Ezekiel 34:11-24; Matthew 25:31-46

“Life is short and we have not too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are traveling the dark way with us. Oh, be swift to love! Make haste to be kind! – Henri Frederic Amiel[1]

“Such ever was love’s way: to rise, it stoops.” -- Robert Browning, “A Death in the Desert,” line 134[2]

The tale of the sheep and the goats is not a parable; neither is it an allegory. It is the conclusion of a series in Matthew which began with an apocalyptic discourse in chapter 24, moved through the parable of the ten maidens (which tells us to be vigilant in our discipleship), and the parable of the talents (which tells us that Christian discipleship, at its root, demands we risk all we have for the purpose of increasing the Realm of Heaven in the here and now). It is, for Matthew, the scene of final judgment at Christ’s anticipated return. All the people of the world will be gathered at the seat of Christ’s glory, and will be separated as to whether they are sheep, or goats.

A disturbing issue in this scene is the criterion used to separate the people of the earth. It has nothing to do with baptism, nothing to do with confession, nothing to do, in fact, with religious membership or beliefs.

Thomas Troeger, of Yale Divinity School recounts hearing a speech by a woman who was a famous radio personality. In her opening lines she told of meeting a stranger at the reception that had preceded her speech. The stranger remarked, “You don’t look at all like what I thought you would. You sound taller on the air.” The radio personality observed to the audience, “What you see is in fact my actual height. If you would like me to be taller, you may close your eyes.”[3]

Troeger goes on to say that folk who get their images of God or Christ from the Bible, or Sunday School Lessons, or listening to sermons, run the same danger – their spiritual imaginings may not be ready for the incarnate presence that startles them in unexpected ways.[4]

Clearly, no one at this assembly of judgment as Mathew portrays it seems prepared for the judgment they receive. All of them alike, whether sheep or goat, ask of Christ the same question: “When was it that we saw you…?” Christ’s response is alike in both cases as well: “…when you saw the least of the members of my family, the youngest, the littlest, the smallest, the weakest, the poorest, those in pain or suffering – whatsoever you did or didn’t do for them, you did, or didn’t do for me. I hope this gives us pause.

After all, most of us pursue some manner of service as church men and women – and in doing so, we believe we’re offering at least some portion of our lives to Christ. Yet, in the scene of the final judgment, it’s not the acts we know we are performing that lead to our judgment – it’s the acts that crept upon us unaware, the smile we gave, the word of encouragement, the spontaneous hug, or speaking the ‘well done’ cherished by every one. It’s simply not what we expected (according to Matthew). Our faith did not prepare us to see Christ incarnate in the child we have no time for, or those who suffer sickness or disease that we don’t take time to visit. We do ‘other things’; we take care of ‘our own’. We all have busy lives, crammed full, yet Matthew says, if I may borrow Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s words, “Earth is crammed full of [Christ], and those that notice, take off their shoes (an act of worship in preparation for service), while the rest sit ‘round and daub (blackberry juice from) their natural faces, unaware.”

Ezekiel’s story compounds our dilemma. In it, God separates not sheep from goats, but fat, comfortable sheep, from lean, needy sheep. The charge is one we don’t expect – while you drank your fill from the stream, you muddied the waters for others; while you ate your fill of green grass, you trampled down tender shoots; you pushed and shoved to get your way, yet, in attaining your goal, unbeknownst to you, you lost your place.

As I sat in my chair one evening this past week reflecting on our texts, I was reminded of an illustration (the source of which I can’t recall) in which the streams of the wisdom and understanding of God are pure at the source. Yet, as they come to us through tradition, culture, time, space, action and reaction, they muddy. There are times when we can allow ourselves to be uncertain about what it is we know, how we came to know it, and whether or not it’s worth knowing. It’s in those moments of honesty that I find my prayers become the simplest – lead me, O God, into your paths; lead me, O God, into the ancient ways. I don’t know I know what they are. I am certain only of this, that I am uncertain. Yet, in an act of faith and trust, I cling to you for who you are, how you are, and what you appear to be.

Now, you might think that’s a fairly safe prayer, but it’s not. For, what it begins with is the affirmation that God has appeared, and we have not known God because God has not come as who or what we expect. God is present, and we miss it. One preacher (I can’t remember who) illustrated this one Sunday when a dirty, ragged, drunken man lay sprawled across the church steps. The folks came in talking about it, suggesting someone should do something about it. What they meant was that the police should be called and the steps should be cleaned. When service began, the man got up, walked down the aisle, and began the service. The man was the preacher.

“Love built on beauty, soon as beauty, dies.” – John Donne, Elegies, No. 2, “The Anagram,” 27[5]

“To love someone means to see them as God intended them to be.”

– Fyodor Dostoyevsky[6]

“Love’s secret is always to be doing things for God, and not to mind because they are such very little ones.” – Frederick William Faber[7]

“It is not the most lovable individuals who stand more in need of love, but the most unlovable.”

“Love is not a feeling to be felt, it’s an action to be learned.”

– John Powell[8]

Neither Mark, nor Luke, nor John mention this story of the last judgment – it is unique to Mathew’s gospel. Matthew shares the conviction of the Book of James: Unless you act on love, you do not love; if you will not love one another, you cannot love God. Our story suggests it is our works that will be judged, independent of our knowing whether or not they are for Christ, or done in Christ’s name. All the peoples of the earth will be judged by one standard – the actions they perpetrated, for good or for ill, against the weak, the poor, the powerless, the needy, or the guilty.

Perhaps of greater surprise to us is the idea that it is in suffering that Christ is incarnate. It is not in power as we understand it; it is not in power as we are accustomed to seeing it – it is in the will to love so completely that it bears the scars of the whip, the bruises of beatings, the judgment of others, and dons the cross, to love, even if it means to die.

“While God waits for [God’s] temple to be built of love, [human beings] bring stones.” – Rabindranath Tagore, Fireflies[9]

It is only when we wonder what we know of love that we wonder what we know of God. All the rules of religion, all the doctrines of faith which strive to teach others something of God, are nothing unless they become the framework for human beings to spin tiny strands of love, connecting one to another, and all to love. Love is an action that lifts others up, holds a child to the breast, and embraces the best and worst of all of us. Love is not so much the teaching of a Sunday School lesson, as it is the welcoming of a child, with warmth, with humor, and with patience, in the conviction that this one small child is worth our attention, and that every child has enormous worth. When we are able to see the small child in each of us, and love each of us as a child, we will see something of the Realm of God, something of Jesus Christ, and something of grace in its purest form.