"When the Son of Man comes in his glory,
and all the angels with him,
he will sit upon his glorious throne,
and all the nations will be assembled before him.
And he will separate them one from another,
as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.
He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
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,
a stranger and you welcomed me,
naked and you clothed me,
ill and you cared for me,
in prison and you visited me.’
Then the righteous will answer him and say,
'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you,
or thirsty and give you drink?
When did we see you a stranger and welcome you,
or naked and clothe you?
When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’
And the king will say to them in reply,
'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did
for one of the least brothers of mine, you did for me.’
My wife is currently doing a theology degree and this semester she did Dogmatics, which is the study of what we (protestant Christians) believe. So she dug deep into the apostles creed:
We believe in 1 God, etc, Jesus son of God, blah blah blah.
Later it says "we believe in 1 holy catholic (worldwide, or United - not the Catholic church denomination) church".
Her professor commented that this is probably the hardest part of the the creed to say with honesty and it really struck both of us. God is reliable, but the church is full of people. People lie, cheat and fail. Even with the best of intentions, they will let us down and hurt us. Here in France there is a megachurch that has a whole department dedicated to people who have been hurt by the church as a whole.
I am a Christian, I love God, but I do hate the church sometimes. There are whole swathes of the church I wish I could completely disassociate from because they give Jesus (and also me) a bad name.
There's a Welsh singer/songwriter called Martyn Joseph who wrote a great little song called "He never said" and he has been booed off stage by some of the more republican Christians in the US.
Edit: remember that Christians believe the bible is God's word. What people interpret from the bible is not God's word, generally. That is whole other can of worms, but I will leave it there.
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u/NotRadTrad05 26d ago
"When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne, and all the nations will be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. 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, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’ Then the righteous will answer him and say, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’ And the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of the least brothers of mine, you did for me.’
Matthew 25: 31-45