Making Goats into Sheep

Fine Lutheran blogger Melanchthon, who sins boldly (but seems to believe more boldly still!), writes an excellent post on the relationship between salvation and holy living, lifting up Dallas Willard and the difference between believing the Gospel of Jesus Christ and trying to enagage in mere exercises in "sin management" (a phrase I love).

Now I am, admittedly, a picker of theological  nits.  And so while I wish to praise Melanchthon and not tear him down, I do want to point out a portion of his post that gets my goat.  He writes, concerning the great parable of the last judgment starring sheep and goats in Matthew 25: "When I was a greener Christian, I used to twist this all around trying to figure out how to get it to work in a scheme of salvation by faith alone. (Honestly, I still do sometimes.) But what I do far too rarely (and I doubt I'm alone in this) is listen to it."  What, Christians, even Lutherans, rarely actually listening to a piece of Scripture?  Say it ain't so! 

Well, alas, I can't say that it ain't so.  But I do want to propose that listening to Jesus' words in Matthew 25 will show that there is very little twisting needed to see how the parable of the sheep & goats fits in perfectly with the biblical teaching of justification by grace alone through faith alone.

(Please note: no uncharitable attitude is meant towards Melanchthon in this; I mean to bash no one who blogs the Gospel!)

The classic conundrum, as it is placed against Lutherans, is a view of "salvation by faith alone" vs. "if you want to be called a Christian, you've got to actually do something."  I think the dichotomy is false, but that's only tangential to this post.  Matthew 25:31-46, though, is lifted up by those who equate "justification by faith alone" with "cheap grace" as evidence that to be a follower of Jesus, you've got to do stuff, preferably stuff that's good for other people.

An unfortunate tendency of the western, modern mind is to take every genre of writing and turn it into a promulgation of doctrine.  Thus, the modern reader takes this parable and turns it into an ethical-doctrinal proposition.  "Jesus says we must give water to the thirsty and clothes to the naked."  But notice what Jesus doesn't ever say.  He doesn't tell his listeners, "if you want to get in, you've got to go and feed the hungry and visit the imprisoned."  I am mindful of something one of my OT seminary profs, Mark Throntveit, taught me: "it's not always what the Bible says, it's what the Bible does."  In other words, pay attention to the effect that a particular passage has on its readers.

The behavior of the sheep and the goats shows how the righteous and the unrighteous, respectively, act.  It is descriptive.  If you want to see how the righteous behave, look at this!  It doesn't, however, tell us how to become righteous.  The sheep themselves certainly weren't seeking holiness!  They just did what came to them.  Their ministrations to the poor, hungry, sick, and imprisoned did not make them righteous; their righteousness caused them to serve their neighbors in all circumstances.

As a description of righteous vs. unrighteous behavior, what then does this parable do?  Well, for me, it provokes repentance.  I don't share a lot of water or visit many (read: "any") people in prison.  I don't work in any soup kitchens or food pantries.  I have lots of self-justifications for this.  Fact of the matter?  I think there are more important things for me to do.  More specifically, there are more important, selfish, things to do, for me.  In other words, I'm a goat.  And if I suddenly start behaving more sheepishly, it's likely out of selfish motivations.

What do these words of Jesus do?  They cause me to confess, to plea for mercy.  And because we have a God who turns goats into sheep, these words drive me to the One who can give me life. 

That One, Jesus, is so good and gracious, I want others to know his grace.  But they may be hungry.  Or thirsty.  Or naked.  So now I want to do something about it, rather than feeling like I have to.

When Christians aren't acting like followers of Jesus, the way to cure this isn't to point out their shortcomings and tell them to get on the stick.  That's necessary, but it's not the solution.  What will change us is the goodness of God.  The Law and the Gospel.  If the parable of the sheep and the goats is preached apart from the good news that Jesus turns goats into sheep, it will not change us.  But if it is preached as part of the good news of justification by grace alone through faith alone, with no twisting needed, then by the Holy Spirit's power, there may just be fewer hungry people in the world afterwards.

Comments

[Mel]

"gets my goat"

Pun intended?

I agree, for the most part, with what you've written here, though I'm still left wondering what to do with the word "for" in Mt. 25:35.

But, of course, I don't really need to know what to do with it, because I do know what to do with the rest of this parable. I think you're right on the money in saying that we shouldn't hear it as a doctrinal proposition. My concern is that most efforts to "explain" a text like this in light of a doctrinal position (like justification by grace alone through faith alone) tend to let the air (pneuma?) our of it, whether or not they involve twisting it.

My point being that the parables tend to end with "whoever has ears to hear, let them hear" not "let them understand how it fits in a systematic theology" and the one can kill the other.

Still, you are absolutely right that if we start to feel like goats, we won't fix it by going out distributing water.

[Evers]

Mel,

Thanks for commenting back.

Here's something I would propose: we always read the Bible in terms of a systematic theology, whether we are consciously doing so or not.

Soteriology (how we are saved) always implies a hermeneutic (how we read the Bible). (Perhaps the relationship is more bidirectional than that, but you get the gist.) The soteriology of "justification by grace alone through faith alone" implies a law-gospel (or demand-promise) hermeneutic of Scripture. That entails, among other things, always asking, "What does this passage demand of us? What gift of God does it promise?" The parable in question does not describe how one becomes righteous. It describes how a righteous person acts. A law-gospel hermeneutic allows us to see that. Other hermeneutics (such as one implied by a "justification by works" soteriology) would cause one to read this parable as an instruction manual about how to become righteous. That would be a misreading of Jesus' words.

Peace!

[Mel]

You say, "[Law-gospel hermeneutic] entails, among other things, always asking, 'What does this passage demand of us? What gift of God does it promise?'"

That's good, but I wonder if maybe we've turned the demand side of this into a caricature. As Lutherans, when we think "what does this demand of us" we have a tendency to think in terms of "the law always kills". What I'm trying to feel my way toward is a position where the command of Christ can also be seen as a Living Word -- not in the sense of making us righteous if we obey it but as a life-giving gift.

Maybe that's not very Lutheran, but is it Biblical?

[Adam Gross]

In Matt 7:20-23 Jesus says the following "Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them. Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity."

What he says suggests that many who have cast demons out of men possessed, performed miracles, and prophesied will be turned away from heaven. This sure sounds like believers fallen away. We don't see a whole lot of genuine miracles happening in America, but if they did, Jesus is suggesting that a Christian that performs them is still in danger of hellfire. I started to study Goats vs. sheep and actually stumbed upon your page while searching, and it was interesting what I found here... http://www.ics.uci.edu/~pazzani/4H/Sheep.html#sheep

They state that sheep are generally dumb (dependent), Goats are smart (independent). Sheep are lees prone to external parasites than goats, but often suffer from stomach parasites. Sheep are prone to overeating, and do not require as much hoof maintainance.

There are some very interesting spiritual imlpications here, and I implore you to look into it yourself. I'd hate to take up anymore space on your blog, shoot me an email if you are intersted in talking more.

[Dan]

Excellent post! Sometimes I'm a shoat. Othertimes I'm a geep. I can be so fickle in what I do and why I do it. But whether I'm a shoat or a geep I'm in need of the gospel. Thanks for the good word.