In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Spirit, amen. In this last Sunday,
before we enter into Great Lent next week, and
before that last lesson that we will hear next
Sunday, we are given every year this story about
the Great Judgment, the Last Judgment. This parable,
if it is a parable, and I'm not sure it is, it
may actually be our Lord literally describing
what is going to happen, is given to us in a
general way for a couple of reasons. A couple
of reasons that are very important today. The
first is that there is judgment. In our world
today, and maybe it's always been thus, An easy
temptation to fall into to think that our Lord
will not really judge us. Our Lord is compassionate.
He's loving. But we also forget that he's just.
And we forget when we hear parables like this
that he reminds us that there is judgment. That
at the end of our lives, there will be a judgment.
There's a kind of a temptation to a universalism
in our world today. that says God is so kind
of compassionate that no one will go to hell.
That he is so kind and so loving that no matter
what anybody did, no matter how far away they
turned away, that he would not allow them to
go to hell. The second general and overarching
theme, if you will, of this parable is that the
content of that judgment is very clear in the
words of the Lord. The content of that judgment
is mercy and love. That we tend to think that
God is going to be this judge in the sense that
we think of a judge in a court of law, where
he will hear the evidence, that I will stand
before him, and those who love me will give evidence.
Well, you know, he did this, and he did this,
and he was this way, and those maybe who don't
care for me will also present their case. And
that we think sometimes that, our Lord has this
kind of scale, this cosmic scale. And we say,
okay, Lord, here are all these good things that
I did. And the scale begins to tip in my favor.
And then the Lord says, but wait a second. We've
got to consider the other things too. And so
we consider the things that are not so good.
And the scale begins to come back up. And we
think that if the bad side outweighs the good
side, then... Game over. God isn't that kind
of judge. The judge that we are going to face
is a judge that will simply show us who we are.
That's going to be the content of our judgment.
He's going to open that book of life and he's
going to come down to my name and he's going
to rip open my chest and he's going to look at
my heart. And my heart will reveal where I belong.
My heart will reveal whether... I am a sheep
or a goat. There is no other content. If we have
a merciful, loving heart, it will manifest itself
in the way that we live our lives, and it will
show itself in the way that we treat others.
Now, in the parable, we hear about the judgment
being that he comes to the sheep, the people
who are on his right hand, and he says, come
all you blessed to the kingdom of heaven that
has been 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 estranged and you took me in. I was sick
and you came to me. I was in prison and you visited
me. You ministered to me. And they were all surprised.
All of them were surprised. When? When, Lord,
did we see you in any of these ways? They said,
when you did it to the least of these, my brethren,
you did it to me. And then, of course, it's the
opposite for the goats. You didn't feed me when
I was hungry. You didn't give me a drink when
I was thirsty. You didn't welcome me when I was
a stranger. You didn't visit me in prison. You
didn't take care of me when I was sick. When?
When did we not do that to you? And it's the
same answer. When you didn't do it to the least
of these, my brethren, you didn't do it to me.
And you are going to the place prepared for the
devil and his angels from the foundation of the
world. So we know that there are two places from
the foundation of the world that have been prepared.
The kingdom of heaven and the eternal fire that
has been prepared for the devil and his angels.
And the judgment is, where will we be? Where
will we be? So let's look at that chart, if you
will, of behaviors. I have to tell you a story,
and it's an important story because it happened
not far from here, just down the road in San
Francisco. quarter, back when we could still
travel as well as we did before COVID and everything
else, we would have diocesan council meetings
in San Francisco. And I was always there on Tuesday
for the advisory council on Tuesday afternoon.
And then we would go for dinner. And after dinner,
San Francisco is a lovely place to walk around.
And I would go for a long walk. And our hotel
was across the street, kind of catty corner from
a Walgreens. It's on the corner of Polk and Broadway,
I believe. And I was coming up to the end of
my walk, and there was a man sitting there in
front on a little stool with a can, and he was
begging. And as I came closer and closer, he
decided that he was done. So I didn't have a
chance to encounter him or anything. I didn't
have a chance to give him anything. and I went
past him, and I was waiting for the light at
the corner, and I watched him, and he folded
up his little chair, he picked up his can, he
walked into the parking lot of the Walgreens,
he got into a Lexus SUV, and drove away. Now,
you talk about a temptation. You talk about the
demons coming and poking you, saying, see, that's
why you don't have to take care of anybody. See?
