Sermon 16th November 2008
Today our Vicar, Cameron Barker, preaches based on the reading from Matthew 25 verses 31-46.
Have you heard the one about the new Christian? She really needed help with a pressing spiritual problem. She knew that the Bible was the place to turn to; but she didn't know it well enough to find a relevant passage. So, she decided to open her Bible at random, close her eyes and stick a pin in the page. She wasn't too encouraged when she read Matthew 27:5, though: “Then Judas went out and hanged himself”. Determined not to be discouraged, she did the same again. This time her pin stuck in Luke 10:37: “Jesus said, 'You go and do likewise'!”
Of course I'd never advocate such an approach to reading the Bible! If we are to hear God's voice clearly through the Bible then we need to know what we are reading, and be able to put it into its proper context. Today's reading is a classic case in point. If we read this passage from Matthew in isolation, we could form a badly wrong impression of what God is like. Instead we need to hear these words of Jesus in context. Of course we must first heed the context in which Jesus spoke them. But we also need to put them in the wider context of his whole ministry. And then we need to see them in the context of the entire Bible.
Getting to know the Bible that well is a life-time's work. But we all can, and must, take every opportunity to increase our knowledge of what comes where in the Bible, and why. That has been one of the many joys of this series that ends today. Over the past three months we have been working our way through a section of Matthew's gospel. We haven't done so verse by verse – but we have gone sequentially. And it's all that which provides the context and the background for our final passage. And we do need that, because this would be very shocking if we'd just stumbled across it.
We haven't just arrived here, though. We have built up to this point steadily, as we have followed Jesus on his final journey, towards Jerusalem. That has been the key general context ever since we picked up the story in Matthew chapter 18 three months ago. This entire series has been set in the final weeks of Jesus' life on earth. And throughout it he has been keenly aware that his days are literally numbered. Jesus always knew that he was going to Jerusalem to die. This was his final opportunity, then, to teach his disciples what they would need to know in order to be able to live without him. So most of Jesus' teaching that we've heard was specifically geared towards his disciples' understanding and maturity.
That hasn't been all that we have heard in this series though. In the early weeks of it large crowds still followed Jesus, and he taught them too. Then, in Jerusalem, we saw several dark glimpses of the ever-growing conflict between Jesus and the Jewish religious leaders of his day. It was that conflict – as typified by the debate about paying taxes that Gill spoke on – that would culminate in Jesus' crucifixion. But of course so much more lay behind his death. It was at that moment, when Jesus died, that he would accomplish what he had been born to do. By his death Jesus opened the way for people like you and me to enter into the Kingdom of heaven. Jesus did that by taking God's judgement – and the punishment that we deserve – upon himself on that cross.
It had always been God's plan to make all this possible. In Jesus' words in today's passage, this Kingdom has been prepared for us since the creation of the world! The other option, that Jesus talked about here, isn't meant to be for us. That has been prepared for the devil and all his angels, not for us. But this is a choice that we each have to make for ourselves. We have to decide if we will accept Jesus' staggeringly generous offer, and enter his Kingdom, or not. In this series we've been reminded again that this isn't an offer that we deserve, or can earn. It's always a gift of grace from God. But if we do decide to accept it, we then have to be ready for its arrival at all times – as we saw last week.
The nature of this Kingdom of God has been Jesus' main focus throughout our series. As we have seen, he mostly communicated that in story form, telling people parables. Jesus took every-day situations from his time like people working in a vineyard, or women waiting to join a wedding reception, for example – and used those to show what life is like when God's in charge. As we have also seen, Jesus might have exaggerated the details in his stories – like the size of someone's debt, for example – but that was usually to make his point more clearly. And it's the point of those stories which we can't afford to miss – because they are central to us understanding how the Kingdom of God operates.
We need to understand that, because God's Kingdom does work so very differently to what we think is normal. Some of Jesus' stories in this series have reminded us of that truth again, and not just because they're set in first-century Palestine. The tone was set from the very beginning, when Jesus said that we need to become like little children if we are to enter God's Kingdom. That's the level of change that's needed in us, and in our world view. Hard as we find it, we need to put aside any sense that we're in control of our own lives, much less of our eternal destiny. All we can do is to cast ourselves totally on God's mercy. Our lives must then be built on and around Jesus as the cornerstone, in response to what he has done for us.
