The kingliness of Christ
Commentary
Object:
The year is 1925. The king of Italy, Victor Emmanuel III, has refused to challenge Benito Mussolini's rise to power, allowing Mussolini to form a new government that is claiming more and more control. Dictatorship and a fascist police state are imminent. Meanwhile, the papacy is in a 74-year-old political dispute with the Italian government over control of the church in Rome. (This dispute would finally be resolved in 1929 by the Lateran Treaty, which recognized Vatican City as a sovereign state.)
In the midst of such tumultuous times, on December 11, 1925, Pope Pius XI instituted the feast we observe today, Christ the King. Originally set for the last Sunday in October (just before All Saints Day), it was moved to the last Sunday of Pentecost in 1970, and is now observed to varying degrees by the many churches that follow the Revised Common Lectionary. Some churches prefer the alternate name Reign of Christ Sunday for this final Sunday of the liturgical year.
What do we learn about Christ the King and his reign in the lessons appointed for this day?
Jeremiah 23:1-6
Like Pius XI, Jeremiah lived in a fraught political age when things were going from bad to worse. War and devastation were on their way, and many of Jeremiah's prophecies warn of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple and the scattering of the Jewish people in the Babylonian exile, all of which occurred in his lifetime.
But in the midst of proclaiming dire prophecies, Jeremiah also hears God promise eventual restoration, and it is from one of these post-exilic oracles that today's lesson comes. While faithless rulers have led to the people's exile, God will restore the people and raise up new rulers. The images for king are twofold in this oracle: a faithful shepherd who restores, heals, and tends a scattered flock neglected by previous faithless shepherds, and a righteous branch who will execute justice and righteousness and who will be called "The LORD is our righteousness" (NRSV). The Tanakh gives this "true branch from David's line" the name "The LORD is our vindicator." This re-gathering of the exiled people under a peaceful, just, kingly rule will be so remarkable that it will supplant the story of the Exodus from Egypt as the premier story of the people's faith (Jeremiah 23:7-8).
It is worth recalling the ambivalence toward human kings in the Hebrew scriptures as we read of the LORD's promise in Jeremiah to provide a faithful and just king who will rule wisely and well. In 1 Samuel 8, we encounter the story of how the people begged Samuel to appoint a king so they could be like other nations. The LORD tells Samuel to go ahead and appoint a king, but to warn the people of the excesses and ways of human kings. The LORD also tells Samuel that the people's desire for a human king represents a rejection of the LORD's divine kingship over them. Thus, in Jeremiah, a king provided and sanctioned by God who rules a re-gathered people represents a healing not only of a broken nation, but of the divine-human relationship.
Colossians 1:11-20
Opinions vary as to whether Paul himself or one of his followers wrote this letter to the church in Colossae. The occasion of writing appears to be some sort of religious syncretism that has crept into the church and its teachings. Worship of angels, ritualism, and unnecessary asceticism all were part of this heresy (Colossian 2:16-19). In the face of scattered spiritual effort and attention, the writer of Colossians urges a single-minded focus on Christ. The poetic description of Christ's cosmic, reconciling reign in verses 1:15-20 draws from an early Christian hymn known and sung by the Colossians. But the addition "by the blood of the cross" at the end of verse 20 is likely unique to the writer of the letter, bringing the lofty images of Christ's power into check by recalling the humility of his death. Verses 1:11-14 call on baptismal language of the early church with their recollection of the saving power of Christ.
Luke 23:33-43
However comforted or inspired we may feel after the first two readings, today's gospel brings us up short. Few people expect the starkness of Good Friday on this generally feel-good Sunday leading into Thanksgiving week and the start of the secular Christmas season. This is the only time in the three-year lectionary that we hear the story of Christ's crucifixion on Christ the King Sunday; other Sundays recount Jesus' conversation about kingship with Pilate from John (Year B: John 18:33-37) and the Son of Man's judgment of the sheep and the goats in Matthew (Year A: Matthew 25:31-46). In today's passage we receive the antidote to any Christian triumphalism this day may engender. The "king" we follow hangs crucified, despised, and rejected, even by his own followers, refusing to save or defend himself. The righteous, living branch of David that Jeremiah foresees comes up against the hard, dead wood of the cross.
