Sunday November 23, 2008
Proper 29
Brothers and sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
It might seem to some from this morning’s Gospel lesson, that finally today on the final Sunday of the church year, Christ the King Sunday, finally our Lord Jesus has given us something to do. For in the Word that our Lord comes to us with today we are given a vision of the final judgment, when the sheep will be separated from the goats, and the righteous sheep will be invited into the place that has been prepared for them and the accursed goats will be told to depart from the Lord’s presence and sent into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
And so in this vision, how is it that the Son of Man coming in glory separates the righteous sheep from the unrighteous goats? One thing we can see is that He tells the sheep that what they did for the least of these, who were members of His family, they did for Him. When they reached out to meet the needs of their neighbor, they were doing so for Christ Jesus. And conversely He tells the goats that what they failed to do for the least of these, they failed to do for Him. When they failed to reach out and meet the needs of their neighbor, they failed to do so for Christ Jesus.
And so, one might be tempted to say "If you are reaching out and meeting the needs of your neighbor, then you are in the Kingdom." But if that is what’s going on, then why would the goats question when they are told that they failed to meet Jesus’ needs? They had just seen Jesus tell the sheep that when they had reached out to the least of these in His family, they were doing so for Jesus also, so they knew that when Jesus referred to doing for Him, He was referring to doing for the least of these in His family.
It appears that the goats must have been expecting to be invited into the Kingdom also. And so, like a lot of people who misread this text, the goats thought that Jesus was saying that the sheep were a part of the Kingdom because of their good works of charity. And it would be very easy for me turn this into a simple call for you to pull yourself up by your ethical boot-straps, so you can go out and meet the needs of your neighbor. And of course, seeking to meet the needs of your neighbor is a noble, worthy and yes faithful goal. But there is more than that going on here.
It is not the good works of love and charity of the sheep that get them into the Kingdom. The key distinction between the goats and the sheep is not good works of charity. They were all, goat and sheep alike, doing good works. Jesus could have been talking about any good work, or any commandment. He could have been talking about remembering the Sabbath, or not taking the Lord’s name in vein, or honoring your mother and father, it wouldn’t have made a difference. The goats would have still been goats, and the sheep would have still been sheep.
What separates the goats and the sheep is faith. The sheep are declared righteous in their faith and the goats are declared unrighteous in their lack of faith. And so it is with us. Everyday, in our lack of faith, we are placed right in there among the goats. Jesus tells this story way back, before His suffering, death, and resurrection but even still, what He is doing is giving us a vision of our future. He is giving us a vision of the day when the victory over sin, death, and the devil that was won with His death and resurrection will be fulfilled.
The battle with sin and the devil rages every day and we live in the midst of it, but the victory has already been won for us, when Christ Jesus took upon Himself all of our sin and despair and laid down His life for us.
The victory has already been won, but still, goats that we are, we try to win it ourselves, by keeping tabs and counting our good works, and deluding ourselves that our good works and piety are visible signs of our spiritual progress.
A few months ago, on one of my visits to Bethel nursing home, I went to visit an elderly woman who is a member of this parish. I walked in and saw her in the area where people were getting ready to play Bingo. I thought "Oh I’d better get in there and give her communion quick so I can sneak out of there before Bingo starts." Well I wasn’t quite fast enough. I sat down and greeted the woman and as I was opening the communion kit they began playing Bingo. So I stayed and helped her play Bingo and then gave her communion and stayed and talked with her a little while, and ended up staying quite a bit longer than I had anticipated.
And as I left I caught myself mentally patting myself on the back, complimenting myself for being such a good and faithful servant. There was a good work done in that visit. In that visit, a saint of this parish received the body and blood of our Lord Jesus in Holy Communion, she heard the declaration of the forgiveness of her sin in the absolution, she heard the Gospel of our Lord proclaimed to her and prayers were made on her behalf. But all I brought to that visit was sin and pride and selfishness. I went in wanting to sneak out early, and went out patting myself on the back. There was a good-work done, but it was not mine. All I brought was goat-like behavior.
And we all do it. We all daily try to delude ourselves into thinking that through our best efforts we are earning points with Jesus and making some sort of visible progress in our righteousness. This is why we have employee of the month awards, or humanitarian of the year awards. It’s why we have awards like this, the 2009 Faithfulness in Ministry Cross. This is from The Story, which is a quarterly publication for students and alumni of Luther Seminary, and there you see three pastors who will receive this annual award. Now I am sure there is fine and noble work being done in the ministries of all three of these pastors, but that they are given awards and given credit for the work not that they are doing, but that is being done through them is just another reflection of our goat-like tendencies.