All that, then, is the context of today's passage. Here we are, just days before Jesus' death. In recent weeks he has explained what the Kingdom of God is; he's taught about its essential nature; in his stories and by his own example he has shown us what it looks like; he's offered us entry into it as a gracious gift; and he's spoken clearly about the demands that membership of his Kingdom places on all who accept it. More than that, Jesus has made it clear that what we see and know of his Kingdom now is only a foretaste of what's still to come. On Advent Sunday we'll focus on his promise to return to bring in the fullness of his Kingdom. But last week we did hear Jesus' clarion call to be ready for that world-ending event, whenever it may happen.
I said last week that the rest of this chapter offers us practical pictures of how we can be, or get, ready for Jesus' return. It certainly does that alright – more clearly than we might perhaps like! And we must note that this is no parable; it's not an exaggerated story to make a point. This is straight teaching about what will happen when Jesus returns. Yes, it does begin with a picture that captures the imagination – the sheep and the goats. It makes better sense to a Kenyan, John assures me as someone who has seen sheep and goats kept together. But that's not the main thrust of Jesus' teaching here. His point was – and is – about the separation, the judgement, that will happen when he, the Son of Man, comes in glory.
It must be said that there's been huge debate about what Jesus meant here. There's not time to delve into that now; but I'm not even sure that I would if I could. It's too easy to waste time arguing the niceties, and to miss the point by doing so. The point surely is that Jesus is coming back; and that when he does he expects his people to be living as his people. We already know from this series that we can't, and won't ever earn our way into the Kingdom of God. It doesn't matter how many hungry, thirsty, or naked people we feed, give a drink to or clothe. It doesn't matter how many strangers we house, or prisoners we visit. What counts is how we have responded to Jesus' invitation to accept his death as being for us. In the picture-language of last week's parable, does he know us – or not?
I've come to that conclusion not least because of how the righteous respond to Jesus' commending what they have done. They will ask him, 'When, Lord, did we do these things for you?' You see, they're not even aware of having done anything that's worthy of comment. These are acts of basic human kindness that we're all capable of doing. And we all have the opportunity to perform them most days. If we are living as members of God's Kingdom, as people who have benefited so much from God's generosity, these are precisely the sort of things that we will do without even thinking about it. Yes, we need to consider the best way to go about it: giving an alcoholic a can of beer isn't an act of Godly kindness. But these key principles of sharing and caring should be so ingrained in us that specific deeds don't even stay in mind.
Now that's not to say for a minute that people who haven't accepted Jesus can't do exactly these same kindly things. There are plenty of fine examples of that happening often enough. But, remember that we can't ever earn our way into God's Kingdom. And, as Jesus' teaching suggests, often those who live mainly for themselves find it easier to choose not to respond to basic human needs, and not even notice it. Those who are sent away in this passage likewise aren't even aware of when they have ignored such needs as those that Jesus mentioned. For them it's just part of how they have lived their life – as generosity must be for Christians.
This is a theme that we'll pick up again at the start of next year. We'll study the letter of James, with it's very practical emphasis on living out the life of faith. And none of this is new to those who worship here regularly. We often stress the need for our behaviour to be shaped by what we believe as Christians. But the ending of this series adds a deep urgency to the need to do exactly that. This was the last thing that Jesus taught to his disciples. He did so in the context of talking about this final judgement that his return will herald. And what comes next in Matthew is Jesus then making the arrangements for the Passover when he would be killed – so that we can be spared that judgement.
How can we be ready for that day of judgement? Simply put, by living as members of God's Kingdom now. We know how to do it – because we've heard Jesus' teaching in this series. We have seen his example, how he gave up his life for us; we have listened to his stories about what the Kingdom is like; we know how much we have to be grateful for, how we don't deserve entry; we can see the needs, all around us; we have an opportunity to respond with the Christmas box appeal. Our task, then is to live grateful, generous, faithful, Kingdom-shaped lives, even when no-one's looking, until Jesus returns. So will we? Let's pray ...
