The Parousia in the Minutiae

As a pastor serving in a comfortable middle class community while enjoying a comfortable middle class lifestyle, preaching was all too easy. After all, I was the one called to be the expositor of the Word of God. God spoke to me in order that I might convey to others what he expected of them. That may be something of a caricature, but you probably know what I'm talking about. Leaving that life behind for a less conventional form of ministry among those who are not so comfortable and not so middle class while learning more every day just what it means to be less comfortable and less middle class, I find myself forced to look again at the many texts upon which I have preached so many times. Today, I revisit Matthew 25:31-46.

"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. Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom 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 a stranger and you welcomed me, I was 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, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?' And the King will answer them, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.'

"Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.' Then they also will answer, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?' Then he will answer them, saying, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.' And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

It is a mistake to interpret this passage as a parable. It is the final segment of a much larger section, Jesus' Olivet Discourse, which begins in chapter 24. The backdrop is Jesus' impending passion and death, an event which he ties inextricably to the inauguration of the eschatological kingdom of God and the birth pangs of the coming new creation. Through his ordeal of suffering and death, he will be vindicated. God will raise him from the dead and enthrone him at his right hand in heaven.

The proper way to read the entire passage is not through the lens of a distant future second coming, but through the lens of the present reign of Christ as the glorified Son of Man, enthroned in heaven but still very much present in our midst in the faces of the poor, the hungry, the homeless, the sick, and the imprisoned. Jesus speaks of "the Son of Man [coming] in his glory," the glory of heaven, the realm of God. From God's perspective, there is much glory manifested through the feeding of the hungry and the clothing of the naked. From the perspective of the earthly-minded, these may appear to be insignificant little humanitarian gestures. But, from God's perspective, they are the coming together of heaven and earth, the in-breaking of his future kingdom in the present.

When Jesus speaks here of the last judgment, he is not speaking of the far off future, but of the everyday present. The criteria upon which Jesus will evaluate us on the last day will not be how well we took care of "the least of these" during his absence, but how well we responded to his presence whenever we encountered the poor beggar, the homeless stranger, the hungry child, the sick prisoner. In other words, did we see the parousia in the minutiae?