All Good Things Must Come to an End?

Welcome to the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern

Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone.

And now, here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. The Holy Gospel according to St.

Matthew, chapter 25, verses 31 through 46. When the

Son of Man comes in His glory and all the angels with Him, He will sit on His throne in heavenly glory.

All of the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

He will put the sheep on His right and the goats on His left. Then the King will say to those on His right,

Come, you who are blessed by My Father, take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation 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. I needed clothes, and you clothed Me. I was sick, and you looked after Me.

I was in prison, and you came to visit 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? When did we see You a stranger and invite

You in, or needing clothes and clothe You? When did we see You sick or in prison and go to visit

You? And the King will reply, I tell you the truth, whatever you did for the least of these

My brothers, you did for Me. Then He will say to those on His left, Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

For I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat. I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink. I was a stranger, and you did not invite

Me in. I needed clothes, and you did not clothe Me. I was sick and in prison, and you did not look after Me.

They also will answer, Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison and did not help

You? He will reply, I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.

And then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.

In the name of Jesus. So the saying goes, all good things must come to an end.

That's how the saying goes. But think about this life for a second. We live under a curse.

We're all born dead in trespasses and sins. We sin against God and sin against each other daily and much.

So when this world comes to an end, is it that a good thing is coming to an end? And if you think about it, what's coming is eternal life.

Well, if eternal life is coming, then, well, all good things must not come to an end.

Because the good thing that is coming will never end. Ever. And so with that, today is the

Sunday, the last Sunday of the church year. Next Sunday, we begin a brand new church year with Advent 1.

And what's interesting is that the gospel text for next Sunday is like the yin to this week's yang.

It's like the opposite of it. Next week, a little bit of a preview, Christ is coming into Jerusalem on a donkey.

Not a war horse, a donkey. But today, He comes on a war horse, so to speak.

So as we look at this text, this gospel text of the parable of the sheep and the goats, let's get a little bit of context here.

And what I mean by that, let's do a little bit of a survey of what the Bible teaches regarding the end of the world. And you will find that God's word speaks about this often and explicitly.

So none of us should be caught unawares. Remember the watch words for the last two

Sundays were watch, watch. Christ is coming. So Revelation 1, we're just going to hop around the scriptures a little bit.

Revelation 1, verse 7 says this. Look, He, Jesus, is coming with the clouds.

And every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him. And all the peoples on the earth will mourn because of Him.

So shall it be. Amen. Now notice a couple of things with this little text.

Everyone is going to see Him, even those who pierced Him. The people who pierced Jesus, they've long since decayed into dust and ashes.

Their bodies are no more. How on earth will their eyes behold the Lord? Well, this hints at the fact that on the last day,

Jesus is going to raise everybody from the grave. Everybody. So, in fact, this past week, we put to rest

Judy Stingram. And at the graveside, when we were committing her body to the earth, afterwards

I was talking with Marlene. And she says, you know, we all have plots here. We're all going to be buried here.

And she showed me where she was going to be buried. And I said to her, on the last day, this is going to be a great place to be.

And she said, indeed it will be. Indeed it will be. So on that great day when

Jesus returns, the great and terrible day, a little bit of both, every eye will see

Christ, including those who pierced Him. Everybody will be raised from the grave. Matthew chapter 19,

Jesus talks about this. He says, I tell you the truth, at the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man sits on His glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

Jesus talks explicitly of His return and even says that the apostles are going to take place in the judgment. Psalm 97, verses 2 through 6, talks about Jesus' glorious throne.

And here's how the psalmist describes it. Clouds and thick darkness surround Him. Righteousness and justice are the foundation of His throne.

Fire goes before Him and consumes His foes on every side. Yeah, this doesn't sound like Precious Moments Jesus, does it?

His lightning lights up the world. The earth sees and trembles. The mountains melt like wax before the

Lord, before the Lord of all of the earth. The heavens proclaim His righteousness and all the peoples see

His glory. Yeah, that's a description of Christ's glorious throne and what that's all about.

