Difficult Passages on Eternal Life

Because I so love the Bible I do not shrink from difficult passages. There are a number of passages on "eternal life" which do not fit into the typical evangelical Christian mode so influenced by, say, John 3:16.

Some of these passages are used by people to argue against justification by faith. I would like to collect of number of these and present how I think Bible readers should think on them.

Let's deal with this one first (Matthew 25:31-46) concluding with these key words -

"And the King will answer and say to them, Truly I say to you, Inasmuch as you have done it to one of these, the least of My brothers, you have done it to Me." (v.40)

This is said to the nations discribed as "sheep" who are told in verse 34 - "Then the King will say to those on His right hand, Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world."

These fed, visited, helped care for the destitute "these the least of My brothers" . And because of their charitable acts it says in verse 46 that they go away into eternal life -

"And these shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." (v.46)

One heads up: Anyone not interested in a careful analysis of these passages from verse 31 - 46 can just stop reading. What you wish to believe about this, just go ahead with that. No need to even examine what I have to explain.

Goodbye. Go find better uses of your time. Life in this age is short.
(Robbie, Rajk999, Galveston)

Athiests and agnostics, please don't clutter up my thread with arguments about the existence of God or the booboos of religious people. I'm asking. (sonhouse, a few others)

For those wishing to examine at least what I think is the meaning of the passage, I will continue below.

I hope some of you have read Matthew 25:36 through 41. Many times people do not understand serious teachings on the Bible simply because they are not well familiar with what is written.

Often the question "But where does he get THAT ?" is asked only because one did not READ it carefully.

I am willing to be called out on anything explained without a biblical basses.
I do not mind a challenge if I propose a concept that seems to have nothing to do with the text or some related text.

Originally posted by sonship
Because I so love the Bible I do not shrink from difficult passages. There are a number of passages on "eternal life" which do not fit into the typical evangelical Christian mode so influenced by, say, [b]John 3:16.

Some of these passages are used by people to argue against justification by faith. I would like to collect of number of these and prese ...[text shortened]... e wishing to examine at least what I think is the meaning of the passage, I will continue below.[/b]

In this section of Matthew the particulars of verses 36 through 41 have to be given careful attention.

Where is the event discussed ?
When is the event ?
Who are the ones involved in the event ?

Nothing should escape our notice. Let me first deal with WHEN and WHERE I propose the events of this passage are to occur. It is important to the understanding of the passage.

WHEN - "But when the Son of Man comes in His glory and all the angels with Him, at that time He will sit on the throne of His glory." (v.31)

The passage concerns the time Jesus Christ, the Son of Man, returns to take up His throne of authority on this earth. It is at the time of the second coming of Christ.

A typical mistake that is made is that people think of this as the "last judgment". It is a judgment, no doubt. It is not the judgment at the end of the Bible in Revelation 20.

Well, how can I say that ? It occurs -" ... when the Son of Man comes ..."

In Revelation when the Son of Man comes He reigns on the earth for 1,000 years at least BEFORE the "last judgment". To prove that you have to read Revelation chapter 20.

The Son of Man raptures His "harvest" of believers and comes down and fights the battle of Armageddon (Rev. 14:14-20). And for one thousand years He and His overcoming believers (those rewarded to be co-kings, etc.) reign on the earth.

Satan is bound for a thousand years - (Rev. 20:1,2)
Satan will not be loosed again until after the thousand years (v.3).
Some overcoming believers are resurrected and reign with Christ for a thousand years (v.4).
The rest of the dead are not raised until after the thousand years (v.5).
Believers in Christ will reign as kings and priests for a thousand years (v.6).
After the thousand years Satan is loosed from his prison (v.7) .

Skipping over some events, the final judgment of Christ as "the great white throne" is accomplished after the previously mentioned one thousand years.

So the judgment of Matthew 25:31-46 is at the beginning of the millennum rather than at the conclusion of it. There is more than one such judgment. This is important to the understanding of who and how the sheep and goats are judged.

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
what do you suggest Jay is a better use of my time than disseminating the crystal clear truths of Gods word?

WHEN - "But when the Son of Man comes in His glory and all the angels with Him, at that time ..."

This happens "at that time" when Jesus returns to the earth physically the second time. It is not a thousand years after that time I think. It is "at that time" .

It is conceivable that "at that time" is general and means one thousand years latter. But I doubt that that is the meaning.

These passages also speak of that time - Matt. 16:27 - "For the Son of Man is to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and then He will repay each man according to his doings."

Then Zechariah 14:5 speaks of that time too - "And you will flee into the valley of My mountains, for the valley of the mountain will reach unto Azel; yes, you will flee, just as you fled before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah the king of Judah. And Jehovah my God will come, and all the saints with Him."

Jesus Christ is Jehovah God incarnate as the Son of Man, the Son of God. And He comes WITH His saints. And this is important to understanding the identity of the parties in the passage - sheeps, goats, and the Lord's brothers.

Jude 14 also speaks of this time of Christ's coming to earth - "And Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied also of these, saying, Behold, the Lord came with myriads of His saints to execute judgment against all and to convict all the ungodly concerning all their ungodly works which they have done in ungodliness, and concerning all the hard things which unglodly siners have spoken against Him."