But you see, if it really were up to us, then we would all just remain goats. What this vision of our King Jesus coming on the day of the final judgment shows us is not that these sheep claimed their place in the Kingdom through their good works, but that the good works done through them were the result of the claim that had been made upon them by the King.
For you see there is only one way to be made from a goat to a sheep, and that is by being killed as a goat and raised in new life as a sheep. And try as we might, we cannot do this ourselves. We are so quick to forget what Jesus tells us in John’s Gospel, that apart from Him we can do nothing. But He does not leave us on our own.
He does not wait for us to claim Him, but rather He claims us by coming to us in Word and sacrament. He comes to us in baptism with the very same power that Paul writes about in Ephesians, the power that God put to work in Christ Jesus when He rose Him from the dead. He puts this power to work in us, by bringing us into the death and resurrection of Christ and thus killing the old, sinful goat in us and then raising us in new life and bringing about the new creation in us.
But the old goats in us don’t die easily, and so daily the old goat in us tries to convince us that we’re fine on our own and that we don’t need our Shepherd. Sin and the devil continue to tempt the old goat in us, playing on our ego by filling us with delusions of grandeur and our own ethical progress through our own best efforts. But the good shepherd Christ Jesus continues to come to us in His Word and sacrament, killing the goat in us, raising us as sheep.
The only way that the sheep in this illustration of the final judgment realize that they are a part of the Kingdom is through a Word proclaimed to them. And so today, in the words of my mouth through the Holy Spirit, Christ Jesus declares you as being among those blessed by His Father and who are awaiting the inheritance of the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundations of the world. Hear the words of Ezekiel in the Old Testament lesson through whom our Lord says that He will be the shepherd of His sheep and make them lie down.
Cast aside all your illusions of progress and piety and rest in Christ Jesus who laid down His life for you. Then, of course, go forth and do for the least of these, not to show your piety, but in joyful response to the new life that you have been given, the new creation that Christ Jesus is making of you, and the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundations of the world.
Amen
Brothers and sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
It might seem to some from this morning’s Gospel lesson, that finally today on the final Sunday of the church year, Christ the King Sunday, finally our Lord Jesus has given us something to do. For in the Word that our Lord comes to us with today we are given a vision of the final judgment, when the sheep will be separated from the goats, and the righteous sheep will be invited into the place that has been prepared for them and the accursed goats will be told to depart from the Lord’s presence and sent into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
And so in this vision, how is it that the Son of Man coming in glory separates the righteous sheep from the unrighteous goats? One thing we can see is that He tells the sheep that what they did for the least of these, who were members of His family, they did for Him. When they reached out to meet the needs of their neighbor, they were doing so for Christ Jesus. And conversely He tells the goats that what they failed to do for the least of these, they failed to do for Him. When they failed to reach out and meet the needs of their neighbor, they failed to do so for Christ Jesus.
And so, one might be tempted to say "If you are reaching out and meeting the needs of your neighbor, then you are in the Kingdom." But if that is what’s going on, then why would the goats question when they are told that they failed to meet Jesus’ needs? They had just seen Jesus tell the sheep that when they had reached out to the least of these in His family, they were doing so for Jesus also, so they knew that when Jesus referred to doing for Him, He was referring to doing for the least of these in His family.
It appears that the goats must have been expecting to be invited into the Kingdom also. And so, like a lot of people who misread this text, the goats thought that Jesus was saying that the sheep were a part of the Kingdom because of their good works of charity. And it would be very easy for me turn this into a simple call for you to pull yourself up by your ethical boot-straps, so you can go out and meet the needs of your neighbor. And of course, seeking to meet the needs of your neighbor is a noble, worthy and yes faithful goal. But there is more than that going on here.
It is not the good works of love and charity of the sheep that get them into the Kingdom. The key distinction between the goats and the sheep is not good works of charity. They were all, goat and sheep alike, doing good works. Jesus could have been talking about any good work, or any commandment. He could have been talking about remembering the Sabbath, or not taking the Lord’s name in vein, or honoring your mother and father, it wouldn’t have made a difference. The goats would have still been goats, and the sheep would have still been sheep.