What an awesome sight that is. And yet we have nothing to fear from Christ. We are in Him.

Daniel writes about the end of the age. Here's what he says. In chapter 7, verses 9 through 10,

Daniel writes, As I looked, thrones were set in place, and the Ancient of Days took

His seat. His clothing was as white as snow, and the hair of His head was white like wool.

Does this sound like Jesus on the day of the Transfiguration, right? His throne was flaming with fire, and its wheels were all ablaze.

A river of fire was flowing, coming out from before Him. Thousands upon thousands attended

Him. Ten thousand times ten thousand stood before Him. The court was seated, and the books were opened.

Now, before you get all nervous about these books, when the Bible starts mentioning the

Day of Judgment, starts talking about books, I know what's written in my book. You know what's written in yours, right?

Now, the last thing I want is for that book to be opened and for me to be held accountable for what's in that book.

And if you're honest with yourself, the same is true for you. You know what's written in those books. Well, let me remind you of the

Gospel here. We'll put a little Gospel in the center here while we're talking about the Day of Judgment. Colossians 2 addresses this.

Colossians 2, 11 -14 says this, In Him, that's in Christ, also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by the putting off of the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised

Him from the dead. Now, you'll notice that there's kind of a common theme here. If you show up on any given Sunday here at Kongsbinger, I'm probably going to point you to your baptism.

For good reason. It's something objective that God has done to you. God has circumcised your heart. Christ has circumcised your heart in your baptism.

And here's the fun part that deals with these books. And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, notice that Scripture makes it clear that each and every one of us were born sinners.

It says this, God made you alive together with Christ, having forgiven all of our trespasses by cancelling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands.

This He set aside, nailing it to the cross. Ah. So on that great and terrible day, when the books are open and we see the throne of Christ and Him in glory, and His hair all white with righteousness, and the books are open, all of those things that you're worried about, that you know condemn you, well, that record of debt has been cancelled.

It's been nailed to the cross. Those pages are not in your book. You are forgiven.

All that's left are your good works because of what Christ has done for you. This is good news.

Now let's get back to the end of the world. Everyone likes talking about the end of the world. I like talking about it from Scripture.

2 Thessalonians 1, 5 -12 reads, All of this is evidence that God's judgment is right.

And as a result, you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God. Ah, that bears repeating.

You, yes, you, all of you, are going to be counted worthy of the kingdom of God for which you are suffering.

God is just, and He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you, and give relief to those who are troubled, and to us as well.

This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with His powerful angels.

He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Fascinating way to talk about the gospel.

Obey the gospel. How do you obey the gospel? Answer, you believe it. The good news is this.

This is the gospel. Christ bled and died for your sins and was raised again on the third day for your justification.

So to obey the gospel is to believe that you have a merciful and kind Savior who took your sins upon Himself and bled and died for you and rose again from the grave.

That's what it means to obey the gospel. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the

Lord and from the majesty of His power on the day that He comes to be glorified in His holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed.

This includes you because you believed our testimony to you. Yes, folks, this includes you.

You someday are going to stand and marvel at Christ and His glorious kingdom all because He's made you worthy.

So with this in mind, we constantly pray for you that our God may count you worthy as God's doing the work of His calling and that by His power

He may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith. We pray this also that in the name of our

Lord Jesus may be glorified in you and you in Him according to the grace of our God and our

Lord Jesus Christ. Matthew 24. We read this a few weeks ago. 29 -31, it says this.

Immediately after the distress of those days, the distress of the last days will be intense. And if Christ does not cut them short, no one will survive.

After the distress of those days, the sun will be darkened. The moon will not give its light. The stars will fall from the sky.

The heavenly bodies will be shaken. Where Jesus in the parable of the weeds, the field and the weeds, says this.

This is His interpretation. At that time, the sign of the Son of Man will appear. This is Matthew 13, 37 -43.

At that time, the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the

Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. He will send

His angels with a loud trumpet call. Oh, that trumpet call is all throughout the New Testament. You pay attention to that.

