Good Works Bless Christ

Please turn to Matthew chapter 25. Matthew chapter 25 can be found on page 831 if you're using the Pew Bible in front of you. We'll be looking particularly at verse 40. We've been doing a truly a mega series on motivations for good works because it's broken up into a little mini series.

This little mini series being on those motivations would have to do with the way good works advance the kingdom of heaven. This particular message is on how good works bless Christ. The particular verse is verse 40, and the King will answer them.

Truly I say to you as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me. However, I will read all of 31 through 46 for context. When you have that, please stand for the reading of God's Word.

When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on his left. Then the King will say to those on his right, Come you who 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 drink. I was a stranger, and you welcomed me. I was 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, saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?

And the King will answer them, Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of my brothers, you did it to me. Then he will say to those on his left, Depart from me, you cursed, 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 no drink. I was a stranger, and you did not welcome me. Naked, and you did not clothe me. Sick, and in prison, and you did not visit me.

Then they also will answer, saying, Lord, When did we see you hungry or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to you? Then he will answer them, saying, Truly I say to you, 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. Amen. You may be seated. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We know it does not return void. We know it accomplishes its purposes.

You have your purposes for us today as we hear that your word proclaimed. We ask that you would accomplish those purposes in us swiftly and greatly by the power of your spirit. That we would recognize the truths here, that we would tremble at the threatenings, that we would rejoice at the promises, and that we would be comforted always by your goodness, and especially that goodness that is found in Jesus Christ.

In his name we pray. Amen. So in going about the Christian life, God has called us to serve him. He has made a people for himself, not just to sit there and await that final day of salvation, but he has made a people for his own possession to be zealous for good works, as it says in Titus 2 .14.

And yet that zeal is threatened by so many different things. And that zeal that could exist often does not because truths that Scripture offers us are not recognized as fully as they ought to be recognized by us.

One of those truths is this truth we have here, that good works bless Christ. You may think of your good works as being primarily for others around you, that they are the ones who benefit. How could God, who has everything, benefit from your good works?

Yet they are told to us to be a blessing to Jesus Christ himself. Now why would that have an impact on the way you go about the Christian life, on the way you go about obedience to him, avoiding those transgressions against his law, walking in those positive commands that he has given in obedience to his law?

How would it help? Well, you can imagine that as you have opportunity to do good to others, you feel differently based on the person that you are doing that good to. If it is someone very lowly, you feel very differently about it than someone very high.

Naturally, if you had an opportunity to do good for some poor beggar, you have a certain kind of emotion about it. But if you have the opportunity to do something good for, for example, the president of the United States or a king, you might feel a great sense of importance in that opportunity to minister to that particular need.

And so it is with the commands that Jesus has given us. He has given us his law not just as something that has only a mundane significance, a significance for this earth, but something that has a heavenly significance, something that blesses Christ.

And the more you realize this truth, the more that you see this with eyes of faith, rather than just with earthly eyes that cannot tell what is going on, eyes that just see brothers and sisters and cannot in them see Jesus Christ, the more you will avoid good works or do them with a lackluster spirit.

The more you see that truth, the more you will do it zealously and the more of such works you would do. And keep in mind, as we have defined good works throughout this series, I'm not talking about just those great kind of extra things that people do when they're going above and beyond.

That's often called, in Roman Catholicism, it's known as supererogation, those things that are beyond God's law. The reality is that we cannot do anything more than God has commanded us. He expects, his law requires perfection.

The only thing that we can do is what is required of his servants. And so when I speak of good works, do not speak just of those things that are extra, above and beyond. I speak of all zealousness and all faithfulness to those commands that he has given.

In total, in this passage here, where we read about this final judgment, if you would consider with me for a moment the context of this passage, what has been going on in the previous passages. In chapter 24, the disciples had asked about the signs of the coming and the end of the age, for when the temple would be destroyed and the end of the age.

Now often these are conflated as being one question, but really they are two different questions and Jesus gives them two different answers. And as he transitions into that second answer in verse 29 of chapter 24, he begins talking about that final judgment.

Later on, he tells them that no one knows the day or the hour of that final judgment. In chapter 25, he gives the parable of the ten virgins. They are supposed to be waiting for the groom. So we are supposed to be waiting for the groom.