What separates the goats and the sheep is faith. The sheep are declared righteous in their faith and the goats are declared unrighteous in their lack of faith. And so it is with us. Everyday, in our lack of faith, we are placed right in there among the goats. Jesus tells this story way back, before His suffering, death, and resurrection but even still, what He is doing is giving us a vision of our future. He is giving us a vision of the day when the victory over sin, death, and the devil that was won with His death and resurrection will be fulfilled.
The battle with sin and the devil rages every day and we live in the midst of it, but the victory has already been won for us, when Christ Jesus took upon Himself all of our sin and despair and laid down His life for us.
The victory has already been won, but still, goats that we are, we try to win it ourselves, by keeping tabs and counting our good works, and deluding ourselves that our good works and piety are visible signs of our spiritual progress.
A few months ago, on one of my visits to Bethel nursing home, I went to visit an elderly woman who is a member of this parish. I walked in and saw her in the area where people were getting ready to play Bingo. I thought "Oh I’d better get in there and give her communion quick so I can sneak out of there before Bingo starts." Well I wasn’t quite fast enough. I sat down and greeted the woman and as I was opening the communion kit they began playing Bingo. So I stayed and helped her play Bingo and then gave her communion and stayed and talked with her a little while, and ended up staying quite a bit longer than I had anticipated.
And as I left I caught myself mentally patting myself on the back, complimenting myself for being such a good and faithful servant. There was a good work done in that visit. In that visit, a saint of this parish received the body and blood of our Lord Jesus in Holy Communion, she heard the declaration of the forgiveness of her sin in the absolution, she heard the Gospel of our Lord proclaimed to her and prayers were made on her behalf. But all I brought to that visit was sin and pride and selfishness. I went in wanting to sneak out early, and went out patting myself on the back. There was a good-work done, but it was not mine. All I brought was goat-like behavior.
And we all do it. We all daily try to delude ourselves into thinking that through our best efforts we are earning points with Jesus and making some sort of visible progress in our righteousness. This is why we have employee of the month awards, or humanitarian of the year awards. It’s why we have awards like this, the 2009 Faithfulness in Ministry Cross. This is from The Story, which is a quarterly publication for students and alumni of Luther Seminary, and there you see three pastors who will receive this annual award. Now I am sure there is fine and noble work being done in the ministries of all three of these pastors, but that they are given awards and given credit for the work not that they are doing, but that is being done through them is just another reflection of our goat-like tendencies.
But you see, if it really were up to us, then we would all just remain goats. What this vision of our King Jesus coming on the day of the final judgment shows us is not that these sheep claimed their place in the Kingdom through their good works, but that the good works done through them were the result of the claim that had been made upon them by the King.
For you see there is only one way to be made from a goat to a sheep, and that is by being killed as a goat and raised in new life as a sheep. And try as we might, we cannot do this ourselves. We are so quick to forget what Jesus tells us in John’s Gospel, that apart from Him we can do nothing. But He does not leave us on our own.
He does not wait for us to claim Him, but rather He claims us by coming to us in Word and sacrament. He comes to us in baptism with the very same power that Paul writes about in Ephesians, the power that God put to work in Christ Jesus when He rose Him from the dead. He puts this power to work in us, by bringing us into the death and resurrection of Christ and thus killing the old, sinful goat in us and then raising us in new life and bringing about the new creation in us.
But the old goats in us don’t die easily, and so daily the old goat in us tries to convince us that we’re fine on our own and that we don’t need our Shepherd. Sin and the devil continue to tempt the old goat in us, playing on our ego by filling us with delusions of grandeur and our own ethical progress through our own best efforts. But the good shepherd Christ Jesus continues to come to us in His Word and sacrament, killing the goat in us, raising us as sheep.
The only way that the sheep in this illustration of the final judgment realize that they are a part of the Kingdom is through a Word proclaimed to them. And so today, in the words of my mouth through the Holy Spirit, Christ Jesus declares you as being among those blessed by His Father and who are awaiting the inheritance of the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundations of the world. Hear the words of Ezekiel in the Old Testament lesson through whom our Lord says that He will be the shepherd of His sheep and make them lie down.
Cast aside all your illusions of progress and piety and rest in Christ Jesus who laid down His life for you. Then, of course, go forth and do for the least of these, not to show your piety, but in joyful response to the new life that you have been given, the new creation that Christ Jesus is making of you, and the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundations of the world.
Amen
posted by Steve at 6:46 PM
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