An Unexpected King
November 24 / 2013 Luke 23: 33-43 and Jeremiah 23: 1-6
What a
week! More scandal stirred up in the
Senate, more chaos stirred up in Toronto city hall, more people and resources
off the Philippines to help in the rescue efforts and clean up, and more world
leaders getting together in Geneva for talks with Iran about Nuclear
power. And it was a week of stirring up memories too
- 50 years since the JFK assassination and 50 years since Dr. Who hit the
television airways. And of course the
people of Hamilton and the folks from Saskatchewan are all stirred up as it is
Grey Cup Weekend. Did you also know that in some parts of Great
Britain this is what this day is called – the last Sunday before Advent – it is
called - Stir up Sunday. Seems like an
apt word to use as we reflect on the week as many a thing did get stirred up –
from Senator Kennedy being charged with sexual harassment – to Toronto City
council voting budget and staff away from the mayor – yet, “Stir Up Sunday’ actually comes from the
medieval collect which is a prayer offered in worship that reads - ‘stir up our
hearts we beseech thee..’ when people traditionally stir up and cook their
Christmas pudding after church. The story goes that people heard the prayer and
knew that Advent was coming and that the steamed fruit pudding should be made
in order to mature in time for Christmas.”
When I was a
little girl we used to keep this tradition – we had a stir up day too – often
it was on a Saturday – but one day in late November my mother would pull down
my Grandma Davies fruit cake recipe which was written on the back of an
envelope and a very large silver bowl and she would measure and stir chop fruit
and nuts and add rum and some flour and mix, mix, mix– until she had a batter –
then she would call me and my sisters into the kitchen where we each would take
a turn stirring the batter – just a time or two – I remember how heavy the
wooden spoon was to stir as the batter was chalked full of fruit - we were told
that it would bring us luck for the next year.
Then she would bake the cakes – wrap them in cheese cloth, douse them
with more rum, put them in the back of the cupboard and there they would sit
until Christmas.
Something is
getting stirred up in the church as well – we are changing seasons – today is
the last Sunday in ordinary time – as well as the last Sunday of the year. We are about to embark on Advent – special time
in the church– these next four Sundays – as we prepare our hearts and minds to
get ready for the Incarnation – to get ready for Christmas – to get ready for the
birth of Jesus – God getting into the world.
This day – this last day of the liturgical year – we call this day
Christ the King Sunday or Reign of God Sunday – it is a day when consider the
power structures of our world and see them not through the lens of the world
but through the eyes of God.
Christ the
King Sunday is not an old tradition – it has only been a special day since 1925
when Pope Pius the 11th realized that Europe’s royal kingdoms where
failing and falling fast, the power control that they once had was
diminishing. What was happening was the
rise to power of ‘isms’: fascism,
communism, Nazism, capitalism, atheism and secularism– and the men and their
governments that are on the rise of Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin – a new kind of
king that Pius knew would not save the people.
So Pius challenged this new way of finding salvation in the kingdom of
communism, fascism, Nazism, socialism, capitalism and proclaimed the last
Sunday before advent as “Christ the King” Sunday. So instead of looking for weak and imperfect
human beings to rule the world – we are challenged to ask the question who is
really our king, and where do we place our allegiance.
The kings of
the world bear little resemblance to the King we meet today in the Gospel of
Luke – and the king we meet today is so unexpected from what the people were
waiting for.
According to
Jeremiah, the king will emerge like a shepherd - a righteous branch of David,
who will protect the people, they will have no more fear and no one will be
lost – this king will rule wisely and Judah will be saved and Israel will live
in safety. Jeremiah is
communicating God’s promise to His people that He will give them good leaders
instead of the bad ones who had brought them to tragedy, of being conquered and
exiled from their homes and their way of life.
He is reminding the people of what a good and righteous leader is like –
he is helping them remember David.
Remember
David – the wonderful king – to the people of Jeremiah’s day David is etched in their brain as the best
example ever of a good king – the people of Jesus time know this as well – for
to them there has never been a king so good – David the giant slayer, David who
brought the arc of the Covenant to Jerusalem, David who ruled Israel and Judah
in the time of prosperity and growth.
