At the beginning of each new semester, teachers and professors frequently distribute to their students a sheet of paper called a synopsis. This synopsis contains a list of things the teacher plans to cover during the semester, along with other pertinent information, such as a list of books the student will be expected to read (which always gave me a headache), the schedule of examinations (ditto), and a list of papers to be written and what length they should be. I argued unsuccessfully with my professors at seminary that they were not doing future congregations any favors by requiring ministry students to be long-winded, but, as you can see, it didn’t do any good. Oh, well... At least I have someone to blame it on!

One item on the list in which every student took great interest was the percentage breakdown of the various components of the synopsis. If you didn’t do well in one particular area, maybe you could make up for it by excelling in something that comprised a higher percentage of your overall grade. And invariably, during the time when the instructor is discussing the synopsis with the students, someone will want to know if the professor could be expected to issue a list of sample questions when it came time to take the final exam. This list is commonly known as a "crib sheet."

One of my professors at seminary had a stock answer for that question. He would silently glare at the questioner for a moment, then sternly warn, "Students, everything you do, say, hear, read, write or think in this class will be included in the final grade." I wondered how he would know what we were thinking, but he made his point. We knew we had to be prepared.

In this morning’s passage from the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus gives us a crib sheet for the final exam. In this well-known and often quoted story, Jesus assumes a role we don’t normally associate with him. A day will come, Jesus says, when He will put on his judicial robe and take his place on the bench and everyone will have to come before the bar to be judged.

If we’re going to be judged, isn’t it great to know that the One who makes the final decision is the One who loved us enough to die for us? But if Judgment Day is going to be anything like Jesus describes it here, then I’m afraid I’m going to cause Jesus a little trouble.

It’s not that I want to be a troublemaker, mind you. It’s just that I don’t fit neatly into either of the categories Jesus describes in the parable. When I go before the judge to plead my case, I’ll have to answer his question, "Well, Lord, sometimes I fed the hungry, making donations to the Community Food Bank. There were days when I did my best to help those who needed clothing, donating my old clothes to the Salvation Army. And there were lots of times when I visited the shut-ins and the sick."

And maybe Jesus will interrupt me there and say, "Well, okay, Johnny. That’s good. You sound like sheep material to me. Come here and stand with the group to my right."

But before I go to stand with the sheep, honesty will force me to add, "But, Lord, there were other days - too many to count, in fact - when I stuffed myself with food while others went hungry. There were nights when I warmed myself by a cozy fire while others slept out in the cold with only a cardboard box for shelter, if they were lucky enough to find one. And sometimes I turned away people who asked for just a little money to make ends meet because I wasn’t sure I had enough to live comfortably myself."

When he hears this, maybe Jesus will stroke his beard for a moment (if he has one), and say, "Well, now, that puts things in a little different light, doesn’t it? That sounds more like a goat than a sheep. What in the world am I going to do with you?"

You see the trouble I’m talking about? I’m not 100% sheep, but I don’t think of myself as goat material either! What I really am, I suppose, is part sheep and part goat, not totally one or the other. I’m a half-breed, a geep, or a shoat! I don’t fit in with either group!

On the one hand, I have a tendency to be a little self-centered at times. Don’t we all? But on the other hand, I do have a compassionate side. I have genuine concern for those who are hurting, especially when a member of my family is the one who’s hurting. And I care about folks who have suffered an injustice - maybe not enough to publicly protest and risk going to jail for it, but I care.

You see the kind of trouble I’m going to cause on the day of Judgment? I’m a geep, a half-breed, part sinner and part saint, a jigsaw puzzle of odd-shaped pieces, some centered and others receptive and generous.

And I have a feeling I’m not alone in that. Maybe Jesus will have to form a third group on that day and have them stand in the middle, a group that perhaps will be much larger than both the others put together. He’s going to have to do something with us, after all. He can’t just leave us there, can he? Well, maybe he could, I suppose. Maybe limbo or purgatory will be a real place after all.

If Jesus were like us, the outlook wouldn’t be too promising, would it? I mean, there’s only one outcome that we would like, and a whole bunch that we wouldn’t care for too much. Thanks be to God that Jesus is not like us. I mean, when you and I have doubts about something, we usually just pass it by, don’t we? But we know that Jesus isn’t like that because look who he picked to be his disciples - common, ordinary people, people with flaws just like the flaws in some of us have. And Jesus used these ordinary, flawed people to accomplish great things, sometimes in spite of their flaws, sometimes because of their flaws, and frequently in ways that surprised everyone.

