But when the Son of man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then shall he sit down upon his throne of glory,
Jesus closes His last long prophecy by describing the moment He takes His seat as King. Three questions follow: which throne is this, why does He come as "Son of Man," and who is gathered before Him?
Kelly points out that Jesus is not yet seated on the throne this verse describes:
Here are proofs enough of the time and circumstances our Lord is speaking about. He is taking His seat upon His own throne as the Son of Man... The Lord Jesus is not even yet seated upon His own throne. When on earth He had no throne. When He went to heaven, He sat down on His Father's throne. Revelation 3:21 says: "The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne." When that promise is fulfilled, He must have left His Father's throne and sat down on His own throne. It is a future thing.
Darby draws out the force of the word "sit."
This will not be a passing act. He will then sit on the throne of His glory, the glory of the Son of Man, for He is now spoken of as coming to earth as Son of Man. Not until then will He sit on the throne of the Son of Man's glory, though divine glory is always His.
Why does the judge take a human title? Kelly finds the answer in what men did to Christ as a man.
It is as Son of Man that the Lord Jesus will sit on the throne. No doubt He will show His divine knowledge in judging. But, as He plainly says, the Father gives Him authority to execute judgment, because He is Son of Man. As Son of God He gives life; as Son of Man He will judge. How solemn! Had He been only Son of God, who would have dared to despise Him?... It was His grace, then, in becoming man to save men, which exposed Him to contempt in His path of lowly obedience and suffering in love.
The angels are not there as decoration. Smith names the work they come to do:
Carrying out judgment is one of the functions of the angels. Matthew 25 opens its account of the judgment of the living nations with the Son of Man coming to His throne of glory, and "all the angels with him."
The prophecy moves in stages, and this verse picks up a thread dropped earlier.
The course of events now picks up again at the point where it broke off in Matthew 24:31. Up to that point the teaching had concerned the Jew in particular. Then came general instructions for those left waiting for the events announced beforehand... From verse 31 the Gentiles come in view. For when the Son of Man comes in His glory and all the angels with Him — that is, back to this world — it is an earthly scene.
Kelly sets this scene against the judgment scene of Revelation 20.
There can be no question about this throne. It can have nothing to do with the earth, because the text itself tells us that the earth and heaven fled away. I learn at once the positive contrast between Matthew and Revelation. Only in Revelation do we hear a word about heaven and earth fleeing away. Only in Matthew do we find very plain signs that the Lord is taking His throne to govern the earth and the men living on it. Those gathered before Him here are "all the nations." That term is never used of the dead or the risen. It is used only of men here below, and in fact only of the Gentiles as distinct from the Jews.
after_note: DELETE
Those who belong to Christ are not among the gathered; they arrive with Him.
When Christ appears, all the saints, conformed to His risen image, will appear with Him in glory. He will "be glorified in his saints, and marveled at among all who have believed." He will also come with all His holy angels around Him. It is evident that He can come with only those who are with Him.
- Throne. He rules now from His Father's throne; this verse describes the day He takes His own.
- Title. He judges as Son of Man — the very manhood in which He was despised is the nature in which He is honoured.
- Train. He does not come alone: the holy angels attend Him, and His saints appear with Him in glory.
- Terrain. It is an earthly scene of living nations, not the great white throne, from which heaven and earth flee away.
- Timing. It is still future. When it comes He does not flash past; He sits, and the sitting is the start of His reign.
and all the nations shall be gathered before him; and he shall separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats;
The Son of Man has just taken His seat on the throne of His glory. His first act as King is to gather the nations and sort them one by one, the way a shepherd parts his flock. Two questions shape the whole passage: when does this happen, and who are the sheep?
Commentators place this scene at the start of Christ's reign on earth, not at the end of history. The word "nations" is the clue. It describes people who are alive, still living in their national groups.
On the contrary, Matthew shows the Son of Man come to the earth and all the nations gathered before Him. Here they are all living, and only living people can be called "nations." At the great white throne only the wicked dead are present, for the righteous dead had been raised long before, at the first resurrection.
Many merge this scene with the final judgment of the dead. The details of the verse resist that. A mixed crowd that needs sorting can only exist in one place.
This is a careful, divine sorting — not a mere act of vengeance that deals with whole masses and sweeps them all into one common ruin. He separates them one from another. At the great white throne the dead stand for judgment, and there is no need to separate them there. But here we have a mixed company. You never find such a mixture in heaven or hell, only on the earth. So every clause proves that our Lord is speaking of a judgment of the living on the earth.
Anyone who had watched a flock in that part of the world knew the sight at once.
It is interesting that sheep and goats are always found mixed together in the flocks of Palestinian shepherds, and the separation of the sheep from the goats would be a vivid way of presenting what will take place in the last days.
The picture does not run long.
The Lord simply compares the separation He makes that day between the righteous and the wicked to a shepherd dividing his sheep from the goats. Then the righteous are called "sheep" and the wicked "goats." After that the figure is not kept up. It is dropped at once, and this language never comes back.
Read on a few verses and a third group appears: those the King calls "My brethren." That group rules out a common idea — that the sheep stand for all the saved of every age.
The King addresses both the sheep and the goats in respect to this third class. Indeed the very ground of judgment is the treatment of the King's brethren. It would be plainly absurd to say that the sheep are the very people He means. If that were so, the language would be completely different. Instead of saying, "Inasmuch as you have done it to one of the least of these My brethren," we would hear the King say, "Inasmuch as you have done it to one another," or "among yourselves."
