Thanksgiving for Christ our King

Christo Rey (Guanajuato, Mexico: 2007)

Today is the last Sunday after Pentecost; the final feast of ordinary/proper time; a Sunday when we proclaim with joy that the resurrected Christ is King as we look ahead toward the beginning of Advent (next Sunday), a season of divine expectation aswe start over again in our church year together, anticipating a new age and the arrival of our newborn king.  This week, many of us will also be sharing Thanksgiving feasts with our friends and family…I’ll come back to this toward the end.

In the1920’s, this special feast day for Christ the King was established by a Pope (Pious the XI) as antidote to the rising primacy of secularism.  It is to remind faithful Christians, amid prevailing commercial and secular culture, that Christ is to reign in our hearts, minds, wills, and bodies. 

The King we’re remembering today was born in a blessed mess (right where we are), identifies more closely with the poor, the hungry,the imprisoned than with regal pomp and circumstance… and ends his earthly life wearing a thorny crown and executed with criminals.  He tells us that he didn’t come to be served, but to serve (Matt 20:28). He tells us that the poor will always be with us (Matt 26:11).  He tells us that He will always be with us and that he’ll never leave us, even to the end of the world (Matt 28:20).

Through the readings we’ve heard in Matthew this season,our Lord has been foreshadowing the end of this age and saying rather plainly,in keeping with his tradition of the tribe into which he was born, that will be a time of reckoning and accounting – a time when our Master holds all of us accountable for how we’ve tending to the flock – our family/neighbors/nation.

Additionally, through the reading from Ezekiel this morning we hear that God will be a good shepherd to the faithful – rescue, protect, nourish, heal, and bring them home to lie in lush green pastures, no matter how/where they’ve been scattered. And, we hear that God will judge harshly both false shepherds and foul followers alike… pride-filled, self-serving, over-indulged ones who have butted and scattered those weaker than themselves.  Note one of the verses that our lection skipped over in today’s excerpt (Ezekiel 34:17) which reinforces what Jesus indicates in today’s Gospel lesson: “As for you, my flock, thussays the Lord God: I shall judge between sheep and sheep, between rams and goats.”

Whether using the images of judging among rams, goats,and sheep, or among different types of fish has he does in an earlier saying in Matthew, Jesus says that there will be a separating of the evil from therighteous / the bullies from the peacekeepers (Matt 13:47-50).

And, as you’ve hopefully picked up on by now, we’re not to preoccupy ourselves with worries about how and or when this will happen.  It will be at an unexpected time, and the Master’s ways of sorting things out in the end are likely to surprise all of us.

Instead, our King expects us to occupy ourselves with good labor in his vineyard, cultivating bountifully the fruits of the Spirit to share with all.  Although he is mercifuland gracious towards us in ways beyond our imagination and comprehension, our good shepherd and king does not do this particular work for us – he gives it back to us to do this caring for each other, reassuring us that he is with us in this communal labor of love… and that to share in this work is to share in God’s love for us / to love Christ himself.  Our job here is not about professing a precise doctrine or creed aloud (though offering witness and testimony of faith in the good news is commanded); it’s about getting our hands dirty with others in the real work of relief, redemption, and restoration.

The parable we’ve heard today (Matthew25:31-46) makes it very clear what this looks and sounds like.  When our King comes againin his glory, all the nations* will be gathered before him.  He will sort them into groups according to actions that flowed benevolently from pure hearts without pretense, not what they’ve proclaimed aloud or the things they’ve done to appear pious.  Who has cared for others, particularly others who are considered less than or least? Who has ignored and/or neglected the needs their neighbors?

*(Note: In this instance, the Greek word translated as “nations” is often used specifically to describe non-Jewish tribes.  Some commentators indicate that having talked about criteria for judging the behaviors of Jews earlier, Matthew is now focusing on criteria for judging behavior of everyone else – the essential spirit of which is very similar to how we’re all to be held accountable before God). 

logo from Good Shepherd Lutheran
(Collinsville, IL)

DISCUSSION:  What does our King draw our attention to with regard to our charitable and benevolent actions towards others?  What needs are highlighted?  What are we to do?  Why?

[if necessary/ helpful to complement the discussion]: A colleague of mine, interestingly enough my ‘shepherd’ as part of the process toward my ordination, says this (from her sermon for today):

"There is, further, a subversive quality to the reality of the kingdom, a sense that those who see and understand it are from the margins of society rather than from the powerful and content center. In Matthew, the list of those who see and acceptwhat Jesus has to offer includes a Roman centurion, a Canaanite woman, and Matthew, a despised tax collector. The disciples themselves are hardly the elite of Jerusalem; they are country bumpkins from the provinces, hardly the sort to set the world on fire. Yet all these people listen to Jesus and follow him, perhaps because the status quo has not given them very much.