When I lived in Las Vegas, and I was the pastor
of St. Paul's Church, Every way that we went
to church always ended up passing one corner,
Pecos and Sunset. For nine straight years, there
was a guy on the corner every time I came by
it, and he was holding up a sign. And it said,
need gas money for California. Nine years. And
I almost wanted to roll down the window and say,
how much gas do you need? All of that can pollute
the power of this story. When you look at those
categories, hunger, okay, I don't really know.
I mean, we can pass people in our journeys, but
I don't really personally know anyone who is
in danger of not eating dinner tonight. I honestly
don't. I don't know of anyone. who, if they really
were thirsty, could not find a tap of water to
turn on and drink. I don't know, by definition,
I don't know strangers, but I don't know in all
of the years that I've been on this earth, in
all of the years that I've been in the church,
I've only known one person to go to prison. One
person. I'm almost 70. One person in my entire
life that I know that has gone to prison. And
of course we know sick people, but oftentimes
sick people are so sick that we can't visit them.
So when I encounter these examples of the beggar
in San Francisco or the beggar in Las Vegas,
and I know that when I look at my own life, I
really don't know a lot of people who are hungry
and thirsty and naked and in prison and all those
kind of things. Does that mean that the Lord
then didn't know what he was saying to us? Does
that mean that what the Lord was saying was only
good to the people who were listening to him
back 2 ,000 years ago? Did he not know what the
21st century was going to be like for those of
us calling us as Christians to the same behavior?
I don't want to stand in front of God and say
that. I don't want to stand in front of the Lord
and say, you know, you really didn't know what
you were talking about. So then, what can we
look at? Does it mean that all of us have to
make that effort to go out, literally to go out
and work in food pantries and everything else?
Tell that to a young couple with four children.
Find the time to go do that. Find the time to
go and do all the other ministries. It does mean
that we can support those ministries. It does
mean we can pray for those ministries. But it
seems to me that Those people are also people
in our lives in a way that we sometimes don't
think about. There are people around us who are
so hungry. So hungry not for a hamburger. They're
so hungry for God. They're so hungry for light.
There are people walking around in darkness that
don't know anything. They're searching and looking
and they're hungry. And we have the food to give
them. But sometimes we don't. There are people
who are so thirsty for God, they don't even know
that they're thirsty for God, and we have the
rivers of wisdom, which is the Holy Spirit, to
give them. There are strangers among us right
now. Have we welcomed them this morning? We know
sick people. Not only people in hospitals, not
only people who have been diagnosed as sick,
but we know people who are sick. In a spiritual
way. We know that people are led astray by the
things of this society today. We know people
that are in prison. We know people who are imprisoned
in their own passions, imprisoned in their own
sins. So we know people in all of these different
categories. So what does that mean for me? What
does that mean for me? It means that when I know
someone is in darkness, I can offer them light.
When I know someone who's imprisoned by their
passions and by their sins, I can help lead them
to Christ. I can help bring them to the church.
All of those different categories, we know people
that are not so obviously sick, not so obviously
thirsty. And we can reach them with effort, but
maybe even more importantly, we can reach them
by the way that we live our life. And so I think
the church gives us this passage just before
Great Lent. Not to say, okay, during Lent, make
sure you go out and feed someone. Make sure you
go out and give someone a drink. Because I think
ultimately what this parable is given to us today
for every year is to remind us that when we talk
about taking care of the least of my brethren,
when we talk about taking care of the other,
we have to begin by being reminded by God himself
that I am the least of the brethren. I am the
other. And our Lord Jesus Christ has come down
to take care of me. And during Great Lent, we
make the effort at breaking away from our hunger.
We're fed by the Lord, but we go out into the
world and we feed ourselves with all sorts of
garbage. We feed ourselves with all sorts of
things on mass media and social media and all
these other kinds. We eat it by the spoonful.
And during Great Lent, it is a time that we try
to feed ourselves with the word of God and feed
ourselves away from that stuff. We are thirsty
because we have denied that Holy Spirit in the
way that we live our life. We are strangers to
God because we have walked away from him. We
are imprisoned by our own passions, by our own
sins, and we are called by God to be healed from
them by confessing and bringing them to the church
and letting God heal us. parable is given to
us on this last Sunday before we enter into Great
Lent next week so that we are reminded that the
only way we can attain salvation is to take care
of the other. That when Jesus tells us to take
care of the least of my brethren, he tells us
to do it because he has done it to us. As we
enter into that great fast and as we enter into
the rigors and the struggles against ourself.
May God strengthen us to begin that care of the
other, to begin that care of the least of the
brethren, by remembering that I am the least
of the brethren. In the name of the Father, the
Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.