One of the unique characteristics of the Kingdom of Heaven, which Jesus describes in many of his parables, is this element of surprise. Now, whether you like surprises or not - lots of people don’t - one thing you have to admit is that surprises generate excitement. They get your pulse rate up and your adrenaline flowing. Jesus says the kingdom of God will be exciting in its timing. Nobody knows when it’s going to come. And there’s another surprising aspect to the kingdom - at least some of those who are included in the kingdom will be those who didn’t expect to receive an invitation to come to the party, perhaps had even been told by others that they didn’t stand a chance. And, on the other hand, some who had been so sure they were in will find themselves on the outside looking in at some they had personally judged unworthy.

I think it’s good to know that God still has a few surprises in store for us, don’t you? I mean, we Mainline Christians often present our faith as so rational, so predictable, so systematized that a lot of the sheer excitement of following Jesus has been lost. Lots of folks think of us Christians as folks who don’t know how to have a good time and don’t want anybody else to have one either. Some folks think church people take the same approach to life that a dieter takes to food. Most diets - and I’m authority on this - are based on the premise that if it tastes good, you’d better spit it out! It’s bound to have too many calories or too many fat grams in it. Many people think that the Christian life is based on the premise, "If it feels good, don’t do it because it’s got to be sinful!" There’s no excitement, no surprises in that kind of life. If that was the kind of life Jesus came to give us, how could he have called it "abundant?" Abundant, joyful life has to have a surprises along the way.

Even at the end, there will be surprises. Notice in the story that both the sheep and the goats are surprised to learn that when they had either served or neglected to serve those in need, they had done so to Jesus himself.

But it’s also good, as we seek to learn more about the ways and workings of God, to come to church and meet an old friend, like this story of the final exam, the last judgment. And it’s appropriate that on this day, the final Sunday of the church year, to deal with final things, the end toward which we inevitably must move. In the end, says Jesus, when all is said and done and our lives are over, the world has ended, we will all be judged.

And on what will the final outcome rest? Will there be a grading curve, and how generous will it be? Will it be enough to allow us geeps and shoats to pass? Will there be a tallying of our financial gifts to the church? A list of all the offices we’ve held in the church? A lifetime report of Sunday School attendance? "No," Jesus says. "It’s all of those things and none of them. It’s everything you’ve done in my name - and everything you’ve left undone."

Every little act of kindness we’ve ever done - the visit to the shut-in, the get-well card to the ailing church member, the food taken to the home where a family member is ill or has died, the little everyday acts of care and compassion that often go unrecognized - that we have done in the name of Jesus will count on the final exam. And every time we have recognized the need to do some of these things and decided they didn’t fit in to our busy schedule and left them for someone else to do - well, I’m sorry, but that will also count.

A man named John Jackson, who is an advocate for the poor in Orlando, Florida, tells of an event that happened one day outside a food distribution center where he was working. Jackson describes the event:

"The line was long that day, but moving quickly. And in that line, at the very end of the line, stood a young girl who appeared to be about 12 years old. She waited patiently as those at the front of that very long line received a little rice, some canned goods, maybe a couple of pieces of fruit. Slowly but surely, she was getting closer to the front of the line, closer to the food. From time to time she would glance across the street. She didn’t notice the growing concern on the faces of the people who were distributing the food. There wasn’t going to be enough. The food was rapidly running out. Their anxiety began to show, but still the girl didn’t notice. Her attention seemed always to focus on three figures huddled together under a tree across the street. At last she stepped forward to get her food. But the only thing left was one lonely banana. The workers were almost ashamed to tell her that was all that was left. But she didn’t seem to mind. In fact she seemed genuinely happy to get that solitary banana. Quietly she took the precious gift and ran across the street where three small children waited. Maybe they were her siblings, maybe not. Very deliberately the girl peeled the banana. Then she carefully divided the banana into three equal parts and placed the precious food in the eager hands of those three young ones. ‘One for you, and one for you, and one for you!’ Then, for her own meal, she licked the inside of that banana peel." Jackson concludes the story, "And I will always believe that I saw the face of God that day."

In a world where "religious" people, claiming to speak for God, often appear to know so much, to have such clear and firm ideas about exactly what’s right and exactly what’s wrong, who’s going to Heaven and who’s going to Hell, isn’t it refreshing to hear of those whose sole motivation for acts of loving kindness is compassion? And isn’t it refreshing to meet those righteous sheep who are genuinely baffled by the words of Jesus that, in their loving acts of kindness, they were really serving Jesus himself?

"That was you, Jesus? Well I’ll be! I didn’t know that was you! If I’d known that was you, I’d have tried to do more. Did I do okay?" And Jesus will chuckle and place his hand on their shoulder and say, "Oh, you didn’t do so bad - for a geep." AMEN