The Least Of These

"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 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.' - Matthew 25:40, 45.

Here in Matthew 25, Jesus gives an account of the judgment, and what he says to each the separated sheep and goats.  This is a frightening passage of no small matter, as it seems that eternal life or eternal punishment depends upon how we treat Christ.  But, Jesus makes the point that what we do to his brothers, even the least of them, is equivalent to doing that to him.  And to make his point even more clear, Jesus says to Saul of Tarsus after being struck down, "Why do you persecute me?"  Christ was pointing out to Saul/Paul that what he was doing to the followers of Jesus was actually being done to Jesus himself.

And just who are the least of these?  I'm guessing that they are followers of Christ who are lowly and insignificant in the eyes of the world, or possibly even in the eyes of the church.  They are the common people who do not have a name for themselves.  They are ones in need of even the basic things in life.  And apparently, they are the ones who suffer at the hands of the goats.  Or more precisely, they suffer at the absence of the hands of the goats.

Can we do good deeds for the least of his?  This is a hard saying of Jesus, and one that I know I need to ponder more, and act upon more even if I don't know I'm doing it.