NOVEMBER 24, 2013 LUKE 23: 33-43 REIGN OF CHRIST When they reached the place called The Skull, they crucified him there, and the criminals with him, one on his right and the other on his left. Jesus said Father forgive them; they do now know what they are doing They divided his clothes among them by casing lots. The people stood looking on, sand their rulers jeered at him: 'he saved others, now let him save himself, if this is God's Messiah, his chosen'. The soldiers joined in the mockery and came forward offering him their sour wine. 'If you are the king of the Jews, they said, 'save yourself.' there was an inscription above his head, which ran: 'This is the King of the Jews.' One of the criminals who hung there with him taunted him: 'Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself, and save us.' but the other rebuked him: 'have you no fear of God? You are under the same sentence as he. For us it is plain justice, we are paying the price for our misdeeds; but his man has done nothing wrong.' and he said 'Jesus, remember me, when you come into your kindom' Jesus answered: 'I tell you this: today you will be with me in paradise.' Today is called Reign of Christ Sunday. It marks the end of the church year. The church year, if you're new to it, is the way the church marks time: instead of January to the end of December, the church marks time from Advent (4 weeks before Christmas) to Advent, with this Sunday as our New Year's Eve, in a way. I like the church year...it tells the story of Jesus but it also echoes the seasons of a life of faith: times of waiting and longing, times of new birth and rejoicing, times of growing and teaching and learning, times of suffering and grief and calling out to the empty sky why why why have you forsaken me times of inexplicable joy and life that defies logic and the worst the world can do, and then, mostly, times of just plain living the best way we know how in an ordinary human way. That's what the church year is intended to echo and affirm. And today we come to the end of the year, because next week - NEXT WEEK!- it starts all over again with the waiting...the longing...the preparing...next week is Advent One. But for today we sum it all up with a celebration that names and claims Jesus as the
everything. The beginning and the end...the reason and the essence of everything we know and hold most dear. This is the day we name Jesus Lord of all. Reign of Christ Sunday. We've also chosen this as communion Sunday and part of our breaking open the word will be in the sacrament, where it's the action, not the words, that speaks our joy. Two things about today seem right to consider at this moment. First, the history of this day. The church didn't always celebrate ROC Sunday in fact, it was brought into being by the Roman Catholic church in the 1920s. So it's very new, really. As I understand it, this is what brought it about: It was the 1920's in Europe. The war was over, people singing the European equivalent of Happy Days are Here Again. Along with that, two things were happening: because of the horrors of the war, many faithful people simply stopped believing. Could not bring themselves to believe in a God who would allow or worse condone what had happened in that war. There was a crisis of faith. Second, there was an alarming rise of nationalism. Countries' borders being redefined but also a growing sense of drawing lines to keep others out defining ourselves as nations over against others. The beginning of the rattling of the sabres that would lead within a very short time to a second war. Into this atmosphere, Pope says we need something to remind us of the truth. We need to be called back -or forward we need to be called to a deeper, wider, truer vision than what is going on in the world right now. We need something to remind us that God is God of the WORLD - not of individual nations over and against others. Something to hold out to us our unity, and our creator as something other than a tribal lord who wants us to destroy others in His name. So: the Pope, and the Roman Catholic church propose that the world (they assume that the world is Christian, at this point) the church proposes that the world mark the end of the church year by a feast a feast proclaiming in worship that everything we treasure, everything that those soldiers fought and died for, everything that is important in the world is summed up in Jesus. AND they hold him up in this way. Not a conquering hero not a mighty warrior, tribal bellicose god, not a victorious general or powerful CEO but a convicted criminal suffering on a cross, offering life to those with whom he suffers
this is the Ruler of the Universe, the church says. This is what it's about this is WHO it's about. In the midst of a world that continues to define itself, define worth by wealth and power, in a world where we are encouraged to think more is better, and that for me to win you must lose In a world where countries still sabre rattle and worse the church offers a vision of God - A God who is manifest in the life and death of a man whose message of all inclusive acceptance, and whose line smashing, border demolishing, earth shaking message of one world, one God, one message of life whose message of love brought him to this. A God who suffers with us who is not in an armchair sending the troops to battle but is there in the battlefield suffering with them, weeping for the foolishness of the people who were meant to live in peace a God who created the world who said to the angels what about I give them a world so beautiful it would break your heart, with water and air and land and animals and other humans. What if I gave them sunsets and waterfalls and hugs and brains to discover the wonder of it all what if I gave them the ability to love and support and bless one another and what if I gave them life, and the power to choose it... do you think they could do anything with that? A God who weeps for what we've done with is, and never ever loses faith that we can, and we will, and that we will be there in paradise and make of this world a paradise as God intended it to be. THIS IS GOD. God has not abandoned us - but rather we who have abandoned God by our ill-conceived efforts to limit and tame and corral Divine power for our own ends. Why do bad things happen? Where is God when people are suffering? Right here - suffering too. If you have lost your faith because bad things happen... take a look at this. This IS our faith. That this is not the end. That this is the exact place where we see God most clearly. Not
