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.’ Matthew 25:34-40 ESV
Spoiler Alert – Stop reading now if you haven’t seen the Internship, and still want to!
The premise of the Internship, is that a competition for a Google internship. It essentially comes down to a team of misfits and a pompous rich kid and his team of stars. The bad guy makes it clear he doesn’t have time for anyone but those he thinks are important.
This becomes most clear in his interactions with a scruffy headphone guy who is painfully shy, and never listens to music but wears the headphones because it lets him keep to himself. One of the two bumbling protagonists goes out of his way to befriend headphone guy, while the pompous villain makes fun of him.
At the final announcement of who won the internship, the pompous guy can’t believe he lost, and interrupts the announcement to say, “lets get someone down here who matters.”
Headphone guy appears, is revealed to be the head of a major department at Google, and he’s been listening to the whole thing. He tells the villain – you haven’t shown very much googliness. We learned earlier in the movie, this googliness is all about community and creativity. But the villain says, “what does that even mean?”
The headphone guy sums it up, “The fact you don’t even know is why you’ll never work here.”
Jesus says this about his kingdom. Compassion is a sign that you get what my kingdom is all about. Its part of kingdomliness. The way you treat those who don’t seem important, is actually very important.
Jesus even puts himself in their shoes – says it’s like you’re serving him when you serve others.
He goes so far as to say that this is how he sorts out those who want to be in his kingdom, with him, and those who want to take a pass. He says its like separating sheep and goats – the ones who want to be in his kingdom will act like it, and those who don’t, won’t. He says this twice, and I only read one version here, which is the positive describing who gets in, but he also tells the story in the negative, describing who stays out. What becomes clear is that we choose God’s kingdom, or separation from him, not just with words but with actions.
We’ll see tomorrow how this applies to our neighbours.
Question: How do these six actions benefit the recipient, the doer, and Jesus?
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We read an important passage yesterday, and today we’ll focus on just the ending. Here it is again:
Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, “Save yourselves from this crooked generation.” So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.
(Acts 2:32-41 ESV)
The audience were “cut to the heart”. Peter’s words transformed them, not into a state of sadness, but into action. They asked, “What shall we do? How do we make this right?”
Peter has three steps: Repent. Be Baptized. Receive the Holy Spirit.
Repent means to turn. This is the first step of change and transformation. If you’ve been heading the wrong way in life, away from God, then the moment of regret and decision to turn around and head back to God is the moment of repentence.
Being baptized is a sign that God is washing away someone’s sins. By washing that person on the outside, we show the invisible washing on the inside that only God can do. It’s a public act of having sin washed away from your heart, and having accepted Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour.
Receiving the Holy Spirit speaks of continued transformation, well beyond the moment of repentence and baptism, and into the future. The Holy Spirit enables Christians to keep going that new direction, even when it’s hard. What did the Holy Spirit do for disciples? We saw last week that he enabled them to speak of Jesus in every language. These brand new disciples, too, will be sent by Holy Spirit to proclaim good news to everyone in the world. Their numbers are growing, and this good news is meant for everyone of all ages and around the world.
3000 people took on this challenge in one day. They became pioneer people – some of the first members of the church, the global phenomenon of people following Jesus and being transformed by him.
Next week, we’ll see what they did, their practices when they gathered, and how their actions changed.
But first,
Question: What do you think changed for those 3000 people? Internally, spiritually, but also relationally?
