Don't Be A Goat Series

Jean Crist from Niagara Falls, New York, talks about her days in a Christian college, where the college president gave a weekly Monday morning chapel message. On one occasion, the student body settled down for another session of daydreaming as he launched into one of those messages. His pedestrian method of delivery made it difficult for students to focus on what he was saying. As they fixed their gaze on him, their thoughts wandered to other things, but their minds had been programmed to listen for his always welcome conclusion, “Now we shall stand.”

Time crept by and finally they heard the words they’d been waiting for. They all stood and found themselves facing a startled president who had asked in the course of his message, “How shall we stand in the day of judgement...?” (Jean Crist, Niagara Falls, NY, “Lite Fare,” Christian Reader)

The Bible says that when Jesus comes again, He will judge the world to determine who goes into His Kingdom and who is banished from His Kingdom. Tell me. How will YOU stand in that day of judgment? It’s a very important question to ask yourself especially as we approach these last days before Jesus comes again. Will Jesus let you into His Kingdom, or will He turn you away?

If you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Matthew 25, Matthew 25, where Jesus describes the criteria by which He will judge who gets into His Kingdom or not.

Matthew 25:31-33 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 a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left (ESV).

Realize that when Jesus comes to rule and reign on this earth...

HE WILL SEPARATE THE SHEEP FROM THE GOATS.

Understand that Jesus will distinguish between those who will inherit His Kingdom and those He will turn away. Know that Jesus will divide everybody into two categories: those that get in; and those that He excludes.

During the day, sheep and goats grazed in the same pasture, but at night, the shepherd had to separate them, because the male goats were often hostile toward the sheep. And the goats needed to be warm at night while the sheep preferred the open air.

The goats just caused a lot of trouble for the shepherds, who received much more for the sale of their sheep than they did on the sale of their goats (Freeman, J. M., & Chadwick, H. J., 1998, Manners & customs of the Bible, p. 470; Keener, C. S., 2014, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, Second Edition, p. 112).

In Matthew 13, Jesus paints a different picture to talk about the same separation at His Coming. There, He describes the wheat and the weeds growing together in the same field, which He will separate at harvest time (Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43).

In our current age, God allows good and evil to co-exist, but there is coming a time when He will separate the two. When Jesus comes again, He will separate the sons of the evil one from the sons of the Kingdom. He will remove all evil from His Kingdom, and Jesus will reign for a thousand years in perfect peace while Satan is bound (Revelation 20:1-6).

Now, in Jesus day, the Jewish Supreme Court (a.k.a., the Sanhedrin) put the prisoners they acquitted on the right of the president, while they put the prisoners they convicted on his left (Freeman, J. M., & Chadwick, H. J., 1998, Manners & customs of the Bible, p. 470).

Let me tell you. When Jesus comes again you will want to stand acquitted with the sheep at His right hand, not condemned with the goats on His left (vs.33).

Michelangelo worked for ten years on his final work, called Rondanini Pietà. He ended up breaking it, because it was full of impurities and so hard that sparks flew from under his chisel. A servant rescued the sculpture, which survives to this day. It bears the marks of Michelangelo's chisel, but none of the beauty of his earlier works. Another sculptor, Lorenzo Dominguez, described the dilemma and unpredictability of working with stone. He said, “The stone wants to be stone; the artist wants it to be art.”

In the same way, God wants to create a work of art in each of His creatures. As He chips away, attempting to free His image within, your stony heart can either submit to His chipping or resist. If it submits, features of the Savior begin to emerge. If it submits long enough, the Savior himself emerges. However, if it resists, and continues to resist, there will come a day when God lets the stone be stone.