You know what he means. He means like all the hard things written by some of the atheist posters on the Internet - things written and said which they do not realize will be judged by Christ.

Anyway, these passages underscore the WHEN. Jesus establishes the throne of His glory in the Holy Land. In Israel Christ will establish the capital of His kingdom over the whole planet. And there also He will conduct a judgment from "the throne of His glory".

I will get to the matter of eternal life. Some ground work HAS to be laid.

The term "the Son of Man" is the title of Christ in relation to His kingdom, His Messianic kingdom -

Matthew 13:41 - "The Son of Man will send His angels. and they will collect out of His kingdom all the stumbling blocks and those who practice lawlessness ... then the righteous will shine forth like the sun in the kingdom of their Father ..."

The judgment seen here in Matthew 25 is therefore in preparation for that Messianic kingdom.

Notice also that it cannot be in HEAVEN. For it says - "The Son of Man will send His angels and they will collect out of His kingdom all the stumbling blocks and those who practice lawlessness ... ".

Though Matthew repeatedly uses the phrase "the kingdom of the heavens " the meaning is the kingdom which has it SOURCE and ORIGIN in the heavens. It cannot mean in heaven in Matthew 13:41. Otherwise the meaning would be that Christ takes the lost into heaven and then separates them out of heaven.

This separation of the lawless out of His kingdom has to be on the earth. He does not rapture the lost up to heaven and there separate them from the saved.

Of course "When the Son of Man COMES" means when He COMES to the earth.

Well, I am eager to get to the problem of eternal life and how to understand it. So I press forward a bit.

Jesus comes, before the millennium. Jesus gathers living people from the nations, meaning the Gentiles. This takes place on the earth. The great white throne has them suspended in space before Christ -

"And I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose face earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. (Rev. 20:11)

The time is different.
The place is different.
The people being judged are different.
The judgment of Matthew 25 is not the last judgment at the great white throne.

Matthew 25 is a judgment of people who are ALIVE at the time Jesus sets back down on the earth.

The judgment of the great white throne seems mainly of those who are dead and resurrected to be judged -

"And I saw the DEAD, the great and the small, standing before the throne ..." (v.12)

The sea gave up the dead to be judged (v.13)
Death and Hades gave up the dead in them to be judged as well (v.13).


Jesus Christ is the judge of the living AND the dead (Acts 10:42; 2 Timothy 4:1) .

The Bible doesn't say He must judge them at the same time.

How we doing ?

We have Jesus coming to the Holy Land at the beginning of the one thousand year Messianic kingdom. We have Him collecting living people from the nations - the Gentiles (same word there). They are not the dead. They are the living.

These are people who passed through the great tribulation divide into two groups - sheep to be saved and goats to be lost.

Now this is important. There are not two parties present in this event. There are THREE parties.

1.) sheep
2.) goats
3.) The Lord Jesus' brothers down to the least of them

Three groups. Here two are mentioned -

"And all the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate them from one another, just as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

And He will set the sheep on His right hand and the goats on the left."

That takes care of the sheep and the goats. From the Gentiles there will be living people who are left alive after the terrible great tribulation. Some will be put on the left to be saved from eternal damnation. Some will be put on the right to go before the devil into the eternal fire.

Some bad fortune that is - to have to go BEFORE the Devil into his own eternal punishment. The fire is "prepared for the devil and his angels" which suggest it is only prepared for them and they have not yet gone into it.

Some unfortunate dupes of the Antichrist will be going into Satan's punishment before he does. It is not worth it to be duped by Satan.

Anyway, we see two groups here. Then we see the third party of the Lord's brothers down to the least of them in these passages:

"And the King will answer and say to them, Truly I say to you, Inasmuch as you have done it to one of THESE, the least of My brothers, you have done it to Me." (See verses 40 and 45)

[b]"Then He will anser them, saying, Truly I say to you, Inasmuch as you did NOT do it to one of the least of these, neother have you done it to Me."

Three parties -

1.) Sheep
2.) Goats
3.) The Lord's brothers down to the very least of them

Where the saints who received eternal life by believing into Christ according to John 3:16 ?

They are in the party of the Lord's brothers down to the least of them.

Those sheep who enter into eternal life are not save people who were born again by believing into Christ according to the gospel.

This is the crux of the proper understanding of the passage. These sheep are saved from eternal punishment. But they are saved on OTHER criteria than is presented in the Gospel preached during the church age.

This is what I will labor to clarify. But first one caveat. The Lord's brothers down to the least of them, I think, also includes persecuted Jews. How many, I do not know. I am pretty sure that the group " ... these the least of My brothers" refers to those made brothers by the new birth and some Jewish people the Lord's brothers because they are Jews. Probably by His mercy a remnant of them are born again too.

That part I am not completely versed on and will not elaborate too much. But what I want to show is that the sheep who are to inherit the kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world are not born again according to John 3:16.

1.) They did not know who the Lord Jesus was.

2.) Eternal life does not enter into them in the sense of those sons of God.
Rather they enter into an everlasting life such as Adam possessed before he fell into sin.

