The Last Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 29C), Nov. 21, 2004
Jer. 23:1-6; Psalm 46; Col. 1:11-20; Luke 23:35-43 or Luke 19:29-38
The prophet Jeremiah foresees that “[t]he days are surely coming” when God “will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king” (23:5). We, as Christians, agree that this vision is fulfilled in the coming of Christ.
What’s not so easy for us to agree on is the nature of the kingship of our Savior. For some Christians, Jesus is a classic Middle-Eastern potentate, after the fashion of the leaders of Kuwait or of Saudi Arabia. He issues clear and direct laws and decrees —“Jesus said it, I believe it, and that settles it,” according to the familiar bumper sticker. Those who obey are rewarded with royal favor and patronage, and those who do not are inevitably punished severely.
For others he’s a monarch of the modern Scandinavian sort, an esteemed and honored equal on the pathway through life. He makes no difference in everyday life. He simply makes one proud to be Scandinavian.
Neither of these extreme models, however, speaks very clearly to the personal experience of most of us. “He is the head of the body, the church,” insists Paul, “he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he may come to have first place in everything” (Col. 1:18). And that, as well, is our own understanding of his rule. For most Episcopalians, Christ is definitely not an arbitrary despot, but then neither is he merely a figurehead.
Another contemporary paradigm for thinking about the relationship King Jesus has to us is that of the (British) crown to the various Commonwealth realms. The sovereign never interferes in the decisions and actions of her national ministers, much less in the electoral decisions of her countries’ citizens. Instead, royal leadership is expressed by the queen exercising her right to advise and to warn, her right to be consulted, and her sovereign prerogative of mercy.
This “Commonwealth model” of sovereignty does seem to speak to our peculiarly Anglican experience of the reign of Jesus Christ. The Lord takes us and our free will so seriously that he simply won’t interfere in our decisions and actions, either individually or collectively. Christ our King constantly exercises his right to advise and to warn through the scriptures, through the Church’s tradition, and through human reason. Our Sovereign can constantly be accessed — through our corporate and our personal prayer. And the Lord’s prerogative of mercy, exercised on behalf of all for whom Christ has died, gives us hope for our own citizenship in heaven.
Christ our King warns us and advises us through the scriptures. He exercises his right to be consulted through his listening to our prayers. And most importantly, he exercises his prerogative of mercy through his showing to us the very same level of forgiveness that he showed to the penitent thief: “He replied, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise’” (Luke 19:38).
Look It Up
What is the relationship between the Lord's kingship and his eventual judgment of all creation (Jer. 10:10)?
Think About It
How does the Lord exercise his kingship in our own lives? In the life of our nation? In the life of the Church throughout the world?
Next Sunday
The First Sunday of Advent (Year A), Nov. 28, 2004
Isaiah 2:1-5; Psalm 122; Rom. 13:8-14; Matt. 24:37-44
