Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions. Not everyone who calls out to me, “Lord! Lord!” will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter. [Matthew 7:20-21 NLT]
Having previously warned people that not everyone who claimed to follow Him would enter the Kingdom, Jesus told the Parable of the Sheep and Goats in which He likened the last judgment to a king separating the sheep from the goats at the end of the day. Placing the sheep to His right and the goats to His left, the King invites the sheep into the Kingdom. The reasoning behind His selection is disarmingly simple: “For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.” [Matthew 25:35-36] Having failed to do those things, the goats are sent into eternal punishment.
Both the blessed (sheep) and the condemned (goats) are astonished at the King’s explanation and they ask when they did or didn’t do those things. The goats seemed to expect they’d enter the Kingdom. After all, they’d followed all the rules. They may have recited the creed Sundays at church, tithed (after taxes of course), and avoided even a whiff of scandal but their supposed faith never moved from their heads into their hearts. Nevertheless, they’re confident they would have helped Jesus if they’d ever seen Him.
Like the goats, the sheep don’t remember seeing Jesus. But, unlike the goats, their faith produced fruit. They’d grocery shopped for the ailing neighbor, brought casseroles to the grieving family, offered water to the landscaper, read to the blind woman down the street, written letters to prisoners, worked at the food pantry, brought communion to the house-bound, mentored a refugee family, tutored immigrant children, volunteered in the charity resale shop, been foster parents, or taken cancer patients to chemo. Rather than projects, they saw people in need! Like the goats, they don’t recall seeing Jesus’ face; nevertheless, sacrificial love was a way of life for them.
Both sheep and goats ask Jesus, “Lord, when did we ever see you?” He explains that whatever the sheep did for the “least of these” had been done for Him and that, whenever the goats refused to help the “least of these,” they had refused to help Him! If, like the Pharisees, we split hairs and ask who the “least of these” are, Jesus answered that question with the Good Samaritan parable and his command to love one another as He loved us! [John 13:34]
This isn’t a case of faith versus works. We are, indeed, saved by grace through faith alone. Even so, our faith is judged by our works and it is by our fruit that He will know us. If our faith hasn’t transformed our lives, it is dead. Faith is far more than “lip service;” we can’t claim we love Jesus when we fail to love others as He did!
Being a sheep isn’t about heroic, grand, or impressive deeds. The sheep hadn’t cured cancer, solved the housing crisis, or reformed the prison system. They didn’t do great things but they continually did little things with great love! Without realizing it, they saw Jesus in every person they met. Both groups claimed to love the Shepherd but only the sheep loved as the Shepherd loved!
Sacrificial love is the real wool that distinguishes the sheep from the goats. Having real wool does not make you a sheep. But being a sheep causes you to have real wool. [Hayden Hefner]
When I learned about people like Abraham, David, Moses, and Samson as a girl, they were the Bible’s version of super-heroes like Batman or Superman. The Bible’s heroes were larger than life, obedient, invincible, and seemed to overcome their obstacles effortlessly. Appearing perfect in their faith and actions, they weren’t people to whom I could relate. In reality, they were as flawed as the rest of us but, for the most part, their imperfections and failures were redacted from the stories we learned in Sunday school.
The email from my dentist asked, “Would you recommend us?” When I answered in the affirmative, I was hyperlinked to a site that added my five-star rating to that of other patients. The following day, I received a longer survey regarding my recent visit. Once done, it again asked if I would recommend his services and requested use of my name in an on-line testimonial. It’s clear that my dentist wants more than feedback; he wants the public approval of his patients. Although I like him, I like my privacy more, so I declined!
Having quoted from Isaiah when proclaiming the Messiah’s arrival, we know John knew Isaiah’s prophecies. The Messiah would “bind up the brokenhearted [and] proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners,” [61:1] but, after spending more than a year confined to a dark cell, John had neither liberty nor freedom. It’s no wonder he doubted.
At the time, Herod Antipas was the Tetrarch of Galilee and Perea. While married to the daughter of Aretas IV, king of Nabatea, Antipas visited his half-brother, Herod Philip and his wife Herodias (who was the daughter of another half-brother, Herod Aristobulus) in Rome. While there, Antipas became enamored with his brother’s wife. After divorcing their spouses, he and Herodias married and lived in Herod’s palace with Herodias’ daughter Salome. Their divorces and marriage were politically explosive and religiously scandalous and John the Baptizer was outspoken in his condemnation of their incestuous sinful relationship. While marrying a niece wasn’t uncommon, Mosaic law prohibited marrying a brother’s wife except in what was called a “levirate marriage” when a brother died childless. Philip, however, was very much alive at the time! Both Herod Antipas’ reputation and his political security were threatened by John’s public condemnation of his marriage as well as his Messianic message.
While we now know what is meant by an iota and dot, jot and tittle, or yod and kots, we wonder what Jesus means by “the least of these commandments!” If the smallest letter is as important as the largest and the smallest flourish on the smallest letter in Scripture was not to be eliminated, how can there be a “lesser” commandment? The confusion again comes from reading an English translation of a Greek rendering of the original Hebrew. Jesus probably was using a popular Jewish idiom “mitsvot kalot” meaning “light” commandments, rather than “mitsvot ketanot,” meaning less important or small commandments. While this seems a bit like splitting hairs, it reflects Jewish thinking in Jesus’ day when a distinction was made between “light” and “weighty” commandments when comparing one to another.
Devotions of the Heart 