You see the reason why this is hard to understand for some is because they think that to live forever is only what God's will is for man. God has angels who live forever. And God created Adam to live forever HAD HE NOT eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

BUT Adam never received the divine life of God into him. That life was available to the first man in the tree of life. But I am still persuaded, and teach until someone can prove otherwise, that Adam never partook of the tree of life. And after death entered into him he was forbidden to eat of the tree of life.

Stop here. Think on it a bit.

What we know: Jesus said that His reborn saints, those who are overcoming, will reign over the nations in the millennial kingdom.

It does not make sense that His sons of God would reign over each other. So there must be some PEOPLE on the earth for Christ's overcoming saints to reign over.

Do you think Jesus meant the His servants would reign over each other? I do not. Therefore it is perfectly consistent with many passages in the Old Testament that there be nations on the earth over which Christ's redeemed saints reign as co-kings with Christ.

Here is the difficulty. Sometimes Jesus spoke of people entering into eternal life -

"And these shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." (v.46)

These are justified people who were justified according to something else besides the gospel which is preached in the church age. That is what I am going to try to prove.

But before I do some should consider it a little bit. Consider just a little.

Do not people always ask "What about this kind of situation? What about that person who never .... ? What about that other person who lives .....? What about these people who never heard ....?"

You Christian brothers know that we very often get questions like this. And often we labor hard to make sure the Gospel we heard is "fair" to everyone. I use to do this a lot.

In latter years I stopped doing this. I just realize that there must be some "unknowns" about these matters.

Having said that, it is not surprising that we find in the midst of the clear Gospel of the grace of God some situation where it appears that justification is according to something else not quite aligned to John 3:16.

I will write a little more about this. And then we have to go over to the book of Revelation to examine the particulars of the time of the great tribulation. For these sheep and goats are most assuredly people who live through that transitional time. That is why they are there alive on the earth when the Son of Man comes with His angels and establishes the throne of His glory in the Holy Land.

Adam was not born of God.
Adam was created very good and was placed in paradise.

Adam had an everlasting life. I think the JWs will tell you that. And it is understandable that they only know eternal life in terms of what man was originally created.

Once again, I find no other reason Adam would have had to die except eating of the forbidden fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

I believe that Adam the first man and his wife Eve had a human life that God would have maintained to live on everlastingly.

Matthew 25:34 says - "Then the King will say to those on His right hand, Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world."

And Matthew 25:46 says of the same - " ... the righteous into eternal life."

Facts which I think are undeniable.

1.) The saved sheep go into the kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world.

2.) They are the righteous. They must be justified as righteous by God, by Christ.

3.) They are justified according to something other than the believing into the only begotten Son of God. Rather it is related to their charitable deeds toward the third group the Lord's brothers down to the least of them.

Whereas the condemned people are negatively cursed because of their negligence of the Lord's brothers down to the least of them.

In both cases what these people DID or failed to DO Jesus considered as them doing it to HIMSELF. Yet they don't seem to know that it was to Jesus that they DID or FAILED TO DO the deeds done.

4.) To inherit the kingdom prepared from the foundation of the world equals to enter into eternal life.

This needs to be looked into more. Sorry. No, the Bible is not always so easy to understand. Sometimes it is easier. Sometimes it is not.

These sheep and goats appear to not have known Who Jesus was.

"Then the righteous will answer HIm, sayhing, Lord, when have we seen You hungry and have fed You , or thirsty and have given You a drink ? And when have we seen You a stranger and have taken You in, or naked and have clothed You ? (vs.37,38)

The condemned goats say something similar in verses 44 only negatively concerning what they did not do.


This is a judgment based on HOW Gentile nations treated persecuted brothers of Christ down to the least of them during the great tribulation. That is the last three and one half years before the second coming of Christ.

I will try to distinguish between the things I am reasonable sure of and other thoughts which are still my speculations.

Originally posted by sonship
How we doing ?

We have Jesus coming to the Holy Land at the beginning of the one thousand year Messianic kingdom. We have Him collecting living people from the nations - the Gentiles (same word there). They are not the dead. They are the living.

These are people who passed through the great tribulation divide into two groups - sheep to be saved and g ...[text shortened]... The Lord's brothers down to the very least of them

That is, why we are called his brethren...

Originally posted by sonship
What we know: Jesus said that His reborn saints, those who are overcoming, will reign over the nations in the millennial kingdom.

It does not make sense that His sons of God would reign over each other. So there must be some PEOPLE on the earth for Christ's overcoming saints to reign over.

Do you think Jesus meant the His servants would reign over e ...[text shortened]... n the Son of Man comes with His angels and establishes the throne of His glory in the Holy Land.

Originally posted by sonship
Because I so love the Bible I do not shrink from difficult passages. There are a number of passages on "eternal life" which do not fit into the typical evangelical Christian mode so influenced by, say, [b]John 3:16.

Some of these passages are used by people to argue against justification by faith. I would like to collect of number of these and prese ...[text shortened]... e wishing to examine at least what I think is the meaning of the passage, I will continue below.[/b]