Last Sunday in the Church Year

Last Sunday in the Church Year (Proper 29A)

November 22, 2020

Text: Matt. 25:31-46

            Christ the Lord is coming.  He is coming soon.  That is the first thing to know.  He is coming in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.  The trumpet will sound and He will raise all the dead.  Those who are alive on that Day will be caught up together with them before the Lord.  The books shall be opened, the verdict rendered.  He will divide the sheep and the goats, believers in Christ and unbelievers, those on His right and those on His left.  And then He will speak of works.

            This is where Lutherans get nervous.  The Lord will say to those on His right, “You did good things.  You fed the hungry.  You gave the thirsty to drink.  You welcomed the stranger, clothed the naked, visited the sick and those in prison.  And insofar as you did it to one of the least of these, my brothers, you did it to me.”  And He will say to those on His left, “You didn’t do good things.  You neglected your duty.  You did not feed the hungry.  You did not give drink to the thirsty.  You did not welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, or visit those sick and in prison.  And insofar as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” 

            Now, we can’t argue against this language, because it is Jesus who says it, and you should never try to be a better Christian than Jesus.  But it is not unlike the line from the Athanasian Creed that always makes us squirm: “At His coming all people will rise again with their bodies and give an account concerning their own deeds.  And those who have done good will enter into life, and those who have done evil into eternal fire” (LSB 320).  Now, we know that line is thoroughly biblical, based on these very Words of Jesus.  But we’re not so sure it’s Lutheran.  In all seriousness, we're afraid both the Words of Jesus in our Holy Gospel, and our confession of them in the Creed, indicate a judgment based on works good or bad, a salvation and a justification that depends not on grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone, but whether I’ve done enough good. 

            Well, you’re waiting for me to say it, so I will: That is not what Jesus means, nor is it what we mean in the Creed.  But before you fall off the horse on the other side with antinomian libertinism, which is to say, lawless free-rein of the sinful flesh, as though the Law doesn’t matter and has no place in the Christian life… you should know that Jesus does have a Word for us this morning about works in this Gospel, and we will come back to that idea in just a moment.  But this morning’s Gospel is first of all about faith.  The grace-word, in which you should take all your comfort, is that beautiful Word, “inherit.”  The Lord says to His sheep, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Matt. 25:34; ESV).  What works do you do to earn an inheritance?  You don’t!  An inheritance is a gift.  It isn’t earned.  The Kingdom of God is His gift to you, promised in the Will and Testament of God’s Son, Jesus, and delivered to you upon His death.  It doesn’t depend on you.  It depends on the faithfulness of His Promise, and it depends on His death! 

            And, by the way, the inheritance of this Kingdom has been prepared for you from the foundation of the world.  What good works did you do before the foundation of the world?  Even Adam hadn’t had opportunity to do a good work, because he hadn’t yet been created.  Still, the inheritance had already been prepared.  Do you see how this is all grace alone, apart from works, so that no one can boast?

            In fact, before a word has been spoken about works in our text, Jesus has already separated the sheep from the goats.  And He already says to the sheep that they are blessed by the Father and the inheritance is prepared.  So also, before He says anything about the neglect of good works on the part of the goats, He pronounces them cursed.  And they are told to depart into the eternal fire prepared, not for them, and not from the foundation of the world, but for the devil and for his angels, which is to say, the demons.  That is an important distinction.  The Kingdom is prepared for humans from the foundation of the world.  Hell is not prepared for humans, but for demons, in time.  The unrighteous, the goats, go to hell, not because it was prepared for them, but on account of their unrighteousness.  Because they cannot dwell in unrighteousness with a righteous Lord Jesus, and those whom He has made righteous (justified), in the presence of our holy God.

            So before we get anything about works, the judgment is rendered, the verdict declared.  And what is the criteria, if not works?  The criteria is the righteousness of Jesus Christ, who died for the sins of the world, who is risen, and lives, and reigns.  Those on His right received that righteousness by faith in this life, and so were covered by Jesus on the Day of Judgment.  “My sheep hear my voice,” Jesus says in another place (John 10:27).  They hear Him, and believe Him and the Promise of His Testament sealed in His death, and so follow Him into the sheepfold (the Church), and into life.  But He says to those who reject Him, “you do not believe because you are not part of my flock” (v. 26).  They do not accept the Testament.  They do not accept the righteousness of Christ that He wills to them in His death.  Thus the separation between the sheep and the goats comes down to faith and unbelief; the reception of Christ’s righteousness by faith, the rejection of Christ’s righteousness by unbelief.

