Christ the King - B

From Kingdom to…

Introduction

Today is the last Sunday in the Christian calendar. It is the Sunday where we wrap up the old, conclude all of our thoughts, and prepare to move on once more into the season of Christmas. So what do you say to sum up Christianity?

Over the years we have said it slightly differently – but to think of this Sunday historically one has to think of that time when the disciples were arguing about money, and Jesus asked whose head was on the coin… 

“Caesar’s,” they answered, “well then,” said Jesus, “Caesar is the king and give him the money.”

As the disciples thought about this more and more they decided that Jesus should be their king, not Caesar. And maybe it is a political rebellion fermenting, or maybe it is a metaphor and Jesus is king of our hearts, but so was born ‘Christ the King’ Sunday.

Of course, the argument against this comes from Jesus himself, who said such things as “My Kingdom is not of this earth,” and “the Kingdom of God is among you.”

He was the guy who argued that the way the rulers of this world work is often contrary to the way of goodness, of love, of God.

The reason Jesus was killed was political, he was branded a traitor and crucified for political dissidence, the Romans thought he was a troublemaker…. So what was this Kingdom Jesus was talking about, and what does it mean for us today?

That is what we are going to be exploring throughout this service.

Politics of Faith

There have been three phases of this movement Jesus started; and each one changed its followers, and the church. I want to give you a really brief history lesson and then perhaps we can see a little more clearly how we got from Jesus preaching about love to the state of the world today.

First, Jesus came to reform the Jewish church. That was his mission; that was the scope of his influence. It took Paul to see that there was a chance to spread the message a little further – and so Christianity started out as an illegal, underground, missionary movement. For the first 300 years, if you were a Christian and caught, you were executed. This is when most of what we think of as the New Testament was written, during a time of fear, a time of persecution.

In 312 AD Constantine took on his co-emperors in a battle called Milvian Bridge. He decided to paint a Christian symbol on his soldier’s shields, maybe get the help of this new God… and he won, becoming the sole emperor of Rome. Overnight Christianity went from an underground movement to the official church of the government.

Now, believe it or not, this lasted forever, let’s say until the late 1960’s. Church was the civic branch of the government. We ran universities and hospitals, we gave money to the poor and organized the food banks; you went to church simply because you were a good citizen… and everyone went…

Most people thought this was the Kingdom Jesus had talked about – we sent missionaries to the far corners of the world and there were Christians everywhere. Governments consulted with the pope, with the ministers, with Billy Graham even before making decisions. Everything was getting bigger and better all the time.

But… as we all know… something was flawed in this… wars continued to erupt, disease continued to ravage the land, poverty just kept getting worse, and people were not really all that loving; especially to the outcasts that Jesus always said should be the focus of our love….

It took the hippies of the 60’s to point out the chink in the armour; but as soon as they drew attention to how the old institutions, like the church, did not actually live up to their claims – everything began to unravel.

The Kingdom of God is like…

Jesus used a lot of images to try and tell us what this peaceable kingdom he was proclaiming was all about – it was like a mustard seed which grows into a huge plant, it was like a vineyard where everyone was treated equally, it was like a banquet to which everyone was invited.

I think of it this way – heaven on earth.

And what Jesus was trying to get across is that heaven is the state of being where we are all loved and valued the way the God would love and value us… His first sermon quoted a prophesy from Isaiah in which the captives are set free, the poor are fed, the debts repaid… That is his idea of the Kingdom of God.

He had no better word – Kingdom made sense… God is the King. A lot of people argue now that the political language, the idea of a king, of a kingdom – none of it makes sense when we are talking about the world Jesus sought to create. Some people change it to the reign of God.  I have even recently heard it called the “Kin-Dom” and place where we are all kin.

I think that is all semantics. I wish I myself had a better word to suggest to you, maybe some of you could think up a poetic way to describe it… But what is it that we are talking about, really?

Well, Jesus went and called together people from all walks of life. He told them that they should look out for each other, that they should even go further than that and find the most vulnerable people in society and help them. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, bathe the sick.

He was not just talking once or twice; he was saying this should be our way of life, our attitude, to put love first. Jesus in fact treated women more like equals than anyone else, talking to them about their lives and their faith, he sat down and ate with the outcasts of society who no one else would talk to, and he stayed at anyone’s house who would ask him in.

He understood that compassion and dignity, that love and equality, would make the world the type of place it was supposed to be… and that is what he tried to get across to his followers.

“The Kingdom of God is among you…” he would say; it is not the future, it is not life after death, it is right here, right now… the question is, can you see it?

Putting it all Together

So I still think it comes back to that moment with the coin; all of what it means to be a Christian summed up in one sentence… whose face is on the coin.

In other words, who is at the centre of what you do – is it money, politics, ambition, greed, the things of this world; or is it love, compassion, patience and hope, the things of God.

I think the Kingdom is as simple and as easy as that – we are called to put love first, to put God first in our lives; and if we can, when we can manage to do that, the world will change.

We begin another year next Sunday in the church. We begin by thinking about how simple things, like a birth in a manger, can make huge differences. It is something to think about.

