get to be ImageBearers; God is Trinity - we get to be CommunityBuilders; God is Savior - we get to be SalvificStorytellers.(1)
So may you discover what it is to be truly alive in God. May you realize more and more your potential to worship God at every moment, in every circumstance. And may you be obedient to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God through Jesus Christ. Amen.
(1) Dan Wilt. Nature of Human Beings. Essentials Blue.
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