to glorify suffering, not that. We've had too much of that as well. Not to glorify it but to say it is part of life, part of faith and is never EVER the end. I want to say too, that in the 1920s, the world was still small enough in some ways that to say Jesus is Lord, Jesus Reigns over all the world could still be said without having to think too hard about the implications of that for other faiths. Now, it's different. May I say this: for us to say Jesus is Lord over all the earth is to say two things: first that for us, because of our place and time of birth, because of our culture and because of what has brought us here, Jesus is the way we see God most clearly. And that for us, He is the very presence of God among us. To say that is not to say that others do not experience the fullness of God in their own ways. Does that make sense to you? We do not have to pull back on our understanding of Jesus and our commitment to him and our celebration of his presence and call we don't have to tone that down, in order to live in a world where others experience God through different channels. We are all at our very best when we hold fast to what brings us to the Light, and honour those who do so differently. We do no one any favours by not being fully who we are. Two examples at least this is the way it makes sense to me. I can say to you clearly and strongly and without question that Nathaniel MacIntosh was and still is the man for me. The only man for me. That does not mean that I dismiss or belittle the fact that for you, it is someone else. The Principle we are affirming is the principle of committed love that we have found, each in our own ways. Does this make sense? One more example and I'm pretty sure I've told you this before because it is one of those moments that changed me in a pretty profound way. It was Vancouver School of Theology days and we had a weekend conference on Jewish Christian relations. It was intense, to say the least. We concluded with a service of worship at which we were to rise and say the apostles' creed. WHY I have no idea, but there it is. Rabbi Shalomi was at the front of the church with the others in leadership and so we stand to repeat the CHRISTIAN creed and I found myself thinking, what is he going to do? He doesn't believe these things...perhaps he'll simply stand with us and be
silent as we proclaim our faith. We began. I believe in God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth Rabbi Shalomi is saying it with us and then he goes on with us and in Jesus Christ, his only son, their Lord... He was saying our creed with us as if to say I do not believe these things but I am happy to stand with you my brothers and sisters, and happy that you do believe them. It was profound. It was a model of how I have tried to live ecumenically and also with other faiths. Let's turn once again to the gospel. We see Jesus here on the cross, a thief on his left and one on his right. One taunting him and one reaching out in desperation for meaning in this suffering and for assurance that this is not the end. That is EXACTLY where God is found every day. In the midst of pain and surrounded by desperation of belief on one hand, the desperation of not believing on the other. In the midst of the world with all its pain and its glory. This is the Holy One. The church has chosen this picture of the one we name as Lord for this feast. And we gather at this table, all of us together we're different from one another and we're different from how we were yesterday and we will be different than that tomorrow. We gather in our imperfection and in our pain; at the corner of belief and unbelief - kind of like a single instrument, able to make one tone and we begin to let our sound be heard and others join in and it's not a pretty sound, at first, and it takes work and patience to hear the beauty but in time the chord is resolved and we feast together the paradise that Jesus promised on the cross is here among us. The Reign of Christ. Jesus, the Ruler of the World. These are only words, temporary shelter for the truth that we experience as we live in his way and learn of his love. Words can only point to the truth we enact here at this table I'll close with the words that the writer of Colossians reaches for to express the inexpressible.
May God strengthen you in glorious might, with power to meet whatever comes, with fortitude, patience and joy; and give thanks to God, who has made you fit to share the inheritance of God's people in the realm of light. God rescued us from the domain of darkness and brought us away into the life of Jesus, in whom our release is secured and our sins forgiven. Jesus is the image of the invisible God; his is the primacy over all created things. In him, everything in heaven and on earth was created, not only things visible but also the invisible: orders of thrones, sovereignties, authorities and powers, the whole universe has been created through him and for him. And he exists before everything, and all things are held together in him. He is, moreover, the head of the body, the church. He is its origin, the first to return from the dead, to be in all things alone supreme. For in him, the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. Through him, the whole universe is reconciled to God making peace through the cross. To reconcile all things, whether in heaven or on earth, through him alone. May you dwell in the Spirit of Love that is Jesus feast on him and find peace. Amen.