David the fantastic king – it is from him that, from his line that a new
king will come, a king to rule just as David did. The people are expecting a great and powerful
man, to overthrow the Roman powers, to send them scattering back to Italy, to
gather all the Hebrew people and to return the temple to its former glory – and
the Jewish nation will thrive again under the leadership of this new and
wonderful great – great – great – grandson of David. So it is understandable that the people did
not understand who Jesus was when he was in their midst – Jesus was just not
what they were expecting. He slipped
into the world – not in palace – but in stable.
He grew up in obscurity, not wandering the halls of the temple with studying
the Torah with learned scholars – no – instead he was but by his father’s side,
with hammer and nails. And then when he
begins his ministry it is not proclamation to the rich and famous – no – it is
in the trenches with the poor and oppressed, the sinner and the prostitute – this
was not expected. And so it is with
Jesus – and so it is with God – just when we think we know what we want, just
when we think we know what to expect, just when we think we have a handle on
who God is and how God is at work in the world something shifts and the true
power is not in castle or in a parliament building or even in white house, true
power – is on a cross – and in a manger – true power is turning the world
around and looking at people in new ways – so that the first come last and the
last comes first, and the little child shall lead them and the lion and the
lamb shall lie down together.
And this is
who we meet today in this out of season passage – yet another unexpected thing
as we listen to an Easter Story a month before Christmas. This King – on a
cross – even in death – does the unexpected.
– for here we have a man on a cross – a man
about to die, a man in excruciating pain, offering hope and comfort to
another. We do not hear about human
kings being this way, nor very many human beings for that matter.
Edward
Markquart writes: “We try to avoid
suffering, often at all costs. When we get the cross put on our back, we often
complain, “Why me, God? Why us?” We get angry at God; we become depressed; we
become hurt; we no longer believe in God or that God intervenes in our lives.”
Isn’t it an interesting quality of human beings that the whole world can be
suffering, and we never ask the question, “why;” but when something goes wrong
with me, with my family, with my friends, with my loved
ones; when something goes wrong with my life, I then ask the
question deeply and personally, “Why God? Why me? Why us? Why my loved one? “....?
Today we
are at the very mystery of God, the mystery of the universe, at the very heart
of the mystery of love. God chose to experience the place of the greatest
pain, the cross. In the cross, we are meet with the very mystery of God,
where God chose not to avoid the suffering of this world. We hear the statement,
“Where suffering is, love is. And where love is, God is.” We are at the very
heart of the incomprehensible mystery of God that is symbolized by the cross.”
David Lose writes: “And this, I think, is the key to ... Christ
the King Sunday: to realize that Jesus is not coming to be just one more king
(or ruler or president or whatever), but rather that he is ushering in an
entirely new order -- a world and order and reign and kingdom characterized by
new life, hope, grace and above all love -- the kind of love that never wearies
in extending and receiving second chances.”[1] Unexpected.
This moment as we pause at the end of
the Church year and reflect with the Christ on the cross – see the man and his
life from the from cradle to cross to tomb and beyond – we remember that we are
an Easter people – and that this act – this horrifying gruesome act of human
misunderstanding, fear and prejudice – this moment in history – was transformed
by God – and became part of the big story of transformation – that of resurrection
–
David Lose again: “This One, you see, strung up by the Empire
for treason and insurrection is, as it turns out, not merely challenging the orders of the world
but overturning them altogether and
establishing a new reign governed not by might, power and judgment but rather
by love, mercy and grace. For he is the King, reigning from his unlikely
throne, granting second chances to us all.”[2]
As we stir up this Sunday the timing
of this morning’s passage is perfect – for here are about embark into our happy
season – a season of hope, promise and love – the season where we first meet
the Christ child as a baby in a place of innocence – also the season of advent
– where the promise of the messiah is contained within the mystery of your
faith – that of Christ coming again – and in order to fully understand the
significance of that event we need to remember again that the baby in the
manger becomes the Christ on the cross – and the Christmas has no meaning
without Easter – the king that we crucify is the same one in a manger, one in
the desert, by the sea, in the temple, on the cross, in the tomb – and wonder
of wonders – alive again. This great
mystery of our faith – baby/cross/tomb and beyond… this wonders of wonders – is
God at work in our world and in our lives – the king has come – the king is here
– the king will come again…thanks be to God…Amen.
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