Have you heard the one about the new Christian? She really needed help with a pressing spiritual problem. She knew that the Bible was the place to turn to; but she didn't know it well enough to find a relevant passage. So, she decided to open her Bible at random, close her eyes and stick a pin in the page. She wasn't too encouraged when she read Matthew 27:5, though: “Then Judas went out and hanged himself”. Determined not to be discouraged, she did the same again. This time her pin stuck in Luke 10:37: “Jesus said, 'You go and do likewise'!”
Of course I'd never advocate such an approach to reading the Bible! If we are to hear God's voice clearly through the Bible then we need to know what we are reading, and be able to put it into its proper context. Today's reading is a classic case in point. If we read this passage from Matthew in isolation, we could form a badly wrong impression of what God is like. Instead we need to hear these words of Jesus in context. Of course we must first heed the context in which Jesus spoke them. But we also need to put them in the wider context of his whole ministry. And then we need to see them in the context of the entire Bible.
Getting to know the Bible that well is a life-time's work. But we all can, and must, take every opportunity to increase our knowledge of what comes where in the Bible, and why. That has been one of the many joys of this series that ends today. Over the past three months we have been working our way through a section of Matthew's gospel. We haven't done so verse by verse – but we have gone sequentially. And it's all that which provides the context and the background for our final passage. And we do need that, because this would be very shocking if we'd just stumbled across it.
We haven't just arrived here, though. We have built up to this point steadily, as we have followed Jesus on his final journey, towards Jerusalem. That has been the key general context ever since we picked up the story in Matthew chapter 18 three months ago. This entire series has been set in the final weeks of Jesus' life on earth. And throughout it he has been keenly aware that his days are literally numbered. Jesus always knew that he was going to Jerusalem to die. This was his final opportunity, then, to teach his disciples what they would need to know in order to be able to live without him. So most of Jesus' teaching that we've heard was specifically geared towards his disciples' understanding and maturity.
That hasn't been all that we have heard in this series though. In the early weeks of it large crowds still followed Jesus, and he taught them too. Then, in Jerusalem, we saw several dark glimpses of the ever-growing conflict between Jesus and the Jewish religious leaders of his day. It was that conflict – as typified by the debate about paying taxes that Gill spoke on – that would culminate in Jesus' crucifixion. But of course so much more lay behind his death. It was at that moment, when Jesus died, that he would accomplish what he had been born to do. By his death Jesus opened the way for people like you and me to enter into the Kingdom of heaven. Jesus did that by taking God's judgement – and the punishment that we deserve – upon himself on that cross.
It had always been God's plan to make all this possible. In Jesus' words in today's passage, this Kingdom has been prepared for us since the creation of the world! The other option, that Jesus talked about here, isn't meant to be for us. That has been prepared for the devil and all his angels, not for us. But this is a choice that we each have to make for ourselves. We have to decide if we will accept Jesus' staggeringly generous offer, and enter his Kingdom, or not. In this series we've been reminded again that this isn't an offer that we deserve, or can earn. It's always a gift of grace from God. But if we do decide to accept it, we then have to be ready for its arrival at all times – as we saw last week.
The nature of this Kingdom of God has been Jesus' main focus throughout our series. As we have seen, he mostly communicated that in story form, telling people parables. Jesus took every-day situations from his time like people working in a vineyard, or women waiting to join a wedding reception, for example – and used those to show what life is like when God's in charge. As we have also seen, Jesus might have exaggerated the details in his stories – like the size of someone's debt, for example – but that was usually to make his point more clearly. And it's the point of those stories which we can't afford to miss – because they are central to us understanding how the Kingdom of God operates.
We need to understand that, because God's Kingdom does work so very differently to what we think is normal. Some of Jesus' stories in this series have reminded us of that truth again, and not just because they're set in first-century Palestine. The tone was set from the very beginning, when Jesus said that we need to become like little children if we are to enter God's Kingdom. That's the level of change that's needed in us, and in our world view. Hard as we find it, we need to put aside any sense that we're in control of our own lives, much less of our eternal destiny. All we can do is to cast ourselves totally on God's mercy. Our lives must then be built on and around Jesus as the cornerstone, in response to what he has done for us.
