Now let us consider how the Lord will deal with the Jews at His coming back. During the age of the church the Lord has temporarily given up the people of Israel and treats them like the Gentiles. They must receive the gospel to be saved and become members of the church. But at the end of this age, according to Zechariah 12 and 13 and Romans 11, the Jewish nation will be revived and will turn to the Lord. Because this will occur during the tribulation, many will suffer and die. Zechariah 13:8-9 says that at least two-thirds of the living Jews will be cut off. This does not include the millions killed by Hitler. When the Lord Jesus comes back, the remaining one-third will repent and believe in the Lord. The house of Israel will be saved at that time.
After they are regenerated and saved, they will be translated into the millennial kingdom on the earth to be the priests teaching the nations how to serve God (Zech. 8; Isa. 2). The overcomers among the Christians will be the kings, the ruling ones, during the millennial kingdom, and the saved ones of Israel will be the priests.
Now we must consider how the Lord will deal with the nations. When the Lord comes back, He will send His angels to bring all the Gentiles unto Him, and He will judge them. This will be the judgment on the living Gentiles. In the New Testament we are told that the Lord Jesus will be the judge of the living and the dead (2 Tim. 4:1). As the righteous Judge, He will judge the living on His throne of glory at His second appearing (Matt. 25:31-46), and He will judge the dead on the great white throne after the millennium (Rev. 20:11-15). In Matthew 25:32 the Lord gathers all the nations before Him. “All the nations” are all the Gentiles who remain at Christ’s coming back to the earth, after He destroys those Gentiles who follow Antichrist at Armageddon (Rev. 16:14, 16; 19:11-15, 19-21). Before the Lord comes back, there will be the three and one half years of the great tribulation, during which the Christians will suffer immensely. Revelation 14:6-7 tells us that during the great tribulation God will send an angel to preach an eternal gospel to the people on earth. The basic contents of this gospel are to fear God and to worship God. If the nations fear God during the great tribulation, they will not persecute any of God’s people. Neither will they worship the image set up by Antichrist.
During the great tribulation the Christians who are not ripe or ready to be raptured will be left on the earth to ripen, and they will suffer. These Christians are referred to as “the least of My brothers” in Matthew 25:40. They are the least brothers of the Lord. According to Matthew 25:32-46 the Lord’s judgment of the nations depends upon how they treat His brothers during the great tribulation. This corresponds to the parable told by the Lord in Matthew 13:47-50. In this parable the kingdom of the heavens is likened to a net cast into the sea and gathering from every species. The sea signifies the Gentile world. “Every species” (v. 47) signifies all the nations, all the Gentiles (Matt. 25:32). The good are put into vessels, and the foul are cast out. This corresponds to the good sheep and the corrupt goats in Matthew 25:32. Remember that Matthew 25:32 says, “All the nations will be gathered before Him.” The word nations in Greek is the same as the word for Gentiles. All the Gentiles will be gathered before the Lord, and the Lord will judge them based on the way they treated His little brothers, the Christians, during the great tribulation. So many of the Lord’s little brothers during the great tribulation will be hungry, thirsty, naked, sick, and in prison (vv. 35-36). If by fearing and worshipping God the nations have well-treated the Christians, the Lord’s brothers suffering poverty and imprisonment under Antichrist’s persecution during the great tribulation, they will be justified by the Lord so that they may enter into the earthly part of the millennium to partake of the kingdom prepared by God for them from the foundation of the world (v. 34). If they have ill-treated them by following Antichrist and worshipping his image, they will be condemned and be cast into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels (vv. 41, 46; 13:49-50).