I. When we turn to the Book of God in order to learn what particulars are revealed to us respecting the awful coming of the Lord, the first thing which strikes us is its suddenness. When it will be we know not; where it will be we know not. It must suffice for us that it will be as sudden as the lightning flash; and that, wherever in the round world it is, we shall be there, as certainly as the eagles gather to the fallen carcase.
II. There shall be only two companies the saved and the lost. No middle place; no place for those who might hope to find themselves average people neither particularly faithful, nor particularly unfaithful; only two companies with a mighty chasm between them the lowest of the blessed company of those that are received inexpressibly more blessed than the first of those that are excluded.
III. "Inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the least of these,... ye did it not unto Me." What an astonishing, what an awful Scripture this is! Can we not conceive how, when we stand before that judgment-seat, our consciences will be full of all manner of sad recollections of sin remembering how we have broken this and that commandment, hoping that this and that palliation may be admitted for our forgiveness, and behold, even before the question of our actual offences committed is opened at all, behold we are condemned for our omissions!Christ was with us, among us, always with us in His poor people, and we did not do all we could for them when we had time.
IV. The judgment will be very different from an earthly judgment. There will be no witnesses, no counsellors, no examination. There will be no selection of particular charges against us, then for the first time to be brought up, proved, and punished. Nothing at all like that. The judgment is going on now,every day and every hour our hearts lie open before God, and as we obey or disobey, as we pray or refrain from praying, as we utter bad words or good ones, as we let our thoughts run to sin, or check them and turn them towards God and heaven, the judgment gathers round them. If we are living carelessly, and thinking little about God and Christ, the shadows of judgment are deepening round about us. If we die so not repenting of our sins, nor turning to God in faith the final judgment will only pronounce what will have settled itself before, what is, indeed, settling itself every day: settling itself for good or evil every day that we live.
G. Moberly, Plain Sermons at Brighton,p. 304.
References: Matthew 25:31. Clergyman's Magazine,vol. v., p. 272.Matthew 25:31, Matthew 25:32. New Outlines on the New Testament,p. 16; E. Blencowe, Plain Sermons to a Country Congregation,vol. ii., p. 41.Matthew 25:31-36. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xii., No. 671.Matthew 25:31-46. H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xix., p. 122.