Christ The King (Luke 23:33-43)

Sermon as preached at Lambs and Evington UMC on 11/24/13

Image courtesy of Vanderbilt Divinity Library

Today marks the end of the Christian calendar with a special day that we call The Reign of Christ or Christ the King Sunday. If you do not know what I am talking about when I say the Christian calendar, you are probably aware of elements of the calendar without knowing it. You have surely heard of Christmas and Easter, the two great feasts of the calendar, and you may have even heard of other seasons such as Advent, Epiphany, Lent, or Pentecost. All of these seasons are part of the Christian calendar, and allow us to follow through the salvation narrative through these different seasons. It is why we begin with Advent, the expectation of the messiah, we then celebrate Christ’s arrival with Christmas, we move forward with Epiphany and then experience Jesus’ time in the wilderness during the season of Lent. Holy week we celebrate Christ’s entrance into Jerusalem, dine with him and the disciples on Mandy or Holy Thursday, mourn on Good Friday, and celebrate that he is risen on Easter morning. Pentecost comes later and we celebrate the power of the Holy Spirit and the creation of the church, and then every Sunday after is about the life and ministry of the church until this Sunday, Christ the King Sunday, the last Sunday of the Christian calendar.

            Christ the King or the reign of Christ Sunday celebrates exactly what it sounds like it celebrates; the fact that Christ is King. It comes at the end of the Christian calendar not only as a celebration that Christ has come and has established the Kingdom of God on Earth, but fittingly the end of the calendar usually also celebrates the end of times. This is not a celebration of gloom and destruction, but rather it is a celebration of the day in which Christ comes in final glory and we are able to feast at his heavenly banquet. Other years have had scripture such as Revelation talking about those gathered around the throne of God celebrating the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. Even other scripture for this year such as Jeremiah 23 exclaims, “The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.”  The scripture is almost always a scripture that obviously celebrates the reign of Christ on Earth, that celebrates that Christ is King.

            Almost always. Our scripture for this morning is a little different. Our scripture is not a revelation John of the end of times, it is not some prophetic soliloquy of the reign of the coming Messiah, it is not even an apocalyptic teaching from Jesus like we saw from in last week’s scripture. No this week’s scripture, the scripture that is supposed to celebrate the fact that Christ is King, is Luke’s account of the crucifixion. This scripture does not portray Jesus as the mighty warrior, coming to conquer the enemies of Israel and to restore Israel to its rightful place as a mighty nation. Instead, this scripture portrays the Messiah as a poor, helpless man, who is stripped, beaten,  made fun of, even by a criminal being executed with him, and of course the result of the passage is that Jesus, this so called King, is killed.

            This passage can leave us with many more questions than answers. If Jesus Christ truly is King, why did he die? Why couldn’t he just free himself from the bonds, use his power and strength to retaliate against all of those who persecuted him, and then lead his followers in the ultimate sign of power and defiance against the powers that be and establish a new Kingdom where Christ is King and everyone must bow down to him. And even if Jesus did have to die, why did he have to die like that? If Jesus is truly innocent why did he allow himself to be crucified next to two hardened criminals?  Why did he let the guards strip him and cast lots for his clothes? Maybe most importantly,  If Jesus truly is the King, then how come when the Romans and the Jewish leaders present were mocking him,  making fun of that very claim, why didn’t he at least correct them or prove to them that he is truly King? How can we worship a King who died in such a distasteful manner as that?

            You see it is actually quite fitting that this text is here on Christ the King Sunday, because  these are many of the same worries and questions that early believers of Christ had to wrestle with.  Many of the earliest followers of Christ who were Jewish expected the Messiah that they had heard about through Scripture and through the teaching at that time. This Messiah would be a political leader, a warrior even, one that would as we mentioned earlier topple the powers that be and restore justice to the land. They believed in Christ, they had seen his ministry to and with the poor, the oppressed; they heard about his proclamation that we can find in Luke 4 when he says, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me He has sent me to preach good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, to liberate the oppressed  and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” These followers looked to Christ for hope, for change from the oppression, but now this leader this Messiah they had hoped for was being beaten and killed, facing the same oppression they had hoped he would conquer.  Other believers had witnessed the signs and miracles that Jesus had performed, restoring sight to the blind, healing the sick,  feeding a multitude from such a little amount of food,  and so they knew that this all powerful Christ would just break free from his captivity and free himself.  The crowd even egged him on making fun of him saying, “"If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself,”  He is the king of the Jews, he will save himself the followers must have been thinking, but imagine the disappointment that comes when the believers get word that their all mighty King is dead.