Yet, it is only in Luke's account of the crucifixion that Jesus prays from the cross "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do" (v. 34; this verse is omitted in some early manuscripts), and it is only in Luke that Jesus and the two criminals crucified with him converse. Jesus promises the one who asks to be remembered in his kingdom, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise" (v. 43). According to The New Oxford Annotated NRSV, Paradise was a contemporary Jewish word for the lodging place for the righteous dead prior to resurrection. The writer of Luke-Acts is clear that Jesus was not "king of the Jews" but so much more, a messiah sent not simply to the Jewish people but to the whole world. For the writer, Jerusalem is the pivot point of Jesus' life and ministry. Through the gospel of Luke, Jesus and the disciples move from the hinterlands into the Jerusalem crucifixion-resurrection-ascension experience; in Acts, Jesus' message and power span out from Jerusalem all the way to Rome, the seat of the empire that crucified him and the center of power in the writer's known world.
As he is dying on the cross, Luke's Jesus ignores claims and mockery about being king of the Jews (which for Luke he is not), and proclaims forgiveness and reconciliation to an outcast criminal and to those who crucify him, who would have been Roman soldiers, not Jews. The "king" we meet on the cross in this reading is one whose power lies in mercy to the outsider, a "king" who is no respecter of religious or national boundaries that separate peoples from one another, a "king" who submits to the powers that would destroy him, and in so doing transforms himself, his followers, and the world.
Application
To whom are you preaching? To people who are powerless and need assurance that, all evidence to the contrary, Christ reigns supreme in the universe, as the letter to the Colossians assures its readers? Or are you preaching to people who exercise power and need to hear the cautions of Jeremiah and the kingly model of Christ crucified? In reality, no matter our circumstances we all have power to do good or ill in the world, to care for or neglect our families, neighbors, and the wider world. We need to be reminded of this and encouraged to appropriately claim and use the power with which God has gifted us. And even the most outwardly powerful among us are ultimately powerless in the face of suffering and death, except in making the choice to live and die in faith, love, and mercy, as Jesus does on the cross. Christ the King Sunday offers us the opportunity to remember that God is God and we are human -- created, loved, and inspired by God, but human, no more and no less. It can also be a Sunday to acknowledge and repent the many times and places when the followers of Christ have gotten it wrong and conflated worldly and godly power -- the wars and crusades in Christ's name, forced and coerced conversions by missionaries aligned with colonial powers -- though too much of this places the emphasis on ourselves rather than on Christ, where our focus most properly belongs on this closing Sunday of the Christian year.
Alternative Applications
1) Another way to enter into this Sunday is to tell the story of how Christ the King Sunday came to be along with the story of how Thanksgiving came to be. We typically think of the story of that first Thanksgiving in Plymouth with the Pilgrims and Native Americans sharing a bountiful feast after a difficult year. But the institution of Thanksgiving as a national holiday on the last Thursday of November was made by President Lincoln in 1863 in the midst of the Civil War. The proclamation invited the nation to give thanks for continued blessings of harvests and civic safety apart from the battlefield, while mourning those killed in the terrible conflict and caring for those widowed and orphaned by the war. Both Thanksgiving and Christ the King Sunday arose out of terrible times when people chose to look beyond their immediate terrors and perils and affirm that God is good, merciful, and ultimately will redeem the very worst that we humans can do. As parishioners prepare to observe Thanksgiving, some with family, some with friends, some alone, it can be a time to acknowledge the blessings and pain inherent in human relationships and to invite the peace of Christ that the writer of Colossians so gloriously portrays.
