Latest / Faith On A Hill / When the Son of Man Comes in His Glory - D. Cates
Transcript
- Dan Cates (00:01) Mm-hmm. Jesus is drawing his Olivet discourse to a close. Jesus has plainly painted a numerous number of pictures of the judgment, of the fact that Jesus is going to be going away and that he is going to come again. Now he closes this discussion or this, we might even say, sermon, with a picture of the judgment itself. In Matthew 25, 31 through 46, we see the judge, we see the judged, and we see the judgment. Those are the three things that we want to consider this morning the judge, the judged, and the judgment. We begin with the judge. Who is he? Well, there in verse 31, Rafe just read that he is the son of man. In other words, he is the one who, though he was God, yet became man, bore equality with man, so that he could stand as one who understood what it is like to be a man. But not only is he a man, if the son of man, rather. If you go down to verse forty, you see that he is also the king. And the king shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto me. He is the king. When we think about the gospel accounts, we recognize that the gospel accounts are written from different perspectives, different perspectives. Points of view. When we think about Matthew, one of the main ideas that we get is that he is the king. He is the one who is of the seed of David. He is the one for whom the Jews looked. He is the one who ultimately is going to be the answer to the complaint of 1 Samuel chapter 8. Give us a king like the nations around us. But they'll have a king. That king is going to be of David's lineage. That king is going to be Jesus Christ. And indeed, Jesus Christ is going to be the judge. Second Timothy 4:1. I charge thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead, the living and the dead, at his appearing and his kingdom. Pardon me. That is. Who he is. But let's notice also how he judges. In John twelve, forty eight, Jesus said, He that receiv rejecteth me and receiveth not the word words that I have spoken, hath one that judgeth him. I'm sorry, it receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth them. The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day. How is he going to judge? He is going to judge by his word. He's going to judge by this book and the authority which is contained in it. But he's also going to judge by God. Acts 17, 31, because he has appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained. Notice, he will judge the world. That's God, because in verse 30 we had seen. God being specifically mentioned. So the Father is going to judge, but he's going to do so by that man through Jesus Christ, whom he hath ordained, whom he hath set forth, whom he hath ordered to be the judge, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men that he raised him from the dead. The fact that Jesus came up out of the grave proved that God was going to judge by Jesus Christ. Hebrews twelve twenty-three to the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirit of just men made perfect. God the judge of all. Hebrews thirteen four marriage is honorable in all things, in all, and the bed undefiled, but whoremongers and adulterers, God will judge. Well, God is doing the judging. He's doing it through Jesus Christ. We see that clearly in Romans 2 16. In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. Notice this according to my gospel. According to that message that Paul had been ordained to preach. Acts 10 42, and he commanded us to preach unto the people and to testify that it is he who. Which was ordained of God to be the judge of the quick, the living, and the dead. So there Paul Peter was telling Cornelius and his household about the role of Jesus Christ in judgment by God. So who is he? He's the Son of Man, He's the King, He is the Lord Jesus Christ. How does he judge the word that was spoken by him and by the authority which God has given to him? But third, under this point we can also ask why can he judge? Well he can judge because he is righteous. Second Timothy 4 8, henceforth is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous judge shall give me in that day, and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing. Not only is he righteous, he is Lord, he is the master. Hebrews 10 30, for we know him that he is that hath said. Vengeance belongeth to me, I will repay, saith the Lord. And again, the Lord shall judge his people. He is righteous, he is the Lord, he is just. John 5 30. I can of mine own self do nothing, as I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father. Which has sent me. His righteousness is one thing, but even somebody who is righteous could play favorites. God does not play favorites, not a respecter of persons. And in judgment, Jesus is going to be just himself. In Revelation 19 11, we add to this list of reasons why he can judge, because he is faithful to and true, and I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse, white representing purity, representing victory. And he that sat upon him was called faithful and true, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war. Now we might add one other reason why Jesus is capable of judging. And that is because He is ready. First Peter 4, 5, who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead. Not only is he divinely capable, not only is he righteous and just and true and faithful. Jesus Christ has accomplished everything which he needs to accomplish. The next step, whenever the divine ⁓ time is right, is for him to come meet the righteous in the air and carry them to the judgment scene. Jesus Christ stands ready. That's why he can judge. Let's notice second in our text, the judged. We've seen the judge, consider the judged. The judged are all nations. Look at the beginning of verse thirty two. And before him shall be gathered all nations. I remember Dad often saying and emphasizing that everyone will be at the day of judgment. No one is going to be able to say, Well, I'm busy that day. I have an appointment that day. Or I'm just going to skip that day. No. All nations, every single person who has composed to every single nation which has ever, is, or will ever existed. God is going to judge through Christ all nations. Now you'll notice that the judged are ultimately divided into two groups, and there are only two. There are only sheep and goats. Look at the rest of verse 32 and into verse 33. And he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats. And he shall set the sheep on his right hand and the goats on the left. How would you and I divide the great mass of humanity who have at any time inhabited this earth? I have an idea that we would divide that mass into many different groups. We would divide that mass into maybe language. And we would have two thousand different groups. Composed of anywhere from ten or fifteen people to five billion people. That's not how God is going to do it. Perhaps we would divide that great