In Matthew 24:1-25,31; 25:1-10,31-46 we find the Lord talking to the disciples about the time just before His return.  The disciples had asked Him to give them a sign that would mean that His return and the end of the world were eminent.  He began by warning them to beware of deceivers who would come preaching about Him while deceiving many people with a false gospel. (From church history we know that this false gospel appeared not long after the establishment of the New Covenant Church on the Day of Pentecost A.D. 31).  Jesus went on to warn them (us) about wars, famines, diseases, earthquakes, persecution and the lack of love in the hearts of men.  He referred to this period of time as the “Great Tribulation” that would ravage the people of the world until He returned to stop it.  At that point He would send His angels to gather church people from all over the world (24:31) in order to judge them using His Word as the standard of judgment (Jn. 12:48).

Beginning with Matthew 24:40 we find Him changing the focus of His monologue from describing the horrors of the Great Tribulation to the process of judging those in the Kingdom of Heaven–His church.  Here He begins to speak about two types of people that had constituted His church since shortly after her founding.  Beginning with verse 40 we find Him describing a situation that only a minutely few church people understand because He speaks in terms of two completely different groups of “Christians” who together constitute what is commonly called “the church.”  Though the two disparate groups will be judged together at the same time, they will experience totally different outcomes.

The Lord begins by speaking in general parabolic terms about to two men and two women (vss 40,41), two types of servants (vss 45-51).  In chapter 25:1-12 Jesus talks about two groups of “virgins” (church members).  In other places in the Scriptures we find Him speaking about good and bad fish, wheat and tares, etc.

In 25:31-34;41,46 Jesus pulls everything together by focusing on the judgment of the two types of church members whom He labels sheep and goats.

The narrative concerns the end of days–the time of His return to judge every human being ever born: “When the Son of Man shall come in all His glory, and all the angels with Him, He will sit upon the throne of His glory.  And before Him shall be gathered (church people from) all nations; and He shall separate them (professing Christians) one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the (His) goats.  And He will set the sheep on His right hand and the goats on the (His) left.  Then the King (Jesus) shall say to them on His right hand (His sheep), ‘Come you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.'”  In verses 41,46 He addresses the goats: “Then shall He say to them on the (His) left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’ And these shall go away into everlasting punishment ….”  To be continued. L.J.