2) Is Christ king in our lives? What does it look like if he is? What should we look like if he is? The letter to the Colossians speaks powerfully to divided spiritual loyalties and invites us to live fully into the kingship of Christ. We could consider 1 Samuel and how we set up kings in our lives in rejection of God's kingship, and the oracle in Jeremiah that promises that God will restore a true and just king, despite human faithlessness.
In the midst of such tumultuous times, on December 11, 1925, Pope Pius XI instituted the feast we observe today, Christ the King. Originally set for the last Sunday in October (just before All Saints Day), it was moved to the last Sunday of Pentecost in 1970, and is now observed to varying degrees by the many churches that follow the Revised Common Lectionary. Some churches prefer the alternate name Reign of Christ Sunday for this final Sunday of the liturgical year.
What do we learn about Christ the King and his reign in the lessons appointed for this day?
Jeremiah 23:1-6
Like Pius XI, Jeremiah lived in a fraught political age when things were going from bad to worse. War and devastation were on their way, and many of Jeremiah's prophecies warn of the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple and the scattering of the Jewish people in the Babylonian exile, all of which occurred in his lifetime.
But in the midst of proclaiming dire prophecies, Jeremiah also hears God promise eventual restoration, and it is from one of these post-exilic oracles that today's lesson comes. While faithless rulers have led to the people's exile, God will restore the people and raise up new rulers. The images for king are twofold in this oracle: a faithful shepherd who restores, heals, and tends a scattered flock neglected by previous faithless shepherds, and a righteous branch who will execute justice and righteousness and who will be called "The LORD is our righteousness" (NRSV). The Tanakh gives this "true branch from David's line" the name "The LORD is our vindicator." This re-gathering of the exiled people under a peaceful, just, kingly rule will be so remarkable that it will supplant the story of the Exodus from Egypt as the premier story of the people's faith (Jeremiah 23:7-8).
It is worth recalling the ambivalence toward human kings in the Hebrew scriptures as we read of the LORD's promise in Jeremiah to provide a faithful and just king who will rule wisely and well. In 1 Samuel 8, we encounter the story of how the people begged Samuel to appoint a king so they could be like other nations. The LORD tells Samuel to go ahead and appoint a king, but to warn the people of the excesses and ways of human kings. The LORD also tells Samuel that the people's desire for a human king represents a rejection of the LORD's divine kingship over them. Thus, in Jeremiah, a king provided and sanctioned by God who rules a re-gathered people represents a healing not only of a broken nation, but of the divine-human relationship.
Colossians 1:11-20
Opinions vary as to whether Paul himself or one of his followers wrote this letter to the church in Colossae. The occasion of writing appears to be some sort of religious syncretism that has crept into the church and its teachings. Worship of angels, ritualism, and unnecessary asceticism all were part of this heresy (Colossian 2:16-19). In the face of scattered spiritual effort and attention, the writer of Colossians urges a single-minded focus on Christ. The poetic description of Christ's cosmic, reconciling reign in verses 1:15-20 draws from an early Christian hymn known and sung by the Colossians. But the addition "by the blood of the cross" at the end of verse 20 is likely unique to the writer of the letter, bringing the lofty images of Christ's power into check by recalling the humility of his death. Verses 1:11-14 call on baptismal language of the early church with their recollection of the saving power of Christ.
Luke 23:33-43
However comforted or inspired we may feel after the first two readings, today's gospel brings us up short. Few people expect the starkness of Good Friday on this generally feel-good Sunday leading into Thanksgiving week and the start of the secular Christmas season. This is the only time in the three-year lectionary that we hear the story of Christ's crucifixion on Christ the King Sunday; other Sundays recount Jesus' conversation about kingship with Pilate from John (Year B: John 18:33-37) and the Son of Man's judgment of the sheep and the goats in Matthew (Year A: Matthew 25:31-46). In today's passage we receive the antidote to any Christian triumphalism this day may engender. The "king" we follow hangs crucified, despised, and rejected, even by his own followers, refusing to save or defend himself. The righteous, living branch of David that Jeremiah foresees comes up against the hard, dead wood of the cross.