That's signaling the end of the world. Kind of like when the walls of Jericho fell, right? Yeah. The walls of Jericho, that's type and shadow of the end of the world.

Yeah. The final trumpet blast. They will gather His elect from the four winds and from one end of the heavens to the other.

So He said, The one who sowed the good seed, well, that's the Son of Man. That's Jesus. The field is the world.

The good seed stands for the sons of the kingdom. The weeds are the sons of the evil one and the enemy who sows them is the devil.

The harvest is the end of the age and the harvesters are angels. One of the reasons why life is so difficult right now is because wheat and tares are all together in the same field.

And those tares can bully. They really do. As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age.

The Son of Man will send out His angels and they will weed out of His kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil.

They will throw them into the fiery furnace where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear.

Or 1 Thessalonians 4, For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God.

There's that trumpet again. And the dead in Christ will rise first, and after that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the

Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore, encourage each other with these words.

As you can see, Scripture talks extensively and explicitly regarding the fact that this world which had a beginning, in the beginning, when

God said, Let there be light, and there was light. And in the beginning, Barashit Barah Elohim, when

God created the heavens and the earth, that this world had a beginning, and it will have an end.

Just like Jesus cried out on the cross, Tetelestai, it is finished. Someday, in the very near future,

Christ will again say, Tetelestai, it's finished, it's done. The end has come. This world is passing away.

And so now we come to our gospel text, the parable of the sheep and the goats. An often abused text.

Why? Well, because with a careless reading, not paying attention to the details, it's very easy to think,

Well, I'm saved by my works. Didn't Jesus say to the sheep, Come you who are blessed because I was hungry and you gave me something to eat?

Isn't that saying that the sheep are saved by their works? Only if you're not paying attention to the details.

This is not saying that at all. Scripture is very clear. Not one person will be declared righteous in God's sight by observing the law.

So therefore, if you read this parable that way, you've missed a vital clue, a vital thing in this text that points to the fact that we're saved not by our works, but by grace.

And if you're truly in Christ, then you truly do good works. There's no such thing as a Christian who doesn't do good works.

That's like saying there's a such thing as a living body that doesn't breathe. That's silly. I don't know any living bodies that don't breathe.

If you do, come see me. I'd like to see that. But we return now to our parable. Here's what it says.

When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and now we have all the backstory. We know the details. And the angels with Him, and we know what they're doing and what they're up to, separating the wheat from the tares.

He will sit on His throne in the heavenly glory and all the nations will be gathered before Him. By the way, everybody's going to be there.

Don't worry about putting this in your day planner. The angels will make sure that you're there. Okay? You see what

I'm saying here? But you ain't getting out of this one. This is the day when every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is

Lord to the glory of God the Father. So all the nations will be gathered before Him. You're going to be there.

He will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on His right, the goats on His left.

And by the way, at this point, the judgment has already taken place. You're judged by what you are, not what you do.

If you are a sheep, you're on the right. If you're a goat, you're on the left. Plain and simple.

You're either sheep or goat. You either believe and trust in Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and are reckoned righteous by the righteousness imputed to you from Christ or you're a goat, an unbeliever, and you have to be judged by all of your works.

So the king will say to those on his right, and notice he starts off with gospel here, not law. He starts off with gospel.

Christ is merciful. In fact, it is really not in Christ's nature to be wrathful, but He will show wrath when

He is provoked. Does that make sense? So Christ says to the sheep,

Come. Come. Great words. Come, you who are blessed by my

Father. Take your inheritance. Ah, here's the inheritance. The kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.

For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty, you gave me something to drink.

I was a stranger, and you invited me in. I needed clothes, and you clothed me. I was sick, and you looked after me.

I was in prison, and you came to visit me. And the sheep scratched their heads and go,

Uh, Lord? But notice these words here. Then the righteous will answer him.

It doesn't say the sheep. It says the righteous. The righteous. And remember what we just read. All of us were born dead in trespasses and sins, but Christ circumcised our hearts, washing us in the waters of our baptism.

He's giving us faith. He declares us righteous. So the king declares us sinners to be righteous by faith as a gift.