mass of humanity by skin tones. And the the lighter the skin tone you are, the farther off on this side, and the darker the skin tone you are, the farther off on this side. Maybe that's how we would divide humanity. But that's not not how God's going to do it. Maybe we would divide humanity into the weak and the powerful, something like the Indian caste system. So the weakest, the ones who don't have any legal representation, we could put them in a group over there. And then we could build up group by group by group until you have those that rule everything. But that's not how God's going to divide it. In fact, when we think about these different things, we we're led to the same conclusion that Job and Solomon and others came to in the Old Testament that death is going to put everybody on the same plane when it comes to anything like that. There's no difference in the grave between the most common of slaves and the most powerful of kings. No difference at all. So how are the two groups determined? Sheep, goats. Very simply, saved, lost. That judgment is not going to be based upon what your parents had done. That judgment is not going to be based upon what your preacher did. That judgment is not going to be based upon what your boss did, what your friends did, or anything else. That judgment is going to be based upon what you did and what I did. The sheep and the goats. Notice in beyond Matthew 25, 32 and 33, John chapter 1. The whole chapter there really devoted to this idea that Jesus is a shepherd who has sheep. And you and I can be those sheep, even though we are 2,000 years removed from that shepherd. He said, Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold. In other words, he had sheep that were not from that Jewish background, but they would be ones that would be added to the church even though they had grown up separated from that Old Testament covenant of promise, Gentiles. Hebrews 13, 20. Now the God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant. First Peter two twenty-five, for ye were as sheep gone astray, but are now returned unto the shepherd and bishop of your souls. Romans eight, thirty-five through thirty-seven, who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, for thy sake we are killed all the day long, we are counted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay in all these things we, even though we're sheep as for the slaughter, are more than conquerors through him that loved us. We can picture the shepherds on the hills of Judea as they would be guiding the their sheep and leading them to green pastures and protecting them from the enemies. But then there's a second group. And they actually grazed with the sheep. Those are the goats. But the goats are the lost. We see that there in Matthew 25, but we also see it in John 1026. But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. The sheep and the goats. Indeed, as you're watching the shepherds guiding their flocks through those wildernesses of Judea, you will see sheep and goats together. But then when they get to the sheepfold, the sheep are put together and the goats are separated from them. So we've seen the judge, we've seen the judged. Now let us see the judgment. This judgment, as we mentioned, is not going to be according to any of the measures which we might apply as far as where people are in our society or have been in the past or will be in the future. No, the judgment is simply going to be according to works. Whether one has been good or wicked, works done or undone. Second Corinthians five ten for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. This judgment, because we have the sheep on the one hand and the goats on the other, Is going to ultimately have the judgment of the righteous and the judgment of the wicked or the cursed. The judgment of the righteous, verse 37. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee and hungered and fed thee, or thirsty, and gave thee drink? The righteous. First Peter 3:12, for the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers, but the face of the Lord is against, is turned from them that do evil. First Peter four eighteen. And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? The righteous. Well why are the righteous? Why are those sheep There on the right hand being blessed. Let's notice verses thirty five through forty. We saw verse thirty seven a minute ago, but we'll read the fuller passage. Beginning in verse thirty five, for I was in hungered, and ye gave me meat. I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink. I was a stranger, and ye took me in, naked and ye clothed me. I was sick and ye visited me. I was in prison and ye came unto me. Then shall the righteous say unto him, answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee and hungered and fed thee, or thirsty and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a stranger and took thee in, or naked and clothed thee? And the king shall answer and say unto them, Verily or assuredly, I say unto you, Insomuch as ye have done it. You notice that the italicized the it is italicized? In so much as ye have done, in so much as ye have obeyed, in so much as ye have worked, in so much as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto me. What's going to happen to these who had been doers of They're going to inherit the kingdom. Look at verse 34. Then shall the king say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Now, some people have the idea that the kingdom is only something yet future. However, we understand that the kingdom is already established. We know from Colossians. That those who are obedient to the gospel are translated into the kingdom. And yet, even though the kingdom has already been established, there is a a certain element regarding the kingdom which is yet future. The kingdom shall be delivered up, Daniel chapter 7. The kingdom shall be in its glory. You and I have access to the kingdom today. But how much more glorious is it going to be when we are in the kingdom and in the presence of the king himself? We might think about the same type of ⁓ two pictures of the same image that we have of marriage as a picture of the church. We see in Ephesians 5, the church is the bride of Christ, but then in the book of Revelation, we see the marriage of the Lamb. So there's a way in which we are already his bride. There's another way though that we are anticipating being with our divine groom. Going to inherit the kingdom. But not only though that, but those who are on the right, these sheep, go into life eternal. Look at verse 46. