Sheep or a Goat

Matthew 25:31-46

"But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. "All the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left. "Then the King will say to those on His right, 'Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 'For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; 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, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink? 'And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? 'When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?' "The King will answer and say to them, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.' "Then He will also say to those on His left, 'Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.' "Then they themselves also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?' "Then He will answer them, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.' "These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

 In the previous post we talked about how ALL mankind is going to stand before Jesus and be judged by Jesus according to their deeds. In Revelation 20:11-14 it talks about the books that Jesus is going to judge out of according to their deeds. In this context of Scripture, all men are broken into two groups. 

First Group = Sheep

Second Group = Goats

The Sheep go on the right and they are blessed of God the Father and will inherit the kingdom. Why is this? Lets see:

Jesus says to those on the right:

1. For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat;

2. I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink;

3. I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; 

4. Naked, and you clothed Me;

5. I was sick, and you visited Me;

6. I was in prison, and you came to Me.

The Righteous will answer:

Lord, when did we do all these things... Notice its the righteous...

Jesus says to those on His left:

Depart from me accursed ones in the eternal fire. Why...because they did not do these things...These will go into eternal punishment but the RIGHTEOUS into eternal life.

Sum up:

Those on the Right = Sheep

Sheep = those that are  righteous and they do the 6 things above that Jesus says we are to do.

Righteous Sheep enter into eternal life (Gods Kingdom) 

So where does ONLY having FAITH fit into this? Those accursed ones call Jesus Lord. Yet, they were considered goats. If ALL we had to do was to believe in Jesus as our Lord and do nothing else, our faith is DEAD! 

James 2:26 (14-26)

For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead. 

Remember what our commanded task given by Jesus was to do - Go out into all the world and make disciples, baptizing them in My Name! Search it out.

• WE CAN NOT ENTER INTO GODS KINGDOM (ETERNAL LIFE) BY FAITH ONLY! 

• THIS IS DEAD DOCTRINE AND IS COMMONLY FED AS TRUTH. 

• IF THIS WAS THE CASE, THE BIBLE WOULD BE MUCH SMALLER THEN IT IS. TO MOST IT IS SMALL BECAUSE THEY DO NOT READ IT.

Matthew 7:13-14

"Enter through the narrow gate; for the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. "For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

Jesus Himself says that there are few that find the way to life. Many people today think they have found this, yet most don't read what Jesus says. They only listen to their pastor or priest that may be saying things that don't exist in the Scriptures.

The only way to prove out what your teacher is saying to you is to look into it yourself. Seek ye out of the book of the Lord and read! Prove what your pastor is saying is either truth or his own ways. That is what a true disciple is. 

Are you a sheep? 

Or are you a goat?

Conquering Sin

So Steve brought out some interesting things in the Milk and Honey post and a scripture that he so kindly allowed me to expound on. John 8:34 Jesus is talking here and says “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. 35 The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever. This scripture is cut and dry, there are only two people in the world; those that are slaves to sin and those that aren’t and in this context they are called sons.

So now arises the question, how are we set free from being a slave to sin? The answer lies within my favorite scripture (which is why Steve saved if for me). If you want to open up your Bible to Romans 6 and take some time and read the entire chapter, it is only 23 verses but those 23 verses are jam packed with answers.

Paul starts out with a rhetorical question to the believers in Rome “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?” 

Interesting concept right, continue on in sin so God’s grace is glorified? There is a phrase for that today, its called “come as you are”. Ask yourself one question; what was the first thing Christ preached when He started His ministry? I will give you a clue; come as you are isn't in the Bible.  Here are the scriptures of how Jesus started preaching. Matthew 4:17 “From that time Jesus began to preach and say “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand”.  Mark 1:15 “The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel”.

Repent in the Greek is translated Meta-nous it’s a compound word simply put it means “change your mind”. Coming as you are does not equal changing your mind, it means the opposite; it means I’m fine where I am at, even if I partake in drunkenness, sexual promiscuity, sensuality, strife, and jealousy; I’m only human God understands... Jesus was very clear about those that do not repent it is in Luke 13:3. We as people have two options; change our mind and do things God’s way or perish. There is no plan C its life or death that’s how serious it gets.

You can see this in Paul’s response to his own rhetorical question in verse 2 of Romans 6. “May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?”

So this brings us back to our original topic; how are we freed from sin? Paul is speaking to a group of believers that have already been freed from sin it says in 2 that they died to sin.  How do you die to sin though?

If you continue on reading it answers that question. “or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into his death”

So this group of believers that had died to sin, died to it by being baptized into the name of Jesus Christ. In Acts 4:12 it says “for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved”  Baptism has to be done in the name of Jesus Christ, you can’t be baptized into a church or anything else because there is no other name that can save you.

There is a list of promises if you keep on reading through Romans 6 that all follow baptism.

1)      Become united with Christ in the likeness of His death

2)      Also be of His resurrection

3)      Our body of sin is done away with

4)      You are no longer a slave to sin

5)      Have the ability to live with Christ

6)      We are alive to God in Christ Jesus

7)      Enslaved to God (in which we derive our benefit resulting in sanctification and eternal life.)

There are more things that come through baptism that are listed in other scriptures like in Acts 2:38 we receive the Holy Spirit when we repent and are baptized.

Our main focus however is how to be set free from sin. As Steve brought out before, Israel could not serve God in Egypt because they were under bondage and Egypt was the pleasures of sin. So put two and two together they were slaves to sin. Nothing has changed since then; people can not genuinely serve God while they are still slaves to sin, they have to act on what the scripture says.  When Christ said “repent and believe the gospel” believe actually derives from an Anglo Saxon word that means “by life” it is more than just “knowing it is real or exists” it means LIVE IT. So now put that into what Christ said, “Repent and make the gospel your life.” Has a bigger impact I think.

So if you have struggles overcoming your flesh and you are ready to stop fulfilling the lusts of your flesh there is an answer and it works. The Bible is truth and I believe Romans 6 says it better itself than I could ever explain it. There is a neat scripture in Isaiah 43:2 it says “when you pass through the waters, I will be with you.” Christ meets you under the water when you take that step of faith to be baptized into His name and He gives you the victory and sets you free from sin. Praise the Lord!

 Like always if you ever have any questions feel free to ask and if you are thinking about getting baptized feel free to write and we will try and answer any questions you may have about it in greater detail.

Until next time, keep those Bibles open and searching the scripture through.