Freely you have received, freely give.

Matthew 25:31-26:13 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

The Judgment

 “But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. ³² All the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; ³³ and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left.

³⁴ “Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation 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 naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to 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 And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? ³⁹ When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ ⁴⁰ The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’

⁴¹ “Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been 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; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.’ ⁴⁴ Then they themselves also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not ^[a]take care of You?’ ⁴⁵ Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ ⁴⁶ These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

26 When Jesus had finished all these words, He said to His disciples, ² “You know that after two days the Passover is coming, and the Son of Man is to be handed over for crucifixion.”

³ Then the chief priests and the elders of the people were gathered together in the court of the high priest, named Caiaphas; ⁴ and they plotted together to seize Jesus by stealth and kill Him. ⁵ But they were saying, “Not during the festival, otherwise a riot might occur among the people.”

⁶ Now when Jesus was in Bethany, at the home of Simon the leper, ⁷ a woman came to Him with an alabaster vial of very costly perfume, and she poured it on His head as He reclined at the table. ⁸ But the disciples were indignant when they saw this, and said, “Why this waste? ⁹ For this perfume might have been sold for a high price and the money given to the poor.” ¹⁰ But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why do you bother the woman? For she has done a good deed to Me. ¹¹ For you always have the poor with you; but you do not always have Me. ¹² For when she poured this perfume on My body, she did it to prepare Me for burial. ¹³ Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be spoken of in memory of her.”

I want to begin with the last paragraph of today’s text, because it has a tie to yesterday’s meditation where we saw that equality in the kingdom of heaven is not achieved through the redistribution of wealth here on earth. It is not that we are not to be compassionate and generous toward those who have needs. We will see that Jesus addresses that in the beginning of today’s text. The truth though is that Jesus did not come to bring equality on earth. He came to give everyone an equal opportunity to enter the kingdom of heaven. In the text it says:   A woman came to Him with an alabaster vial of very costly perfume, and she poured it on His head as He reclined at the table. But the disciples were indignant when they saw this, and said, “Why this waste? For this perfume might have been sold for a high price and the money given to the poor.” But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why do you bother the woman? For she has done a good deed to Me. For you always have the poor with you; but you do not always have Me. For when she poured this perfume on My body, she did it to prepare Me for burial.”   Jesus says there will always be poor people. Anyone who understands economics also knows that is true. In fact most economists will acknowledge that even if all the wealth in the world were distributed evenly, in a fairly short period of time there would once again be rich and poor.  There is no governmental system that can eliminate poverty. All that can be done is to try to meet the needs of those who are poor. The question then becomes what is the most efficient and effective way to do that. Do we trust government bureaucracy, which tends to be slow and inefficient, wasting as much as ninety cents on the dollar, or de we find more effective ways through non-government charities? 

In today’s text Jesus says:   “But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne.  All the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left. Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 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;  naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.’  Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink? And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You?  When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’”   Perhaps if the church would truly look at those in need as if they were Christ Himself we would not eliminate poverty, but we would meet every need. James 2:15-16 says:  If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? 

As disciples of Christ though we must remember that we are not only to meet the temporal needs of others. In Matthew 10:7-8 when Jesus sent out the disciples He said:  “As you go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.”   When we go out, we are also to feed them spiritual food. We are not only to give them a drink, but we are to lead them to the river of life. We are not only to visit them in prison, but we are to set the captives free. We are not only to visit and comfort those who are sick, but we are to lay hands on the sick that they may recover. The life of Christ is our example of how we should live, but we should never forget that that Jesus didn’t come just to live, but that on the cross, He died so that we could live.

Heavenly Father, Lord Jesus Christ; precious Holy Spirit; may I live my life with the compassion and generousity that You demonstrated in Your life. May I never forget or neglect the true demonstration of Your love. As it says in Romans 5:8: You demonstrate Your own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. May I freely give as I have received. Amen.