            And now we get to works.  The sheep, having been declared righteous by God on account of Christ, by grace, through faith, apart from works, have nonetheless done works.  And they’re surprised to hear it.  They’re surprised because they don’t remember doing them.  And they know they’ve so often failed to do them, and that when they’ve tried to do them, their works have been soiled with sin and filth.  And on top of it all, they know that they’ve done evil.  They know that they live only by God’s mercy and the forgiveness of sins in Christ.  So they are not counting on their works for a favorable judgment.  They’re counting on the works of Christ, and on Christ alone.

            But they have done works.  These are the works God has done in and through them.  These are the works the Holy Spirit has wrought in them, the fruits of faith.  They have loved their neighbor.  They have fed the hungry and given drink to the thirsty.  They have welcomed strangers, clothed the naked, visited the sick and those in prison.  Now, the works were not extraordinary, and that is why the sheep don’t remember them.  A mother fed and clothed her infant.  A father went to work to provide for his family.  Parents brought their children to Church and taught them to be faithful Christians.  A husband and wife encouraged each other, spoke the Word of God to each other, bore with one another in patience and forgave one another, lived in faithfulness and gave themselves into each other’s embrace.  The family took a casserole to a widow in her grief.   They set an extra place at the table for a college student at Thanksgiving.  They stopped by the hospital to visit Grandma and gave her a card.  These works did not impress God.  They weren’t even all that great on the face of it.  But here is the key.  They were done in faith.  They were done because this Christian family, or the members of this Church, or this individual Christian, knew that such works are what God desires, not so that we become righteous, but because we are righteous in Christ.  You should do good works, because God wants you to, and your neighbor needs them; because a good tree produces good fruit; because that is what one, whom God has declared righteous for Christ’s sake, does.  And you will rejoice, even as you are surprised, to hear Christ speak of such works on that Day. 

            The goats will be surprised, too, but that is because of what Christ doesn’t say of them.  They remember doing a lot of good things, and they want credit.  This is the great difference.  While the sheep only count on the righteousness of Christ, the goats think they are good enough on their own.  Okay, maybe with a little grace from God to balance out their mistakes and weaknesses, but they’re basically good people, and the good things they’ve done ought to stand up before God.  They’ve given to charity.  They’ve donated to food and clothing drives, worked at a soup kitchen, visited Aunt Myrtle when she was sick, built a Habitat for Humanity house, and given a handout to a homeless person, all good things, to be sure.  And they’ve known plenty of Christians who aren’t nearly so philanthropic!  So give us a little credit, Jesus!  But that’s the thing.  If you want your own works to count for you on that great Day… they will.  And it won’t be good enough.  Because for all the good you’ve done, you’ve failed to do so much more that you should have.  And wherever you failed to do it, you failed to do it to Jesus.  And whatever good you’ve done in terms of outward behavior, if it hasn’t been done in faith, it is not good before God, for as the writer to the Hebrews says, “without faith it is impossible to please him” (Heb. 11:6).  And your mistakes and weaknesses are no minor matter.  They are evil, rebellion against God, rejection of Him, and of His Son, Jesus Christ.  Beloved in the Lord, do not drag your own works before God on the Day of Judgment.

            No, on that Day, you plead Christ alone.  And Christ is all you need.  For that reason, you will greet that Day with great rejoicing.  And when your Lord commends you for the good works done in you, you will be surprised, but you won’t deny it.  He isn’t lying.  You will simply marvel that in spite of all your sins, He accomplished great good through you.  That is actually Gospel.  He accomplished it.  He did it.  And He gave you to be His instrument.  And you will know that all the sin you brought to it was washed away by His blood, and you, the Christian, brought to salvation and faith by His grace alone, really were given to love God and praise Him by your works.  This is simply St. Paul’s theology: “For by grace you have been saved through faith.  And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:8-10). 

            So chill out, Lutherans.  Jesus is a better Lutheran than you are.  Believe His Words.  He is coming soon.  He will raise you from the dead and judge you righteous by His own righteousness, by grace alone, through faith alone, apart from works.  But in the meantime, He has given you works to do.  Do them with joy.  And know this: Because Christ is our Emmanuel, He is with us in such a way that any work done to one of the least of these, a lowly Christian, for Christ’s sake, is done unto Christ Himself.  Imagine that: You get to feed and clothe Christ!  Now come to the Supper where He forgives your sins, strengthens you to do His will, and gives you life by His crucified and risen Body and Blood.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.