31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 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. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
34 “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. 35 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, 36 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.’
37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40 “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.’
41 “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. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 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.’
44 “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?’
45 “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.’
46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
As I thought about this text I tried to be perfectly honest with myself. As a clergyman I’d like to claim everything I do qualifies as service to Christ.. I’ve given my life. Well, not so fast Lee. I had a chaplain friend many years ago who told me he didn’t tithe. “My whole life is a tithe” he told me. OK, let me ask this: Who benefits from him holding back $1,000 a month from the offering plate? Jesus or the chaplain?
Whatever we do…whether evangelizing a neighborhood or feeding the homeless, or loving our children…is understood by God as having been done for Christ if our only purpose is obedience to Him. On the other hand, we can pour out our lives as missionaries in a foreign land and it benefits us nothing if we are not doing it for Jesus.
But, of course, why would anybody do that if it were not for Jesus? Believe me when I say there are countless motivations for doing good “church work”. Only one of them brings eternal benefit.
As they say…”follow the money”.
So, finally, we get to the point of it all…when Jesus comes he will finally separate the believers from the unbelievers. While this is very good news for us…not so much for the unbelievers.
“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.
The world wants to know what standard Jesus plans to use. I suppose you and I would like to be sure as well. Here’s the bottom line: ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
The life that is poured out in service to Christ is the life Jesus will identify for eternal rewards. It’s not complicated in principle, but an enigma in practice. Mostly, because we don’t see Christ in the things we do every day. Our Lord helps us out by saying “service to Christ” is defined as an attitude of the heart.
How does that work? We know scripture clearly teaches that only a personal relationship with Christ derives eternal life…nothing else. I’ll suggest that none of us has the fortitude to live a lifetime in service to Jesus without knowing him. There are way too many distractions. We see proof of this in disintegrating relationships all around us. God is able to determine our motivation perfectly because, unlike you and I, He look at the heart.
The life that is “poured out” is the intended to be evidence of the faith that is “poured in”.
Live boldly out there today…
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