He gives the parable of the talents about how judgment will be conducted on that final day, how those servants will be evaluated. And here likewise, we have a statement about how people will be evaluated.

The separation of the sheep and the goats. In verse 31, it says,. This verse impresses upon you the greatness, the splendor, the power of his reign at that point. Now Christ is already king of kings. He already reigns.

But he must continue reigning until every last enemy is put under his feet, as it says in 1 Corinthians 15. And on that day when every last enemy is put on his feet, that reign will become so fully manifest that those who had taken it lightly will be forced to take it with great fear and trembling.

He will come in all his glory with his angels. He will sit on his glorious throne. It says in verse 32,. Before him will be gathered all the nations. He will separate his people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on the left. Describing, putting people in two different categories. In some of these parables, we're talking primarily about evaluating people of one category in different ways.

But here we are talking about just two completely different categories. There are those who are the sheep, those who will have eternal life, as it says in the final verse in verse 46, and those who go off into eternal punishment, those being described as the goats.

There are these two categories, the sheep and the goats. Now how will that evaluation be made? It's a very surprising answer that is given. It is not based on a general pattern of conforming to the law as most people imagine it.

Rather, it is framed particularly in that goodness done to Jesus Christ. Now none of this is to contend with what I was describing earlier, that we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone.

Yet it is to describe what is that characteristic difference between those who are saved by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone, and those who are not. What is it that primarily characterizes the difference between the sheep and the goats?

And what is described here is not just a conformity to some kind of law that is separate from any sort of human interaction, but rather it is particularly that good we have done for the king of the kingdom.

That this is what characterizes it. And that is known particularly in the way we interact with those citizens of the kingdom. This is the evidence that will be pointed to on the last day. There are several things that we should learn from this passage about the significance of union with Christ.

What this is teaching us is that union with Christ has implications. That union with Christ that His people have gives them a shared identity with Him. Not only does it give them a shared identity with Him, but it means that any offenses towards them are shared with Christ, and any kindnesses with them are shared in Christ.

There is a shared identity, which means shared offenses, which means shared kindness as well. This unity is both a legal and a spiritual unity with Christ. This is something that we have covered before.

But just to walk through this again, we have a legal union with Christ. We are counted in the courts of God as being one with Him. We are joined together with Him. This is similar to the notion of adoption.

When you are adopted, you are considered as one with the family that you are adopted into. Even though there be no actual share in blood in any court who would regard whether or not you belong to that family for some matter where that would be in concern, they would regard you as being part of that family because of that legal status that you have.

We are regarded, we who have trusted in Jesus Christ, are regarded as having a legal identity with Him, a legal shared identity with Him, so that wrongs and kindnesses done to us are considered shared with Him.

Likewise, there is a spiritual unity. Now, when I say spiritual, I mean brought about by the Holy Spirit. Even a legal unity could be considered a spiritual unity with a lowercase s in the sense that it's not a material unity.

When I speak of a spiritual unity, that unity brought about by the Spirit that grafts us into Christ so that unity is not just a legal fiction, but is something that has an actual component to it in a spiritual reality that we join together to Him as the branches are grafted into the vine.

There's a very real connection. Just to use another scriptural analogy that brings both of those together, we have the analogy of a husband and wife, something that is more than an analogy as the Bible explains to us that there is an organic union between those two things, between the unity between man and woman as they become one flesh, and the unity between Christ and the church.

This is something that God has built into creation. It's not some arbitrary analogy that Paul is drawing from or anything like that, but something that God has built into creation to illustrate that glorious salvation that we have.

In that unity between a husband and his wife, you have both the legal unity as it's recognized in the courts of law, but then you have also a real unity, a unity that is able to bring about the fruitfulness of children.

There's an organic unity and there's a legal unity. And so there is with us a legal unity with Jesus Christ as well as a spiritual unity with Him. And both of those imply a shared identity with Him. This is something where you do not understand completely that unity that you have.

You cannot fully understand that unity at this time because it has not been fully revealed. One of the most surprising parts of this passage, you would think it's one of those, you know the term of self-fulfilling prophecy.

I don't know what you would call the kind of prophecy where once you say it, it can't come to pass. But you might imagine that this would be that sort of prophecy because He says, because they will say, when did this ever happen?

