Christ the King, Last Sunday after Pentecost (RCL), 20 Nov. 2005
Matthew 25:31-46, Walter W. Harms
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SHEEP OR GOAT

What We Bleat
We thunder it out; we may just have gotten the wheels of the brain moving when we say it; it may be totally mechanical for us when we speak this; we may not even think of what we are saying, when we say in the statement of belief the Nicene Creed: " He will come again in glory to judge both the living and the dead."

Part of that phrase comes from the narrative of the life of Jesus written by this person, the disciple of Jesus, Matthew as he records these remembered words of Jesus: "When the Son of man comes in his glory!"

What We Are Bleating
Jesus is coming back, and coming back in his glory and coming with all the angels with him. "In his glory" means simply there will be mistaking who he really is this time. No possibility that anybody is going to make a mistake about that. He is coming with all the brilliance of the sun, accompanied by the millions of angels. And he will sit on his throne, for this Son of man is the King.

No mistake of who is in charge, no mix up about what his position is.
He is King. Not a constitutional king as in England, not a figure head king as in some Scandinavian countries. This King is Lord of all. He owns this world and all that is in it, including all people, including all of us here today. We are not just subjects; he owns us!

All nations will be gathered before him. The dead will be raised. The living at the time of his coming will be there. You will be there. I will be there. Your friends, neighbors, classmates, significant others.
Your ancestors will be there and your posterity will be there.

The Shepherd King's Surprise Action
He separates all the people into two groups. He'll do it like a shepherd divides the sheep from the goats, sheep on the honored right side; goats on the left.

Until the coming of the Son of man in his glory, they are mixed together, sheep and goats. However, in God's Word, God's people are referred to as sheep. The term, goat is never used of God's people.
Sheep are under the authority of the Good Shepherd, the One who lays down his life for his sheep.

The separation takes place before either group is told what they have or haven't done, or what the basis of separation is. The sheep are told before they know what they've done: "Come, you who are blessed by my Father, take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world."

The Great Surprise
You miss the whole point of Jesus telling us this parable if you do not see that it is not their good deeds that get them the kingdom. They don't earn the kingdom. They inherit it. Inheritance is determined by the giver, not the receiver. There is not the slightest sense at all that somehow a person, you, I, anybody could get the inheritance by doing anything. It is a free gift, as Paul tells the people in Rome, a free gift from God.
Not the slightest chance to keep a score of your deeds in order to qualify.

Score Cards
The righteous hadn't kept score. They don't know their own good deeds.
Maybe they did call them good deeds; maybe not. Often their right hand doesn't know what their left hand is doing. They did what they did because of the necessity to help, love, serve, visit, feed because they had been helped, loved, served, visited, and fed. They were infused, like you infuse a turkey with butter, with the oil of gladness, the Spirit poured into their hearts, and they simply did what they did.

The unrighteous know what they are doing. They kept score of how many times they helped others, the amount they gave, they made sure their picture was in the paper for serving at a soup kitchen, attending a charity ball, and they knew what compelled them to help: social pressure, the desire for recognition, and this. "Someday I may be in that position, God forbid, and I hope someone will help me."

Do we keep score? Have you ever said, "Well, I won't volunteer again."
"I didn't get thanks for all my hard work." Or "my goodness didn't
even get recognized." Do we always have to be asked, stroked,
cajoled, pampered, be sure we're going to have a wonderful time before anyone gets our help? Is that sheep language or goat language?

Do you complain about helping people? About giving to others? Do you want to help only those who are worthy, who make all the right decisions?

In terms of New Orleans, are we going to help only those who had enough sense and the means to get out of New Orleans, or are we not going to help some because they were dumb enough to live below sea level with ancient levees, to poor or old or whatever, not to have the means to get out? Are we to help those who loot only food but not those who took big plasma TVs? Would you and I be willing to help policemen who deserted under fire? Are you a right side or left side person? Sheep or goat?

What the Sheep Get
You know just maybe all this talk about inheriting the kingdom isn"t all that great. What is this kingdom we are to inherit? It is the place where God rules, where the name of God is hallowed and his will is done. It is the time and place where we live with God ruling over our lives. It is where we begin to see people as Jesus saw people.

Soon after Jesus spoke these words about the end times, his passion begins. The passion of Jesus is that time in the city of Jerusalem when he was arrested, tried, crucified, and when he died. In this time of great commitment to his goal of rescuing others, he is found in the outcasts of society. In his passion, Jesus very clearly stands in the shoes of the powerless, the weak, the defenseless, the hated, the tortured. He began his life as a refugee from the flood of hatred from King Herod and he ends his life washed out of his city to the Place of a Skull by the tidal wave, the tsunami of jealousy and rage from people who were his own people, but who did not receive him as their king and claimed Caesar as their king.

Where He Is to Be Found
Is it any wonder then, that we do not see Jesus in the sick, the nursing person, the street corner beggar whether real or false. We want a clean, sterilized, with it, respectable, preferably middle class King.

Jesus says he is found in the broken, for the broken hearted God will not despise. Jesus goes where he can help. He will be found among us as we come to him with broken and contrite hearts. He will be found among those who need help making a go of it in life, as he helped the man who could not make it into the pool of Siloam for healing. He is where people are hungry, without a roof over their head. He goes to the outsider, the foreigner and helps, as he did with the woman from
Phoenicia. He goes where life is needed when there is death; where a
woman lived in the shadows of noonday to get water because she was ashamed to get water from the well any other time.

But Jesus will look like a refugee, a towel head, a druggie, people in the slums and ghettos, people with all kinds of troubles with the law, the drop out, the unwed mother, the person with AIDS.

Where We See Ourselves
I can guarantee you that you will not see him, unless you see yourself there. We were at one time people without Jesus. We were dead in trespasses and sins. We were caught in circumstances that would have left us no better than the person who steals and loots. We are only where we are because the King stooped down and helped us, gave us opportunity and opened up doors that we didn't even see

If the words of the creed, "he will come again in glory," slip too easily off our tongues then perhaps these words also slip too easily off our tongue, "I a poor miserable sinner."

Unless Jesus had found you and given you his life we would be dead in trespasses and sins. And if we think of ourselves as better than anyone else, we are wrong. And unless we see that we through the poverty of Jesus became rich with the only money in the bank that counts, we will not see ourselves as being able to help those who are hungry, thirsty, naked, refugees, wrongly imprisoned.

The King is not only coming, he has come. He continues to come to us.
As he comes, he brings all of needy humanity with him. And there you see Jesus.

Look in the mirror. Do you have a "goat"ee heart and spirit?

The Review for the Finals
You know as I prepared for this, I wondered just what Jesus was up to in telling us this parable. Get us to do more, give more, participate more? I believe the King wants us to again see how gracious he was, is and continues to be to us. He continues to feed us, as he does again in the Sacrament today, for without him we cannot, we do not live. If we cannot live without him, others cannot either. Do we not want others to live? Do we not have to feed them so that they will not connected with the only branch that gives life?

And when the roll is called up yonder, and the King calls your name, not only will you and I and all people be there, but with joy we will gather around the golden throne on the right side of the Lamb that was slain who was and is the King. We will bow in awestruck humility, in deepest adoration and with tears of joy, proclaim this One we call Jesus, King of kings and Lord of lords, forever. Amen.

Walter W. Harms, retired pastor
Austin, TX U. S. A.
Comments? waltpast@aol.com