Yet, it is only in Luke's account of the crucifixion that Jesus prays from the cross "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do" (v. 34; this verse is omitted in some early manuscripts), and it is only in Luke that Jesus and the two criminals crucified with him converse. Jesus promises the one who asks to be remembered in his kingdom, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise" (v. 43). According to The New Oxford Annotated NRSV, Paradise was a contemporary Jewish word for the lodging place for the righteous dead prior to resurrection. The writer of Luke-Acts is clear that Jesus was not "king of the Jews" but so much more, a messiah sent not simply to the Jewish people but to the whole world. For the writer, Jerusalem is the pivot point of Jesus' life and ministry. Through the gospel of Luke, Jesus and the disciples move from the hinterlands into the Jerusalem crucifixion-resurrection-ascension experience; in Acts, Jesus' message and power span out from Jerusalem all the way to Rome, the seat of the empire that crucified him and the center of power in the writer's known world.
As he is dying on the cross, Luke's Jesus ignores claims and mockery about being king of the Jews (which for Luke he is not), and proclaims forgiveness and reconciliation to an outcast criminal and to those who crucify him, who would have been Roman soldiers, not Jews. The "king" we meet on the cross in this reading is one whose power lies in mercy to the outsider, a "king" who is no respecter of religious or national boundaries that separate peoples from one another, a "king" who submits to the powers that would destroy him, and in so doing transforms himself, his followers, and the world.
Application
To whom are you preaching? To people who are powerless and need assurance that, all evidence to the contrary, Christ reigns supreme in the universe, as the letter to the Colossians assures its readers? Or are you preaching to people who exercise power and need to hear the cautions of Jeremiah and the kingly model of Christ crucified? In reality, no matter our circumstances we all have power to do good or ill in the world, to care for or neglect our families, neighbors, and the wider world. We need to be reminded of this and encouraged to appropriately claim and use the power with which God has gifted us. And even the most outwardly powerful among us are ultimately powerless in the face of suffering and death, except in making the choice to live and die in faith, love, and mercy, as Jesus does on the cross. Christ the King Sunday offers us the opportunity to remember that God is God and we are human -- created, loved, and inspired by God, but human, no more and no less. It can also be a Sunday to acknowledge and repent the many times and places when the followers of Christ have gotten it wrong and conflated worldly and godly power -- the wars and crusades in Christ's name, forced and coerced conversions by missionaries aligned with colonial powers -- though too much of this places the emphasis on ourselves rather than on Christ, where our focus most properly belongs on this closing Sunday of the Christian year.
Alternative Applications
1) Another way to enter into this Sunday is to tell the story of how Christ the King Sunday came to be along with the story of how Thanksgiving came to be. We typically think of the story of that first Thanksgiving in Plymouth with the Pilgrims and Native Americans sharing a bountiful feast after a difficult year. But the institution of Thanksgiving as a national holiday on the last Thursday of November was made by President Lincoln in 1863 in the midst of the Civil War. The proclamation invited the nation to give thanks for continued blessings of harvests and civic safety apart from the battlefield, while mourning those killed in the terrible conflict and caring for those widowed and orphaned by the war. Both Thanksgiving and Christ the King Sunday arose out of terrible times when people chose to look beyond their immediate terrors and perils and affirm that God is good, merciful, and ultimately will redeem the very worst that we humans can do. As parishioners prepare to observe Thanksgiving, some with family, some with friends, some alone, it can be a time to acknowledge the blessings and pain inherent in human relationships and to invite the peace of Christ that the writer of Colossians so gloriously portrays.
2) Is Christ king in our lives? What does it look like if he is? What should we look like if he is? The letter to the Colossians speaks powerfully to divided spiritual loyalties and invites us to live fully into the kingship of Christ. We could consider 1 Samuel and how we set up kings in our lives in rejection of God's kingship, and the oracle in Jeremiah that promises that God will restore a true and just king, despite human faithlessness.
