When It's Ok To Be Sheepish or Not Trying To Get Anyone's Goat

Matthew 25:31-46

The Sheep and the Goats
31 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 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, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers 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, 'I tell you the truth, 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."

In the message this past Sunday at Journey, this passage in Matthew 25 came up and was discussed (albeit on a very elementary level). I thought I would take the time to dig deeper into what this passage is all about and who it pertains to (this part may surprise you).

As with any passage of this length it is best to break it down from the beginning. Remember, it is important to know things like who is being spoken to, why is it written, etc.

Let's look at the first part in verse 31 it says "when the Son of Man shall come in all his glory and the angels with him". This is key information. This tells the when of the verse. The Son of Man is Jesus and there are only two instances that the Bible describes Jesus leaving Heaven and coming to earth... the Rapture of the Church and the Second Coming. At the Rapture of the Church Jesus comes alone. I Thessalonians 4:16 "16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first." At the Second Coming Jesus comes with His angels and Saints as seen in the book of Jude verses 14-15 "14 Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men: "See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones 15 to judge everyone, and to convict all the ungodly of all the ungodly acts they have done in the ungodly way, and of all the harsh words ungodly sinners have spoken against him."

So, since the passage in Matthew says Jesus is not coming alone, we can conclude that this verse is speaking of the Second coming and not the Rapture.

Ok, now we know the when. If this is a Second coming verse then this deals with the 7 years of tribulation that the world will go through after the Rapture. It primarily deals with the Jews. During the Tribulation period God will send two mighty witnesses (Elijah and Moses) to evangelize. How do I know the two witnesses are Elijah and Moses? Moses' body was preserved for this event and int he book of Jude, Michael the Archangel argues with Satan about Moses' body. Satan does not want this to happen. Elijah never died. He was caught up into the air. The second proof text is their abilities. The book of Revelation talks about how the witnesses will have power to turn water to blood and keep it from raining. Moses and Elijah were the two who had this power in the Old Testament.
Through their evangelism 144,000 Jewish men will come to Christ. These 144,000 men will then go on a worldwide evangelism tour like the world has never seen. However, many of the 144,000 will find themselves battling the forces of the Anti Christ who will be in power. He will have them thrown into prison, he will keep them from getting enough to eat, from getting adequate medical care, and basically make it difficult for these witnesses to have the basic necessities of life. However, those who they have reached and converted will offer assistance to them... giving them shelter, something to eat, clothing, visiting them in prison, etc.

When Jesus returns to judge those who have been living on earth during the Great Tribulation, he will divide the saved from the lost. The saved (referred to as sheep) will be on His right. The lost (referred to as goats) will be on His left. When Jesus tells them that they cared for Him by doing things like clothing him and feeding Him, He is talking about how the believers (sheep) have cared for the 144,00 witnesses. This is explained in Matthew 25:40 where it talks about doing things for the least of these "brothers of mine". Only saved people are brothers of Christ so this could only be refering to the 144,000. Since the saved (the sheep) were brought to Christ by these 144,00 witnesses they will obviously be eager to help them out in their basic needs.

Conversely, the unsaved (the goats) could care less about the Word of God, Jesus, or the 144,000 so they will not offer aid to them by giving them something to eat, clothes, etc. In fact, they will most likely enjoy seeing the 144,000 suffer.

Another key verse in this passage is found in verse 34 "..the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world." From the creation of the world, the Jewish nation has been God's chosen people. Only after they rejected Jesus when He was here the first time did God shift focus to the Gentiles (us, the Church age). This verse is talking about the Jewish people who are saved during the Great Tribulation period coming into the 1,000 year Kingdom that Jesus will set up on earth (also known as the Millennium). We as Gentile believers who are Raptured up with the church before the Great Tribulation will also be a part of the Millennium. I believe that based on our rewards received at the Judgement Seat of Christ (or Bema Seat) we will be given positions of authority and leadership and assist Christ during His 1,000 year reign.

Let's think for a second about goats and sheep. Goats are stubborn. sheep can be easily led. Jesus called His followers sheep. Pagan cults use the goat as a symbol.

This is pretty powerful and deep stuff so it will most likely need another post to go into more details.

What to take away from these verses:

The sheep gave the witnesses food, clothing, etc because they were sheep already. They were not bestowed the title of sheep because they did these things. In like manner, the goats did not help because they were goats. They did not turn from sheep to goats because they did not help or didn't know it was Jesus they were not helping.