Then the righteous will answer Him saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you or thirsty and give you drink? Now, any disciple who has read this passage knows what the answer is to it. So how can it be the case on the last day that anyone would be confused about this matter?

The reality is that we do not understand the depth of our unity with Christ so that we will still be perplexed by this on that day of judgment. That it will become a greater reality to us and we will be surprised at all the ways that those actions toward our brothers and sisters are credited to us as actions to Christ.

Paul describes marriage, particularly the consummation as a mystery. It is something that has not been fully revealed. We are united to Christ in betrothal, but there is a greater union with Him that is to happen at that marriage feast, at that consummation.

When Paul describes it as a mystery in Ephesians chapter 5, it is a mystery that still has not been revealed. Many people think of the term mystery as being something that defies logic. If you talk to Roman Catholics, for example, they would talk about the Trinity as a mystery, right?

Which means that it is something because they are effectively undermining the very good doctrine of the Trinity by describing it as something that not just fully cannot be understood, but rather as something that is irrational or illogical.

They describe it as a mystery, meaning that no one can understand it. A lot of people will hear that and then think that Protestants believe the same thing, that it is a mystery in the same sort of way, where we are willing to throw under the bus the Trinity as being something that does not comport with logic.

Or they will often point to the Eucharist, the Lord's Suffering as being a mystery because they believe that the bread and the wine turns literally into Christ's body and blood. Of course, that entirely defies logic, and so they refer to that as a mystery, as something that defies logic.

When the Bible talks about something being a mystery, it is not talking about something that defies logic. What it is talking about is something that is hidden and then later revealed. Well, there are a lot of mysteries that have been hidden and later revealed.

At the end of Romans 16, it talks about the gospel as being something that was hidden, but has now been disclosed at the end of the age. Paul, throughout Ephesians, speaks of the mystery of Christ that was entrusted to him.

That has been disclosed, which is the union of the Jews and the Gentiles into Jesus Christ. But in that same book, he talks about the mystery of marriage, particularly the consummation that happens in marriage.

Why is that a mystery? Because we do not understand yet what that entails for the consummation that will happen between Christ and the church. That wonderful thing that happens in the consummation and the human marriage, there is something analogous to that that is the greatest thing that one can imagine.

Just as people imagine that marital union is the greatest thing that you can enjoy in this life, so it is the case that there is the greatest thing that you will experience is that union with Jesus Christ that we do not yet fully know.

It is a mystery. And so on that day, when we are evaluated as sheep or as goats, based on the way we have treated others in their union with Jesus Christ, it will be perplexing to us because it is still a mystery to us and will be revealed at that time.

Operate as one who understands he has no understanding. If you remember from the Old Testament, Joash was given by Elisha, well, he was given the instruction to strike his arrows against the ground. And so he struck three times and the Syrians were only struck three times.

And he said, if you would struck more times, it would have been completely destroyed. The implication is there. Many people look at that and they say, how was Joash supposed to know he was supposed to do it so many times?

He was supposed to know he did not know the implications. And so he was supposed to strike many times. You are supposed to know that you do not know the implications, that you will be perplexed on that last day.

Operate as one who understands that he does not have a complete understanding of his brothers and sisters' unity with Jesus Christ. And so should serve them and love them in such a way that he recognizes that the implications of that will be far greater than you can imagine right now while it is still a mystery.

That shared identity with Jesus Christ implies a shared offense. This is a very real offense when one offends one who is a citizen of that kingdom of heaven. Acts 9 .4 says, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting the church?

Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? Christ counts that as a personal offense against him. This is a very, very serious thing. Zechariah 2 .8 says, For thus says the Lord of hosts, After his glory sent me to the nations who plundered you, for he who touches you touches the apple of his eye.

Now, we still use that phrase, apple of one's eye, from the scriptural passages. What that's talking about is the pupil, one of the most tender and precious parts of the body. It's able to see. It is also not just sensitive to light but very sensitive to touch.

It is not something you would want to touch. I, in particular, am pretty grossed out by the idea of touching an eye. I can't imagine ever using contact lenses. Whenever I go to an optometrist, that part where they have to check your eye pressure just really, just really bothers me.