            But have you ever watched one of those movies when it seems as though the movie you know everything that is going on in the plot, and then they reveal something that changes everything. The Ocean’s 11 movies are a great example of this.  As you go along with the cast in the movie you see things fail, you see people get arrested and you begin to believe that their heist had failed, and then the movie goes back and reveals how it was all part of the heist. Luke’s gospel is like one of those movies one where what you think you know what you saw, but then looking back you realize you had it all wrong.

            Luke does this to help the earlier followers understand and cope with what had happened. At first it seems as though everything that is happening in this passage points to the fact that Jesus is in fact not King;  the jeers, the sour wine, being stripped, not saving himself, being hung with criminals and so on.  In a very amazing and subtle way, Luke however shows the readers that these things don’t point towards Christ not being the King, but rather reveal that he is in fact King. How so you may be wondering?  Luke appeals to many of the Jewish followers and those familiar with Scripture and shows them that all the things happening to Jesus is in fact a fulfillment of Scripture.  This would have first become apparent to the readers when Luke talks about how they took Jesus’s clothes and cast lots for them. This would trigger a recollection of the 22^nd Psalm which says, “they divide my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots.”  As Luke continues his narrative other aspects of the crucifixion of  Jesus would continue to jump out from scripture like this. For example when we hear of Jesus being given sour wine  or vinegar depending on the translation,  we can once again jump back to the psalms, this time psalm 69 which says, “They gave me poison for food,  and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.”  As we hear this we like the earlier readers begin to realize that the suffering, the torment, the jeering and name calling is not indicative of Jesus being a nobody, but that he is in fact the fulfillment of scripture. No, they did not receive the warrior Messiah they had expected, but they began to realize they have received the suffering servant of whom Isaiah foretold.  Isaiah 53 says, “Surely he has borne our infirmities  and carried our diseases;
yet we accounted him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole     and by his bruises we are healed.  All we like sheep have gone astray;  we have all turned to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,  yet he did not open his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.”  Jesus is the suffering servant, who amongst all the jeers, the whips, the embarrassment, does not open his mouth in retaliation, but instead was wounded for our transgressions, and by his bruises we are healed. And here in lies the good news, that Christ died for us while we were yet sinners, that proves God love towards us ,  that the great irony is that those who mock him for being the King of the Jews were in fact correct. Jesus Christ is King!

            This leads us however to another difficult question;  what does it mean to say that Christ is King?   What does it mean to celebrate the reign of Christ? We have affirmed through our reading of Luke that through his death, (but I’d be remised if I didn’t mention also through his life and resurrection) that Jesus Christ is in fact King, but what does his reign look like?  Was he only king then? Is he still king now or are we just talking about when Christ comes again? These are challenging and difficult questions.  How can we exclaim that Christ is King and yet look and see a world in which it does not seem as though he fully reigns?  Does it refer simply to our personal salvation, or are we truly talking about this reign of Christ on Earth?  Luckily our passage from Luke has an interesting conversation between Jesus and one of the criminals who is hanging beside him, and this conversation may be able to help us out.

            As Jesus is being jeered by the crowd, there are two criminals being crucified beside him. One of them joins in with the jeers, tempting Jesus to use his powers to free himself. The other criminal however  rebukes  him and says, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation?  And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong."  He then turns to Jesus and says, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.”  To which Jesus replies, “"Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”  This exchange beautifully shows the mystery of claiming Christ as King.  The criminal is pleading with Jesus,  when you come into your Kingdom, when there becomes a new heaven and a new Earth and you reign comes in full glory, don’t forget me, I want to be part of that.  The criminal is thinking about the future, and Christ reign at the end of times. But interestingly enough Jesus doesn’t just say I won’t forget you, or on that day you will be with me, but instead he says, “Today, you will be with me in Paradise.” Yes, Jesus is alluding to the fact that they are both about to die, and  Jesus is telling the criminal that he will be with him in heaven, and yet it is so much more than that.  He is saying that salvation does not only come some day in the future when all is made right, but that salvation comes today.  That shortly, I will die, and will rise again and in doing so I will conquer sin and death. Today, my reign as King begins.

            And so we are left here this morning as people in the middle. Christ has already brought forth his heavenly Kingdom, and yet that day in which Christ comes in full glory is not fully here. This gives us a special opportunity as Christians. We have assurance that through the grace of God we are able to be saved, and yet we also know that the work of the Kingdom is not yet complete.  We are therefore comforted that we have as John Wesley describes in his Aldersgate experience, “ assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death .” At the same time we are called to be kingdom builders working alongside Christ the king through the power of the holy Spirit. All of this  gives us the hope to be able to exclaim “Rejoice the Lord is King” and yet the humility to cry out, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”