While the world has changed over and over in the years since the Gospel of Matthew was written, the list of the vulnerable in today’s gospel has only grown. “The hungry” now means a billion people who go to bed every night with little or no food. “The thirsty,” means millions of people worldwide dealing with severe drought. “The sick,” includes millions of people infected with the most difficult and pernicious illnesses, including AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis. And the United States leads the world in its share of “those in prison.” It is harder than ever to see the reality of God’s kingdom and the Lordship of Christ behindthese devastating everyday realities. But it is easier than ever to see those on the margins whose needs are overwhelming. …

The notion of the kingship of Christ, over against the reality in which we live, begs the question: are we behaving like citizens of the kingdom? Are the hungry and thirsty, the poor and neglected better off because of us? Is the reality of the expansive, all-encompassing love of God visible in what we do? In the end, this gospel says, that’s what matters in human existence. When we make choices about where to spend our time, our money, our energy, and our best gifts, we are making choices that build the kingdom – or don’t."

-- The Rev.Kay Sylvester is the assistant rector at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Tustin,California. 

THANKSGIVING

This week we will also be observing a national holiday, Thanksgiving, that although now is considered by most to be mostly secular, is actually rooted in faithful religious tradition.  It emerges from the faith and perseverance of our pilgrim predecessors who originally gave thanks to God and their native American neighbors for bringing them through early hardships (note relevance of being fed when they were hungry), but also the faith of one of our great presidents, Abraham Lincoln, as he turned to God amid a time of great civil unrest.   Hear these words delivered by President Lincoln nearly 150 years ago (October 1863), the same year as his Gettysburg Address (Nov. 19, 1863), as part of his “Thanksgiving Proclamation” that served as another precedent for the national holiday of thanks we’re preparing to observe this week. 

Keeping close to your heart the themes of today – what our King is watching for in our actions  - and listen for what the Spirit invites us to hear in Lincoln’s words:

"… No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the most high God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace,harmony, tranquility, and union." (http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/source/sb2/sb2w.htm)

President Lincoln was clearly thankful for a “beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens”.  And, his yearning for “…tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged” as well as his prayer for the “interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds” resonates well with today’s Gospel reading, no?

CONCLUSION

As we enter this holiday season, what are we all really yearning for?  The beauty of the twinkling lights at night; the smell of crackling wood burning warm inside; the table prepared for us with loving care… can we not see these as signs and symbols that invite us to the feast that we’re really hungry for – more perfect communion with God and each other?

How can we make our gatherings this week more of a foretaste of the heavenly banquet that has been prepared for us by Christ our King? 

As we leave church this morning, we’ll again be among the busy secular world preparing for the stressful holidays and the cunning commercial demands for our time and attention.  When you feel yourself getting caught up following other lords, worshipping idols, and eating of the bread of anxiety, step back, close your eyes, breath deeply, and remember our Lord’s supper and the paradise kingdom he calls us to.  

If we hear people saying harmful/hurtful things to each other in the coming weeks, recall that we’ve been called by our Lord into a place of peace, a reign of reconciliation, a kingdom of kindness. 

Christ our King is not really removed from us, upon a throne somewhere distant.  He is present by, with, and in us and those around us in greatest need – the least among us, those who we might prefer to avoid (those who might prefer to avoid us). We experience Christ in/through our interactions with each other.  Loving God through loving each other is the work of the Christ’s kingdom.  Hear what the Spirit is saying to God’s people.  Notice when any of us is hungry, thirsty, sick and dis-eased, imprisoned… and let’s act from what is written on our hearts without overthinking it.  

Our King’s reign is already over hearts and minds… a reign of compassion, justice,mercy, charity, peace and love.  This is worth being thankful for this week as we gather in his name around our tables.

Let’s end inprayer…

Christ, you are our King of redeeming justice, leading us in a principality of peace and charitable love.  Christ, our king, we are thankful for the mercy and peace you have freely given us – compel us to share these with our family, friends, and neighbors.  Strengthen us as we boldly seek to help build your kingdom by being unexpectedly generous in our compassion, forgiveness, charity, and love toward others… particularly toward the “least of these” who are in most need.  And, to graciously accept kinds acts from others when they’ve seen, through your Spirit, our deeper needs. 

AMEN.