The Rev. Nancy E. Gossling Church of the Redeemer, Chestnut Hill
So here we are, at the end of another liturgical season in our church. Having started one year ago we end this long green season with what we call “Christ the King Sunday,” the Last Sunday after the Pentecost, or in more secular terms, the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Next Sunday we will begin our season of Advent in the run-up to Christmas, and although the stores have been advertising Christmas long before Halloween, we still try to stay within our liturgical lanes in the church, maybe even in our own homes. And just to be clear, our green season has nothing to do with the Celtics basketball team.
When we choose the name of this Sunday as Christ the King Sunday we are identifying Jesus as our King of kings and Lord of lords. As Jesus the Christ, the Messiah and Savior of the world, He rules heaven and earth alongside God and the Holy Spirit. We also know Jesus by other names. For instance, the Son of Man, the Son of God, a rabbi, and our friend. Most often we know him as the Good Shepherd who will separate the sheep and the goats on that Judgment day.
I’m always fascinated by animals and so I wondered why Jesus might identify his followers, or the crowd who is listening to him, as being either sheep or goats. Tempted to think only along current day, non-agrarian, cultural lines, I decided to investigate. What did the audience around Jesus think when he told them this parable? Clearly, this passage might suggest that we all would prefer to be identified as a sheep rather than a goat, right?
According to the Cultural Dictionary of the Bible, by John J. Pilch, “imposing on these texts our Western understandings of sheep and goats is grossly inconsiderate and inappropriate.” (p140). Sheep and goats represented the core values of honor and shame that permeated the Mediterranean culture at that time. Sheep were primarily men’s animals and kept outside, whereas goats belonged to the women, who kept them in the house, providing the family with daily milk and cheese.
Men were expected to assert, protect, and if possible augment the family’s honor. And women were most vulnerable to bringing shame to a family. “The common assumption is that women are, like goats, lascivious and unprincipled creatures. They are ever on the prowl, untrustworthy, and the weakest links in every family. Because women are the most vulnerable to attacks on family honor, they must always be under the watchful eye and care of a male.” (p136-7)
Now before you join me in my feminist outrage, let me tell you what Pilch says about the great judgment scene we hear in today’s gospel story. “Those people assigned to the right side, to the sheep gathering, are those who practiced hospitality, which in the Mediterranean world is extended mainly by men and solely to complete strangers. Those assigned to the left side, the goat gathering, are those who failed to practice hospitality.” (p139) So this parable is judging men who have not practiced hospitality to strangers. They are the goats.
Such an understanding about Mediterranean culture, about shame and honor, about men and women, and about goats and sheep raise fundamental questions for us today. Do you bring shame or honor to yourself, your family, your church, your work or your school, and your community by your behavior in general? How do you practice hospitality to any stranger that crosses your path, whether they are male or female, sick or well, on the street or in your church, a Republican or a Democrat? Who is the stranger to you?
The Rev. Chris Wendell recently wrote, “Only about 55 to 60 of the people on the Mayflower were Pilgrims. The other 40 or so weren't part of the English settlement in Holland from which the Pilgrim community had come, and they were not there for religious reasons. The Compact was necessary because the individuals in the group had differing world views, values, dispositions, religious beliefs, and motivations. They did not all trust each other. In fact, the Pilgrims called the non-Pilgrims "the strangers.” And yet, they knew they had to become one community or they would perish.”
The gospel of Matthew, as you may well know, was written probably between 80-90 A.D., after the birth of Jesus. It was written after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem and during a time when Christians were persecuted not only by Roman emperors but also by Jews and Gentiles who found their behavior and their beliefs to be strange. Accused of immorality, cannibalism and insurrection, and people who encouraged the destruction of the hierarchical status quo, they were persecuted and killed. Hiding in houses, with fish symbols to point the way to their hidden communities, they worshiped God together, slaves, women, children, and men, even strangers who suddenly appeared. Occasionally at their own peril if they welcomed them.
There was common speculation by these new Christians as to who would be judged when the great Judgment Day occurred, and for what reasons someone would rise to heaven or spend eternity in hell, where there would be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Yes, Matthew emphasized with visual clarity what hell would look like, and it was not pretty.
“The gospel of Matthew is known for its sharp moral stringency and apocalyptic severity.” (HarperCollins study Bible p1858) And apparently there were great divisions even within the new church communities themselves, with certain members being judged as good or bad, depending upon what they believed. It was not always what they did or did not do, but also what they believed!
Predictions of the end times and judgment are frequent in the gospel of Matthew. Jesus said, “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (5:20) He also said, “I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool’ you will be liable to the hell of fire.”(5:22) “Do not judge, so that you may not be judged,” he warned. (7:1)
Jesus also tells parables about division. “At harvest time, I will tell the reapers, ‘Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’” (13:30) There will be good fish and bad fish caught in the net. “So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (13:49-50)
As Jesus approached his own judgment time, his death upon the cross in Jerusalem, his denunciation of human behavior became sharper in the gospel Matthew. “Woe to you, who does this or that,” Jesus repeated to the crowds around him. His description of the end times became clearer. There will be suffering and persecutions throughout the world. There will be wars, earthquakes and volcanoes, and our days will be cut short. Even so, the faithful slaves will be found working, the wise bridesmaids will be prepared, and the good stewards will be found trustworthy.
So are you shaking in your boots just yet? Are you trying to align yourself with the sheep, the good fish, the wise bridesmaid, and the good steward? Will you be found lacking in your faithful hospitality toward the stranger? We, who judge others, because their mistakes and actions are so much more egregious than our own? And we, who want others to be cast into the eternal fires, while we ascend in our heavenly robes, leaving them all behind?
“Jesus said, ‘When all the nations will be gathered before him, he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.” And yet Jesus also frequently argued that he had come to save the sinners and not the righteous.To forgive and not punish. A house divided, like yours and mine, like our nation and our world, cannot stand, he warned them.
Sin is often described as separation, within ourselves and from God and from other people. So maybe, just maybe, the ultimate mission of Jesus was one of reconciliation. Maybe, just maybe, Jesus wanted all of God’s beloved children and beautiful creation to be united with God forever. As our King of kings, and Lord of lords, perhaps Jesus will come again to unite us in power and great glory, not to divide and conquer us like some rulers today.
In truth, we all fail to extend hospitality to the stranger. In truth we all fail to see Jesus today. And so, we all stand judged and condemned. However, just as a good shepherd might return errant goats to the house for protection at night, so too might the good shepherd enclose the sheep in the pen, laying down his body by the gate for their protection.
We are not “either/or” people but rather “both/and” people. As Barbara Brown Taylor once wrote, Jesus is not only our Good Shepherd but also our Good Goatherd. As our King of kings, and Lord of lords, Jesus the Christ rules, even today!
Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24 Matthew 25:31-46
