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Sermon for Christ the King Sunday – November 22, 2020
Matthew 25:31-46
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
In our gospel reading for this morning we find Jesus at the end of his earthly ministry. His passion and death are right around the corner, and before he goes to the cross, Jesus gives his disciples, and us, a glimpse of his coming again. He will come in glory, he tells us, with all his angels with him. He will return as the king of heaven and earth, sitting on his throne of glory with all the nations gathered before him. He will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. The sheep will be at his right hand, and the goats will be at his left. And the king will say to the sheep, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,” while the goats will be told, “You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”
At this point you might be wondering to yourself nervously: “Am I a sheep, or am I a goat?” You might be asking yourself, “What can I do to make sure I’m in the sheep category when Christ returns?” You might be tempted to think that what makes a sheep a sheep is the good things they do. You might think that the ticket in to the good place is to be earned by feeding the hungry and giving a drink to the thirsty and clothing the naked and caring for the sick and visiting the imprisoned. You might start panicking that you haven’t done enough of those things to avoid the bad place.
But this is to get this vision Jesus gives us, this glimpse into his coming again in glory, all wrong. Before Jesus mentions anything about what the sheep have done, he spells out what has made them sheep. Jesus says, “Come, all that are blessed by my Father.” Who is blessed by the Father? Those who have received the salvation he has provided freely as a gift through his Son! Those who are blessed by the Father are those who have received Jesus in faith! That’s what Jesus has been saying over and over again up to this point! Jesus then points to an inheritance that is given to the sheep. An inheritance is not something you earn, it is something you are given because someone has died. This is precisely what Christ is just about to do. He is the Good Shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep, so that all who receive him in faith would have eternal life. Finally, Jesus says this kingdom he has in store for his sheep was prepared for them before the very foundation of the world. It was not prepared for them after they proved themselves through their good works. It was already established for his sheep well before they had even bleated their first bleat.
The sheep in this vision, then, are not sheep because they have performed good works. They perform good works because they are sheep! Just look at how surprised they are when those good works are mentioned! They didn’t even realize they were doing anything special! “When did we serve you, Lord?” they ask. “When did we do these good things for you?” And the king replies, “When you did it to the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”
I remember many years ago when I lived down in Lewis County there was a man who was walking along the Cowlitz river when he saw a couple of boys who had fallen out of a canoe and were starting to drown. He jumped into the water and managed to save them both. He was hailed as a hero and was celebrated on the local news. He looked utterly shocked to have been given so much attention. “I wasn’t trying to be a hero. I didn’t even think about it. I was just doing what needed to be done,” he said.
In the same way, Jesus’ sheep don’t perform good works because we’re trying to impress anyone. We don’t do it to impress our King. We don’t do it to earn anything. We do it because it is what needs to be done. Like our lettering above our donation center in the narthex says, “God doesn’t need your good works, but your neighbor does.”
But in a delightful plot twist, when we serve our neighbors through our good works, whether we realize it or not, we are in fact serving Christ himself. When we respond to human need, we are serving our Lord and King. This King of ours hides himself in the people around us, where we serve him through the callings and opportunities of daily life.
So when you bring groceries for the food pantry, you are feeding Jesus. When you bring coats or socks to our clothing drives, you are clothing Jesus. When you make beautiful quilts for strangers on the other side of the world, you are making blankets for Jesus. When you are up half the night with your sick child, or are caring for an ailing spouse or an elderly relative, you are taking care of Jesus. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve made visits to church members at the hospital or nursing home (back when that was allowed!) and have found that someone from our congregation has already been there. When you make those visits, you are visiting Jesus himself.
Our King Jesus hides himself in the human needs all around us, and it is there that we serve him – but we don’t do it because we’re trying to earn points or ensure our place in the coming kingdom, we do it because it needs to be done. We do it because that is who we are as people who have faith in Jesus. We do it because God has already made us sheep, and that is just what sheep do.
If you hear this vision, this parable of sorts, this glimpse of the coming kingdom, and start looking at yourself, trying to discern if you’re really a sheep, maybe beginning to panic a little bit, you are putting your focus in the wrong place. Look instead to your King Jesus and to what he has already done to make you his sheep. You have been blessed by God the Father. He has given you his dear Son to be your savior, to forgive your sin, to reconcile you to himself. The moment you receive Jesus in faith you are a sheep. As a sheep, you have been given an inheritance. Jesus died for you, and you have inherited his life, his righteousness, his glory, his kingdom. He is the Good Shepherd who laid down his life for his sheep. Christ’s kingdom was prepared for you before the foundation of the world, before you ever lifted a finger in his service.
Christ Jesus makes us his sheep by giving us his Word and sacraments, where we are blessed by the Father, where we receive our inheritance, where we are given a glimpse of the kingdom and a foretaste of the feast to come. Through these means of grace we are assured that we are indeed sheep.
Then we hear the words: “Go in peace, serve the Lord,” And we go back to our daily lives to do the things that sheep do. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church