Matthew 25:31-36: in context

Jesus describes the final judgment, when the Son of Man comes in glory and gathers all the nations before him, separating them as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. To those on his right he says: come, blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom. For I was hungry and you gave me food, thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you took me in, naked and you clothed me, sick and you visited me, in prison and you came to me. The mercy shown to the needy was, he says, shown to him.

The astonishing truth in Jesus' words is that he identifies himself with the needy, so that mercy shown to them is mercy shown to him. I was hungry, he says, and you fed me; I was a stranger, and you took me in; I was sick, and you visited me. He was speaking of the hungry, the stranger, the sick, the imprisoned; and he says that what was done for them was done for him. Christ is present, in some real sense, in the needy; and to serve them is to serve him. This transforms how we regard and treat those in need. We can see the hungry, the stranger, the sick, the imprisoned as problems, burdens, or people beneath our notice, easy to pass by. Jesus says that in them, he is present; that the mercy we show or withhold from them, we show or withhold from him. The person in need at our door is not merely a stranger but, in a mystery, Christ himself, to be served as we would serve our Lord. This gives an extraordinary dignity to acts of mercy, and an extraordinary weight to their neglect. To feed the hungry, welcome the stranger, visit the sick, care for the imprisoned, is to minister to Christ; and to pass them by is to pass by Christ. He who has pity on the poor, the proverb says, lends to the LORD. And the judgment Jesus describes turns on this: those who served the needy served him, though they did not fully realize it, and are welcomed; those who neglected them neglected him. This is a searching truth about our lives. The opportunities to show mercy to the needy that we meet daily, the hungry, the stranger, the sick, the struggling, are opportunities to minister to Christ himself, present in them. To see Christ in the least, to serve the needy as we would serve our Lord, is to grasp what Jesus teaches here; and how we treat the least is, in the end, how we treat him. Inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these, he says, you did it to me. The needy person before us bears, in a mystery, the presence of Christ; and mercy shown to them is mercy shown to him.

Do I see the needy, the hungry, the stranger, the sick, the struggling, as problems or people beneath my notice, easy to pass by, or can I take hold of Jesus' astonishing word that he is present in them, so that mercy shown to the least is mercy shown to him, and serve the needy I meet as I would serve my Lord, seeing Christ in the least?