Creation 2 B

Home: Where Heaven and Earth Meet

note: I wrote this sermon and then really strayed from it... ad libbed more than most. I did not even write the conclusion; and it ended up different in each place I preached it. Not sure where my head was this week... guess I was beginning to get sick - I had the flu for over a week... anyway... here is the basis from which I spoke.

Introduction

Did you ever come home from school to smell cookies baking in the oven? Or have you ever been sitting around on a Christmas Eve looking at the tree and felt really, really content? How about going away on vacation or for work and then first seeing the lights of home on your way back…

There is a feeling, I don’t know if it is nostalgia, or awe, or comfort… but there is a feeling associated with home. I have often moved away from the Maritimes; and any Maritimer who finds themselves in exile will tell you, when you stand on the rocks by the ocean and breathe in that salt air again – it is magical.

I guess I am talking about moments in time where you “feel” at home. I think that means safe, warm, cozy, loved, content…. Sometimes that might be because of the place, sometimes because of what is happening, maybe even because of memories.

In ancient Celtic lore we call these, “thin places” the places where the dividing line between heaven and earth is very thin and you feel almost holy.

I guess if we go back to the beginning, this is what the story of Genesis is all about – there was a time when we felt so at home, so in tune with the world that everything was like this – but then we started turning inward, or getting greedy, or something… and we, over time, have lost that sense of being at home in the world.

Isaiah 55:10-13

For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it. For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress; instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle; and it shall be to the Lord for a memorial, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.

With Kids – Liturgy of Covenanting

Singing in the Rain

There are many places in the Bible where our relationship to the natural world around us is highlighted. Think about Genesis and how we coexist with the animals – or how about the whole Jonah story – where a really big fish acts as his own personal submarine and then when he is too hot in the sun a plant grows up to offer shade. Abraham always had his formal meetings under a huge tree and life in the Kingdom of God is often compared to working in a vineyard.

But there are also passages where the world is alive… like our Isaiah passage. Where mountains and trees join us in dancing and song – where plants grow flowers just because of their love for creation…

I know, it sounds sort of silly from a modern scientific standpoint – we know that they are not alive in the sense that we are… but sitting here at my desk watching the trees rustle in the wind, and the birds play in the berry bush while the sun streams down, I can get, poetically, that the whole of creation is enjoying the beautiful day.

In Native spirituality there was an emphasis on how we were all connected – how the wolf and the deer were my brothers and sisters. Perhaps that was a better way to see it… everything is connected… and everything is “home”

Revelations 21:1-5

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” And the one who was seated on the throne said, “See, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

Love Come Down

We have strange conceptions about heaven. They come from thousands of thousands of years of hardship. Streets paved of gold comes from a sense that we live in poverty; sitting on clouds playing harps from a time when back breaking work was the thing we most wanted to escape from.

Vikings used to say that heaven would be a place where you could battle all day without dying… they loved to fight and hated to die…

For the most part there are very few clues about heaven – and most of what we have imagined is wishful thinking… the clues we do have are mostly about feelings – that it will be a place where there is no more crying, no more pain.

The other interesting thing is the location – Jesus was always convinced we could create heaven on earth… he said things like “the Kingdom of God is among you” and kept trying to teach by example how we might help make the earth what God intended.

I don’t know, human nature being what it is, I think that perhaps we feel it would be easier to “go to” heaven than to “create” heaven. But I also think the Bible is quite clear that the dividing line is not so easy as we would like to believe.

Remember, when God created the world, it was supposed to be perfect. We may have messed it up a bit as we have gone along – it is getting a little old now. But that does not mean there is not a chance for renovation.

So what would you do to make this world a better place? What would you change? I think that we need not look any further than our own lives and our own homes to answer this question – what do you do to make your home perfect? You put in things that make you happy – flowers and paintings and portraits. You create spaces that feel comfortable and inviting…

I’ll leave you to think about it for a minute; we will get back to it with the Gospel…

Luke 7:11-23

Soon afterwards he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went with him. As he approached the gate of the town, a man who had died was being carried out. He was his mother’s only son, and she was a widow; and with her was a large crowd from the town. When the Lord saw her, he had compassion for her and said to her, “Do not weep.” Then he came forward and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, rise!” The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized all of them; and they glorified God, saying, “A great prophet has risen among us!” and “God has looked favorably on his people!” This word about him spread throughout Judea and all the surrounding country. The disciples of John reported all these things to him.

So John summoned two of his disciples and sent them to the Lord to ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” When the men had come to him, they said, “John the Baptist has sent us to you to ask, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’” Jesus had just then cured many people of diseases, plagues, and evil spirits, and had given sight to many who were blind. And he answered them, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”

Heaven on Earth

You might not recognize it at first, but Jesus is doing what any good preacher would do when asked a direct question, quoting scripture…  He is in fact quoting Isaiah… a few different passages of Isaiah but he is weaving all the prophecies together from the Old Testament when Isaiah talked about what it would be like when God restored the earth…

The blind seeing, the lame walking, the sick healed, the dead raised and the poor taken care of.

In a Biblical sense, that is it… that is the fulfillment of the question, what is life supposed to be like…