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, talking about those who are on the left, but the righteous into life eternal. You and I have physical life right now. It's not eternal. We don't know how long we have, but we know that from the moment that we first took our first breath, really from the moments that we were conceived, we were already terminal. In other words, our lives were going to come to an end. But there is a life that far surpasses this one, a life eternal. With access continually to the tree of life that flows from the throne of God Revelation chapter twenty two, beginning in verse one and following. The tree on either side of the river of life. That's where those who are on the right will be going. But then we said there was a second group. Those who were not doing the will of God, those who were just outright wicked, or those who knew to do the will of God and chose not to do it. Those are on the left. Those are cursed. Those are the ones about whom we read in verse 41. Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me. I don't know what hell is going to be like. I know that there are pictures in Scripture of fire. There are pictures in Scripture of darkness. But I think the greatest picture of the terror of hell and scripture is separation from God. Hell is an eternity of separation from spiritual life. Hell is an eternity of intelligent hopelessness. Depart from me ye cursed. Into everlasting fire, continuing through verse forty-five, prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was in hungered, and ye gave me no meat. I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink. I was a stranger and ye took me in, naked and ye clothed me not. Ye took me not in. Naked and ye clothed me not, sick and imprisoned and ye visited me not. Then shall they also say unto him, saying us, answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee and hungered, or a thirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or imprison, and did not minister unto thee? In other words, if we had seen it was you, we would have done something. Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye did it not, To one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. What a terrible recognition on that day there will be for the wicked and especially for those who knew to do right but simply chose not to. We noticed there in verse forty one that they were told to depart into everlasting fire. I can't picture that. The reason I can't picture that is because I I think from an earthly perspective, in order to have fire, you need some sort of fuel. In order to have fire, you need oxygen. So you have oxygen and fuel, you have an emission source, boom, you have fire. But heaven and hell are not going to be empirically physical. However, there is some way in which that fits as an appropriate picture of what hell will be. I know that the concept comes from south of Jerusalem, in a valley they called the Valley of Hinnam, which is why sometimes when we speak of hell, we speak of it as Gehenna. The Valley of Hinnam is where all of the refuse from Jerusalem would be tossed into the valley and there would be constant burning. In fact, I don't know that many days would go by where you did not look down into that valley and see fire. And not only did you see fire in that valley, you saw wickedness in that valley. Because that's where even some of the kings of Israel would offer their children to the false gods like Molech. That's a picture of hell. At the very least, that is not a place that we would want to go. And yet that prepared for the devil and his angels is where these who are on the left are told imperatively. To depart from Jesus and go into. We see in verse 46 that in addition to being described as the everlasting fire, that this is also described as everlasting punishment, and these shall go away into everlasting punishment. There are some religious groups that believe that if you were lost, you were just going to be annihilated. That's not much of a punishment. This is going to be, as we mentioned, an intelligent separation. an intelligent hopelessness, it is going to be an eternity of knowing what was lost. That's the judgment. We see in Matthew 25, 31 through 46, the judge, the righteous Lord Jesus Christ. We see the judged, the whole world, divided into two groups. And we see in the judgment the separation of those groups based upon what each individual had done or not done in this life. The judgment is not unfair. The judgment is certainly not a surprise. Malachi three eight, then shall ye return, told in prophecy, then shall ye return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not. In other words, this judgment has been known. Not just for two thousand years, but for twenty four hundred years and really more when we think about the other prophecies of the Old Testament. It's not a surprise. If it's not a surprise and it's not unfair, then the question in light of the whole of this discourse from Matthew twenty four thirty six to Matthew twenty five forty six is this. And it's a simple question. Will we be ready? That day is coming. Will we be ready? Hopefully the answer to that question is yes. It may be that the answer to the question is I don't know. But this morning you can know. You can accept the teaching of Jesus Christ. He said, The word that I have spoken the same shall judge you in the last day. If that's the standard, then that's what we need to obey. Hearing his word and believing it, we turn ourselves from the sins that separate us from our God, which will separate us for eternity. We confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. And certainly that includes the idea that He will be the judge. And we're baptized so that the sins which we have committed can be washed away. They can go into remission. Acts two thirty-eight. Being then added to the Lord's church, Acts 247, we strive to remain faithful. Faithful isn't just checking the attendance box at the worship service on Sunday morning. Faithful is doing those things that the righteous said. When did we do that? And the Lord the King said, When you did it unto the one of the least of these, you did it unto me. That's faithful. Will we be ready? If the answer to that question is I'm not, make the right change today. Let's together we stand and sing. A great day coming, a great day coming. There's a great day coming by and by when the sinner and the sinner shall be pardoned right and left. Are you ready for that day to come? Are you ready? The judgment day ready Are you ready for the judgment day? There's a bright day coming a bride day coming, there's a bright day coming by and by His brightness shall only come to them that love the Lord. Are you ready for that day to come? Are you ready? Are you ready for the judgment day? Are you ready? There's sad day coming, a sad day coming, there's a second day coming by When the saints I shall do this to depart you mine. Are you ready for the day to come? Are you ready? Are you ready? Are you ready for the judgment day? Are you ready? Are you ready for the judgment day? Okay. Give my life for thee my precious blood I shed that thou my friends and beaten from the dead I gave my gave my life for thee. What hast thou given for me? I gave my given life for thee, what hast thou given for me? What has thou born for me? I bore. For thee, what hast thou born for me?