The End

Matthew 25:31-46
 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory,
 and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 

All the nations will be gathered before him, 

and he will separate people one from another
as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, 

and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. 

Then the king will say to those at his right hand, 

‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father,
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; 

for I was hungry and you gave me food, 

I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink,
I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 

I was naked and you gave me clothing,
I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’

Then the righteous will answer him,
‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food,
or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 

And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you,
or naked and gave you clothing?

And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’ 

And the king will answer them,
‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these
who are members of my family, you did it to me.’ 

Then he will say to those at his left hand,
‘You that are accursed,
depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; 

for I was hungry and you gave me no food,
I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 

I was a stranger and you did not welcome me,
naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’

Then they also will answer,
‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger
or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ 

Then he will answer them,
‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these,
you did not do it to me.’ 

And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

If I asked you what is special about this particular Sunday, what kind of answers might you give?  Maybe you would say, “It’s almost Thanksgiving.”
             

I’m guessing one of the first answers you might give is not that it is the end of the year.  Especially since we are only at the end of November.  But, it is the end of the year, at least in the liturgical calendar.  See, for Christians, the beginning of Advent is really the beginning of the new year.  It is the beginning of the cycle of Christ’s birth, life, death, and resurrection that we celebrate every year.  So in a way, this is the last day of the Christian year.

The other defining characteristic of this day is that it is called Christ the King Sunday, or Reign of Christ Sunday.  We celebrate the status of Christ as Lord and as King.  We celebrate Christ’s final identity after resurrection, the King of creation, the Lord of all.

One of the behind-the-scenes things that happens every week here at First Presbyterian involves the marquee board outside.  Each week, or almost each week, Elizabeth or I – whoever is preaching – picks out a sermon title.  On Tuesday our maintenance man, John, puts that sermon title up on the marquee board, at the corner.  We get extra points if we keep our titles to three words or less.
             

This week, John came to me and asked if I was going to be preaching about the apocalypse and I was pretty confused because, if I’m honest, I don’t always remember what title I choose.  He and I had very different reactions to my sermon title this week: The End.  While I wrote the end because of the end of the liturgical year, John went much more broad and heard the end of all things.  Hopefully this sermon will just indicate the end of the former and not the latter.

I don’t think John’s understanding of the words, “the end” is a unique one.  Our culture is fascinated with the end.  We are fascinated by the end of cycles – liturgical or calendar years.  We are fascinated with our own individual ends, our deaths.  We are particularly fascinated with our communal end, with the end of the world.

The is objectively the best movie ever.
No, don't argue.  It is.

If you doubt this, think of the number of apocalypse stories in popular culture of late: Hunger Games, Divergent – government sponsored apocalypse; The Day the Earth Stood Still, Independence Day – alien apocalypse, World War Z, The Walking Dead, Dawn of the Dead, I Am Legend – zombie apocalypse; 2012, Contagion, The Day After Tomorrow – miscellaneous apocalypse; and my favorite lately: Interstellar – space apocalypse.  Religious groups have even gotten into the mix – a new version of Left Behind has just come out.  We are fascinate with the end.  And our passage today uses the method of talking about the end as a way to talk about who God is.

There is a blending of imagery here in our passage: the imagery of the king and the shepherd.  This would not have been an unfamiliar blend for the ancient readers.  Kings were often thought of as shepherds who tended to their flocks.  Scripture uses this image to talk about the bad human kings of the past.  But God is the good shepherd, the good king.  We see this imagery in our Matthew passage.

In Matthew’s passage Jesus takes on the role of the shepherd-king.  He will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.  There is something about that image that is meaningful for us, but what is it?

In this passage Jesus the shepherd-king divides the people there are some at his right hand and some at his left.  Those at his right hand have done something right and those at his left have not.  What is it that causes Christ to separate these two groups?

It is the way the two different groups treated Jesus.  But the groups are confused: "When did we care for you, when did we feed you, clothe you, visit you?"  Or "When did we ignore you, when were we not attentive to you?  We don’t remember this Jesus."

Jesus responds: "Whenever you did these things or did not do these things for the least among you - for the least important, the least wealthy, the least beautiful, the most vulnerable - you did them for me.

I think the last part of this passage, the least of these, gives us some idea of why Matthew wrote this.  Our minds immediately go the apocalypse/end of the world route.  We may think, this is the Christ-ultimatum.  When the kingdom of heaven comes, this is what Christ is saying we will be judged on.  Our tendency is to look at this as a do-or-die thing.

But perhaps Jesus gives us this set of instructions not as a precursor to some apocalyptic judgment, but as a way of conveying the kind of living that a life of faith demands.  

If we try to think of the kind of person that Jesus might identify with, who do we think of?  What kind of person would Christ say he is like?  Jesus identifies himself with the least of these.  The life that faith requires, is one where we see Christ in those around us, especially in the most vulnerable, and treat them accordingly.

So much of what we read or hear in the news every day is about the bad things that happen in the world.  War, disease, chaos, hunger.  While these things are a reality, and we should never ignore the world, I find myself leaping at the chance to read about something good happening in the world.

I heard a story this week from a program called StoryCorps about an assisted living home in California called Valley Springs Manor.[1]  The facility was closed down last fall, I’m guessing for financial reasons.  After the staff stopped getting paid, they all left.  Well, almost all of them left.

See when the facility closed down, the residents fell through the cracks: 16 residents were left behind to fend for themselves.  Some of these residents were dementia patients, and they went from receiving care 24 hours a day, to being left to prepare their own meals and care for themselves.  Two members of the staff, a cook named Maurice Rowland and a janitor named Miguel Alvarez, decided to stay on with the residents.

So these two young men - both in their mid 30’s - decided that they would care for the residents.  They spent all of their time at the assisted living home, cooking, handing out medication, bathing and cleaning for these left-behind people.  Miguel says that he was abandoned by his parents when he was a child, and he could not do the same thing to these people.  Maurice said that even though these people weren’t their family, they were kind of like their family for this short period of time.

Miguel and Maurice spent several days caring for the residents until the fire department and sheriff took over.  As a result of this incident, the Residential Care for the Elderly Reform Act of 2014 was passed.  This is a story of caring for the least of these, of shepherding for weak sheep.

As we look at the world around us, we see a world full of the “least of these” people.  People who are hungry and thirsty, who need food for today and food for tomorrow.  People who are strangers in this land, who need a place to live, a refuge and a welcome.  People who have no shelter or no clothes, no way to stay warm, who need a roof, or a coat, or money to pay their power bill.  People who make up our overwhelmingly large prison population, who need to be visited, and reminded that they are cared for and not forgotten.

The people and organizations that care for the least of these are struggling organizations like Stanly Community Christian Ministries, Homes of Hope, the Community Inn.  These avenues by which we care for the least these struggle to keep their doors open.

In the faces of the least of these, we see the face of Christ.  As we come to the end of the liturgical year, and as we look to the beginning of Advent, we hear the renewed call.  The call of the king who has the power to care for all people.  The call of the shepherd who is willing to sacrifice all for another.  Let us see the need in the world, and not stand idly by.  Let us care for the least of these.

Amen.

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[1] Alvarez, Miguel and Rowland, Maurice. (2014, November 21) “If We Left, They Wouldn’t Have Nobody.” Jud Esty-Kendall (Producer), StoryCorps. Hayward, CA: National Public Radio.  Retrieved from http://www.npr.org