All that, then, is the context of today's passage. Here we are, just days before Jesus' death. In recent weeks he has explained what the Kingdom of God is; he's taught about its essential nature; in his stories and by his own example he has shown us what it looks like; he's offered us entry into it as a gracious gift; and he's spoken clearly about the demands that membership of his Kingdom places on all who accept it. More than that, Jesus has made it clear that what we see and know of his Kingdom now is only a foretaste of what's still to come. On Advent Sunday we'll focus on his promise to return to bring in the fullness of his Kingdom. But last week we did hear Jesus' clarion call to be ready for that world-ending event, whenever it may happen.
I said last week that the rest of this chapter offers us practical pictures of how we can be, or get, ready for Jesus' return. It certainly does that alright – more clearly than we might perhaps like! And we must note that this is no parable; it's not an exaggerated story to make a point. This is straight teaching about what will happen when Jesus returns. Yes, it does begin with a picture that captures the imagination – the sheep and the goats. It makes better sense to a Kenyan, John assures me as someone who has seen sheep and goats kept together. But that's not the main thrust of Jesus' teaching here. His point was – and is – about the separation, the judgement, that will happen when he, the Son of Man, comes in glory.
It must be said that there's been huge debate about what Jesus meant here. There's not time to delve into that now; but I'm not even sure that I would if I could. It's too easy to waste time arguing the niceties, and to miss the point by doing so. The point surely is that Jesus is coming back; and that when he does he expects his people to be living as his people. We already know from this series that we can't, and won't ever earn our way into the Kingdom of God. It doesn't matter how many hungry, thirsty, or naked people we feed, give a drink to or clothe. It doesn't matter how many strangers we house, or prisoners we visit. What counts is how we have responded to Jesus' invitation to accept his death as being for us. In the picture-language of last week's parable, does he know us – or not?
I've come to that conclusion not least because of how the righteous respond to Jesus' commending what they have done. They will ask him, 'When, Lord, did we do these things for you?' You see, they're not even aware of having done anything that's worthy of comment. These are acts of basic human kindness that we're all capable of doing. And we all have the opportunity to perform them most days. If we are living as members of God's Kingdom, as people who have benefited so much from God's generosity, these are precisely the sort of things that we will do without even thinking about it. Yes, we need to consider the best way to go about it: giving an alcoholic a can of beer isn't an act of Godly kindness. But these key principles of sharing and caring should be so ingrained in us that specific deeds don't even stay in mind.
Now that's not to say for a minute that people who haven't accepted Jesus can't do exactly these same kindly things. There are plenty of fine examples of that happening often enough. But, remember that we can't ever earn our way into God's Kingdom. And, as Jesus' teaching suggests, often those who live mainly for themselves find it easier to choose not to respond to basic human needs, and not even notice it. Those who are sent away in this passage likewise aren't even aware of when they have ignored such needs as those that Jesus mentioned. For them it's just part of how they have lived their life – as generosity must be for Christians.
This is a theme that we'll pick up again at the start of next year. We'll study the letter of James, with it's very practical emphasis on living out the life of faith. And none of this is new to those who worship here regularly. We often stress the need for our behaviour to be shaped by what we believe as Christians. But the ending of this series adds a deep urgency to the need to do exactly that. This was the last thing that Jesus taught to his disciples. He did so in the context of talking about this final judgement that his return will herald. And what comes next in Matthew is Jesus then making the arrangements for the Passover when he would be killed – so that we can be spared that judgement.
How can we be ready for that day of judgement? Simply put, by living as members of God's Kingdom now. We know how to do it – because we've heard Jesus' teaching in this series. We have seen his example, how he gave up his life for us; we have listened to his stories about what the Kingdom is like; we know how much we have to be grateful for, how we don't deserve entry; we can see the needs, all around us; we have an opportunity to respond with the Christmas box appeal. Our task, then is to live grateful, generous, faithful, Kingdom-shaped lives, even when no-one's looking, until Jesus returns. So will we? Let's pray ...
posted by Parish Administrator at 11:50 am
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