And so he says to the righteous. The righteous will answer him. Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you or thirsty and give you something to drink?

They're just like, amazing, right? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, needing clothes to clothe you?

When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you? Now pay attention to the details here.

Then the king will reply. I tell you the truth. Whatever you did for the least of these, my brothers, you did for me.

Who are Jesus' brothers? In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus talks about this explicitly.

Jesus' brothers, sisters, those are the ones who believe in him.

So notice here, the sheep, the sheepy things they do. The sheep doing the sheepy things they do, they see

Christian brothers, and you can say sisters, and they see their

Christian brothers in need of food and they feed them. They see their Christian brothers thirsty and they give them something to drink.

They see their Christian brothers, even though they are strangers, they invite them in. They see their Christian brothers needing clothes and clothing them, or sick or in prison.

In prison for what? For preaching the Gospel. And they go to visit them. This is all about how sheep treat sheep.

How Christians treat other Christians. What does the Scripture say? They will know we are Christians by our love.

It doesn't say gossip, by the way. I just want to make that clear. If you were confused on that, they'll know we are

Christians by our love, our love towards each other. So, this is not talking about some generic acts of mercy, although we should and ought and must take care of our neighbors in need, even if they're not believers.

But this isn't talking about that. Jesus here is talking about how Christians are treating Christians.

As you've done to the least of these, my brothers. And this then becomes the hinge point. Because the goats then, how do they treat

Christians? Is the question that comes up. The king will reply, I tell you the truth, whatever you did for the least of these, brothers of mine, my brothers, you did for me.

Then he will say to those on his left, depart. Terrible words. Listen, you don't want to hear these words.

Not from Jesus. Not applied to you. Depart is a bad thing on this day.

Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire. Yeah, that's how long that's going to last, by the way.

Into the eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. Notice it says, prepared for the devil and his angels.

It is utter foolishness that any human being would end up in this place. Because Christ has bled and died for the sins of the world.

No one, no one needs go here. This place was prepared for the devil and his angels.

Christ did not die for the devil and the demons. He died for the sins of the world. He says to them,

I was hungry. You gave me nothing to eat. What's the context? These brothers of mine.

So how do the goats treat Christians? Oh, they're hungry? I don't feed them.

I was thirsty. They don't give them anything to drink. As a stranger, you don't invite me in. I need clothes.

You don't clothe me. I was sick and in prison. You did not look after me. What do goats do? They reject

Christ and they reject his brothers who bring the message of the good news of Christ and him crucified for their sins.

And when they see them, they mistreat them. They persecute them. They put them out.

They don't care for their needs. In fact, oftentimes they work in hostility against their needs and persecute them even to the point of death.

This is what goats do. So they will answer, Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick and in prison and did not help you?

I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for the least of these. Least of what? Least of these my brothers.

You did not do it for me. And then we've got this verse.

Then they, the goats, will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.

Notice that eternal life and eternal punishment are inextricably linked. You can't tear them apart.

How long is eternal life? How long do you Christians intend to live when Christ returns?

Forever. World without end. Days without end. And the sad news is that the opposite of this is that those who reject

Christ, persist in sin and unbelief, despite the fact that Christ has bled and died for them, they will go to eternal punishment.

Their punishment will last as long as our eternal life. It's sad.

It's tragic. It's a tough verse to preach on. But this is the truth.

This is what's at stake. This is why we preach the gospel. This is why we plead with our neighbors, repent, be forgiven,

Christ has bled and died for you. Let me paint a slightly better picture to end with here though.

It's a tough place to end. Revelation chapter 21 says this, Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth.

I can't wait for this day to come. New heaven, new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away.

So even the universe is like us. We come to eternal life through death and resurrection.

And so this universe, this time -space continuum dies. It passes away. And then it is resurrected.

For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. There was no longer any sea.

I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride, beautifully dressed for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Now the dwelling of God is with men and he will live with them and they will be his people and God himself will be with them and be their

God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death. Thank God.

No more mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things has passed away.

He who was seated on the throne said, I am making everything new.

Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true. He's making everything new.

So the saying goes, All good things must come to an end. But that's not what our texts say this morning.

This cursed creation is coming to an end. And all good things will last forever and ever, days without end.

And because you are in Christ, because you are forgiven, because you've been brought to penitent faith in Jesus, you are washed and redeemed, you too will be with Christ.

You will hear from him, come into the inheritance prepared for you before the foundations of the earth, all because of what

Christ has done for you. It's kind of a last way of looking at this. Have any of you read the

Chronicles of Narnia? Yeah. Some of you have read them. The final book is called

The Last Battle. Now, if you're not familiar with the stories, I'll try to bring you up to speed quickly. Chronicles of Narnia are about this other world called

Narnia. And in that other world, Jesus is called Aslan. And he doesn't appear as a man.

He appears as a glorious, fearful, and wonderful lion named Aslan. Well, in the last book,

The Last Battle, Narnia, just like earth, comes to an end. And it comes to an end very similar to the way the earth is going to come to an end.

And there's a reason why. There's a parallel there. It was a great deception. And one of the deceivers was a donkey named

Puzzle, who ultimately repented. But in the story, if you're familiar with The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, there were four children,

Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy, who traveled to Narnia. And they went back another time.

And then, when they went back the second time, Peter and Susan were told they could never return to Narnia.

And they were very sad about this. And then there was another adventure where Edmund and Lucy went back to Narnia.

And at the end of that adventure, they were told they couldn't return to Narnia again. And it was very difficult for them.

They wanted so badly to be back in Narnia. Well, at the end of The Last Battle, Peter and Edmund and Lucy are all back in Narnia.

Now, Susan is left out because, unfortunately, Susan, she grew up. She ceased to be childlike.

So she's not there. Very sad and tragic indeed. But, so we pick up at the very last pages of The Last Battle.

And Aslan is talking to the donkey named Puzzle, the one who participated in the great deception in Narnia and who was brought to repentance.

And Aslan forgives him. Here's what it says. The very first person whom Aslan called to him was

Puzzle the donkey. You never saw a donkey look feebler and sillier than Puzzle did as he walked up to Aslan.

And he looked beside Aslan, as small as a kitten looks beside a Saint Bernard.

The lion bowed down his head and whispered something to Puzzle at which his long ears went down.

But then he said something else at which his ears perked up. You can only imagine.

Law and gospel. You're guilty, but I forgive you. The humans couldn't hear what he said either time.

And then Aslan turned to them and says, You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be.

So Lucy spoke up. Well, we're so afraid of being sent away, Aslan.

When you have sent us back into our own world so often, Aslan said, well, there's no fear of that.

Have you not guessed? Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.

Aslan said, there was a real railway accident. Your father and your mother and all of you are, as you used to call it in the

Shadowlands, you're dead. Therefore, the school term is over.

The holidays have begun. The dream has ended. This is the morning.

As he spoke, he no longer looked to them like a lion. But the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them.

And as for this, well, this is the end of all the stories. And we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after.

But for them, it was only the beginning of the real story. All of their life in this world and all of their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page.

And now, at last, they were beginning chapter one of the great story which no one on earth has read, which goes on forever and forever, in which every chapter is better than the one before.

This is our hope. C .S. Lewis picked it up, and we see it.

We see it, and we greet it from afar. And we pray with the church as the church has prayed throughout the ages,

Maranatha, come, Lord Jesus, come. Come and save us and take us home.

And he will, and all of us will see his glory and marvel.

And all of us will hear from him, well done, good and faithful servant, because he has made us righteous.

He has bled and died for us. He has done all of this for us, and this is most certainly true.

All good things must come to an end. The good things haven't even begun, and when they begin, they will never end.

In the name of Jesus, amen. If you would like to support the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church, you can do so by sending a tax -free donation to Kungsvinger Lutheran Church, 15950 470th

Avenue NW, Oslo, MN 56744. And again, that address is

Kungsvinger Lutheran Church, 15950 470th

Avenue NW, Oslo, MN 56744. We thank you for your support.

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