You know, they have a special tool that measures it without using the thing that does that little vibrating push. And my insurance doesn't cover that, and that costs like an extra $40 or $50. And I just sit there thinking, man, I can't believe I'm not willing to pay $50 so that someone can touch my eye.

It's just very—I do not like having my eye touched. But you can imagine, what easier way would there be, if you were in armor, et cetera, for someone to attack you? They could touch your eye. They could just ruin you so quickly.

So it is with Christ. The one who touches his servant touches the apple of his eye. Just as a husband would take personal offense to his wife being harmed or his children being harmed, anyone in his family, so there is an identity with Jesus Christ that he takes that personally.

And there are great consequences for this action. It talks about eternal punishment. Many people believe that that eternal punishment is an eternal nothingness. That is not the punishment of which Scripture speaks of.

If we go off into life forever and ever, and the Bible speaks of the torment that the wicked will experience forever and ever, so it is that torment is not something that is just to the end of the age, as many people would argue.

That parallel between forever and ever of the one means the forever and ever of the other. It is an eternal torment that happens. The consequences are incredible. And who could bribe that king on the last day, that king who has everything?

You could not bribe him, not only because he is righteous, not only because you have nothing that he would want, but also because he is the plaintiff. He is the one bringing the charge and bringing the evidence.

How often do you have a courtroom case where the king, the judge, is the one bringing the evidence? But that's what you have here, is that Jesus Christ is the one bringing the evidence. Could you imagine how a defendant would feel standing in the courtroom?

The judge got down and he's doing both roles. Clearly, you're going to lose.

Clearly.

I would encourage you, sometime after the service, don't distract yourself now, but read the quote I have from Roland Stedman. Stedman, this is a, I think he was a Puritan, but he was an early nonconformist.

He has this great quote about how awful it would be for those who offend Christ's servants. He speaks to the unbelieving. This is something I find very interesting in older sermons, old Puritan sermons.

They would frequently speak to the unbelieving as ones who understand that they are unbelieving and yet recognize the implications of their actions will have eternal importance in God's heavenly courts.

So it is. If you do not trust in Jesus Christ, know that the more you harm his children, the more you will face consequences for this. Now, that shared identity, likewise, implies a shared kindness, a shared sense of the pleasure, the joy and thankfulness, the gratitude that will happen when there is a kindness towards someone.

A kindness towards one of Christ's children is a kindness towards him. The same analogies can be made here. If you were to protect someone's eye from harm, they would be very thankful. If you were to protect someone's wife or their children from harm, they would be very thankful.

If you were good to them, they would be very thankful. Think of passage that's helpful here. It's a passage that was part of the preaching text from yesterday. If you go ahead and turn to 1 John 4, I would like to walk you through this passage.

1 John 4 explains a little of this dynamic of the way that you would act towards one who is one of Christ's children. I'll start in verse 8. 1 John 4, 8. Anyone who does not love does not know God because God is love.

In this, the love of God was made manifest among us that God sent his only son into the world so that we might live through him. Okay, so a couple of truths to stop there and think about. God is love.

No one can see God, right? No one can see his love except his love was made manifest. That means it's made visible. God's love is made visible in his sending the son into the world. Verse 10. And this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he has loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God, but if we love one another, God abides in us, and his love is perfected in us. Once again, this contrast between not being able to see God and yet in some way being able to see him, him being manifest.

We cannot see God, but his love, he being love, is manifest as we love one another, as we are perfected in his love. By this, we know that we abide in him and he in us because he has given us of his spirit.

And we have seen and testify that the father has sent his son to be the savior of the world. This is the apostle speaking. Remember at the very beginning of this book, he talks about what we have seen, what we've heard, what we've touched with our own hands, right?

He is speaking as one who has seen Christ. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the son of God, God abides in him and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe that the love that God has for us, God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God and God abides in him.

By this, love is perfected with us so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment because he is also, as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, for fear has to do with punishment.

And whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

In this commandment we have from him, whoever loves God must also love his brother. So that verse there, verse 20 says,. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

I think the way many people interpret that verse in their head and the way that I often thought about it was maybe it's saying that it should be easier to love someone that you can see than someone that you can't see.