If the treatment of these brethren is the test, then the verdict turns on how people received a message — and on who carried it.
He will sit on the throne of His glory. All the nations will be gathered before Him at His throne of judgment, and He will judge them by the way they treated the messengers of the kingdom, who had gone out to preach it to them. These messengers are the brethren (v. 40); those who received them are the sheep; those who neglected their message are the goats… I do not doubt that these brethren are Jews, as the disciples were — people who will be in a similar position as to their testimony. The Gentiles who received this message will be accepted, as though they had treated Christ in the same way. His Father had prepared the enjoyment of the kingdom for them, and they will enter it while still on earth.
Being counted a sheep here is not the same as belonging to the church.
But those Gentile sheep at the consummation of the age are not the church… The church will be glorified on high. Remnants from both Israel and the nations are about to be blessed on the earth in that day. The sheep of Matt. 25:32 are by no means all the sheep of God.
Commentators differ on how far the word "all" reaches.
"All" may refer only to those nations directly connected with Israel, for the Lord speaks of "My brethren"… However, it may mean every nation.
- Throne — Christ sits in glory on earth at the start of His reign. This is not the final judgment of the dead.
- Gathering — the living nations stand before Him. Only living people can be called "nations."
- Separation — He divides people "one from another." That is careful sorting, not a mass sentence, and it fits only a place where good and bad are still mixed.
- Standard — the test is how each one treated the King's brethren, the Jewish messengers who carried His kingdom message to the nations.
- Scope — the sheep are truly blessed, but they are Gentiles blessed on earth. They are not the church, and by no means all the sheep God owns.
and he will set the sheep on his right hand, and the goats on [his] left.
The Son of Man sits on His throne, the nations stand before Him, and a shepherd's simple act settles everything. Who are these sheep and goats, when does this happen, and why does the right hand differ from the left?
Notice the manner of it. This is not judgment poured out on a crowd. It is a sorting done one by one. And because good and bad stand together, we learn where it happens.
This is a careful and divine sorting. It is not a mere act of vengeance that deals with masses and could sweep them all into common ruin. He separates them one from another. At the great white throne, where the dead stand for judgment, there is no need to separate them. But here there is a mixed company. You never find such a mixture in heaven or hell, but only on the earth. So every clause proves that our Lord speaks of a judgment of the living on the earth. It follows that the people meant by "the sheep" and "the goats" are the righteous and the ungodly among the nations then living on the earth, when our Lord comes to judge as Son of Man.
The Lord drew His picture from ordinary working life. Here is why it fits so well:
Sheep and goats are always mixed together in the flocks of Palestinian shepherds. So separating the sheep from the goats would be a vivid way of showing what will take place in the last days.
The choice of animal is not random. The goat's own nature carries a meaning:
One thought connected with the goat is this. By its independence, self-will, hardness and the dark colour of its hair, it naturally suggests sin. Our Lord shows this in the parable of the judgment of the nations. There the sheep stand for the blessed, and the goats for those who are under the curse.
The two sides are not just places. And what the right-hand group receives is not what belongs to the church.
He will separate the sheep from the goats. The sheep stand at the right hand of His approval, the goats at the left hand of His refusal. He knows how to express His approval to the sheep, and how to welcome them into the earthly kingdom. That kingdom was prepared for them from the foundation of the world. This is a contrast to the portion of the church, God's heavenly people. God chose them in Christ "before the foundation of the world" (Eph. 1:4).
The common reading treats the sheep as every saved person and the goats as every lost person, from first to last. One detail in the passage resists that reading.
Almost everyone in the professing Church believes that "the sheep" represent all the people of God, from the beginning to the end of time. And "the goats" stand for all the wicked, from first to last. But if this is so, what are we to make of the third group mentioned here, whom He calls "these My brothers"? The King speaks to both the sheep and the goats about this third group. Indeed the very ground of judgment is how they treated the King's brothers.
Another writer names these brothers, and shows why the way the nations treated them decides the case:
This sitting of the court is not the final judgement of the dead. It is the King's inquiry into one matter. How have the Gentiles treated those whom He graciously calls "My brothers"? These are the Jewish preachers of the gospel of the kingdom during the sorrows of the last days. Some will treat them well and receive their message, and they will be spared to enjoy the blessings of Christ's reign. Others will treat them with scorn and cruelty, and so bring solemn judgement on themselves.
Commentators differ on whether to call this scene a parable. One writer states plainly what it is:
It is indeed no parable. It is a very simple statement of the separation of the living on the earth, when the Lord comes to it and sets up His throne there. He compares that separation to a shepherd separating his sheep from the goats. So it is part of that judgment of the living already spoken of, and it comes more than a thousand years before the judgment of the dead at the great white throne.
- Mixed — Sheep and goats graze in one flock. Good and bad stand together, a mixture found only on earth.
- Sorted — The Shepherd separates them one by one. It is not a sweeping ruin that swallows everyone alike.
- Named — The names are not neutral. The goat's self-will and hardness suggest sin; the sheep stand for the blessed.
- Placed — The right hand means approval and a kingdom on earth prepared from the foundation of the world. The left hand means refusal.
- Tested — What divided them was their treatment of the King's brothers, the preachers He sent during the last days.