But if you think about it, that really doesn't seem to be the case. Often it is easier to idealize in your head someone that you haven't seen. You know the statement, never meet your heroes?

Why is that?

It's because it's because once you get to know them it's harder to love them.

Right?

What this is getting at is not so much that it would be easier to love someone that you can see, but rather the way God himself is manifest is in the one who is being perfected by love. No one can see God, but his love is made manifest in Jesus as he has loved us and that is love that he loved us and because he loved us, we love and now his love is being manifest in us,.

The most.

Visible picture you have of God on this earth as his son makes him visible, the most visible picture you have of Jesus Christ is in his brothers and sisters and your brothers and sisters. And if you claim to love God, but then when you see him you do not love him, what does that say about your love for God?

You don't really love God because you're not loving him when you see him because you are supposed to be seeing him in your brothers and sisters that are being perfected in love. This is a, this is part of that reality that when you are kind to your brothers and sisters, you are kind to Jesus Christ.

When.

Others are grateful for your goodness to them, Christ is grateful for your goodness to him.

Hebrews 13.

2 says that by hospitality some have entertained angels. Now a lot of people take that as a promise that you could experience an angelic presence in your home today. I do not believe that is even suggesting that that's a possibility.

It's just talking about good blessings having come to those in the past. In Genesis 18, other passages where Lot is visited, Abraham is visited, Manoah is visited,.

Etc.

Now, some have entertained angels, but every single person who entertains a brother or sister has entertained.

Christ.

If you, if your kindness towards a brother or sister is a kindness towards Jesus Christ, then when you entertain a brother or sister, when you are hospitable to a brother or sister, you are being hospitable to Christ.

And so this promise that some have entertained angels, and you realize that the angels that it's talking about often are the angel of the Lord, who is the pre-incarnate Christ, you are actually entertaining the angel of the Lord as he dwells in your brothers and sisters.

And so that promise becomes much more, that statement of blessing becomes much more great when you realize, okay, I might not be entertaining spirits in that way, but I am entertaining Christ as I am entertaining my brothers and sisters, as I am being hospitable to them.

It talks about there being, this being the case for even the least of these, even the least of these, my brothers. This is not to say that there isn't a very real,.

A very.

Real statement of, I don't want to use the term hierarchy because that might imply authority, but a scale, right? This is not necessarily promoting a kind of egalitarianism that says everyone is alike.

In fact, that's kind of the point of it, that there are the least.

Of those.

Matthew 10, 40 through 20, says the following,.

Or.

40 through 42, whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me. The one who receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet's reward, and the one who receives a righteous person because he is a righteous person will receive a righteous person's reward.

Whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward.

Now,.

You see at the end there, he says he won't lose his reward, he will have a reward, but there's a notion of a prophet's reward, there's a notion of a righteous person's reward. This is not saying that.

The least.

Are, that it's all equal, but it is saying that even the least, the reward that would come from being kind is so great that you would not want to miss out on it. There is a shame that is involved in need.

This is something I was explaining to someone recently. A lot of people think of shame as that shame has to do with your sin. Right? So if you sin, then you should be ashamed because of your sin, but really what shame has to do with the effects of sin, there's shame that has come about from the fall, there are a lot of shameful things that have nothing to do with your own personal sin.

You know, there's a man who's born blind, it wasn't his sin or his parents' sin, but that's still a, there's a shame that comes with being blind. There's a shame in Scripture throughout it that comes with being barren.

That is a shameful thing. That doesn't mean it's a sinful thing on that person's part, but there's a shame that comes with it. And because there is a, because there is a shame that comes with these statuses of need, so there is also a shame with those who would enter into those statuses of need, giving of themselves to help those situations of need.

So when you see those who are in great need, there can be a lot of reasons why you would not immediately want to, because you are entering into their shame, first of all. Secondly, the reality of the world we live in with our brothers and sisters, a lot of their need is not just pure victimhood.

A lot of times it's a result of their own sin. So, then there's the question you have to ask yourself of, you know, whether or not this person, whether or not you want to deal with them. It may feel like a real burden to deal with, not just one who is a victim, but one who has, by their own sin, entered into a treacherous condition.

But these.

Should not be viewed as burdens. They should be viewed as incredible opportunities. Christ.