CHRIST THE KING

(End of Year ‘A”)

Matthew 25: 31-46 (Two mini sermons in verse)

Ephesians 1: 15-23

Ezekiel 34: 11-16, 20-24 (Sermon 1: “The Dream King”)

Psalm 100

PREPARATION

We have come to worship;

We have come in the name of Christ the King.

The joy of the Lord Jesus be with you all!

And also with you!

Today ends the Christian year which began in Advent last December. We end it not with a whimper but a bang! We celebrate our faith in Christ Jesus, with a great tidal wave of praise which began at dawn in islands of the Pacific, has reached our shores, and will move west and sweep around the planet.

We are a small part of that wave. Let us rejoice in the paradoxical glory of Christ, our only true King, in whom there is no shadow or darkness, but a light wherein the humble and poor make walk secure for ever and ever!

Around the world this day, the universal church celebrates

the “THE REIGN OF CHRIST”

Christ Jesus, friend of the poor, the meek and the merciful,

has been enthroned above all authority and power

in this world and in the world that is to come.

Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth,

serve the Lord with gladness

come into his presence with singing.

God has placed everything under Christ’s wounded feet,

appointed the one who wore a crown of thorns

as the supreme head of the church, his body.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving,

come into his courts with praise.

Give thanks and praise his loving name!

PRAYER OF APPROACH

Most holy God, by your Spirit encouraging us, and the love of Christ enabling us, may we worship you with the enthusiasm born of true love. We join our voices with the millions who this day praise the name of Jesus from every nation on earth, and with the great host of heavenly souls whose praise and love fills the universe and flows far beyond all time and space. Glory be to you forever! Through Christ our King.

Amen!

CONFESSION AND ASSURANCE

Friends, this church building is like a hostel for royal pilgrims. Let us bring our errors and our sins before the Keeper of this place.

Let us pray.

Most holy Friend, we come into this hostel of Christ our King bearing the baggage of our long journey through life. We bring hopes and fears, victories and defeats, love and indifference, generosity and selfishness.

We place the lot before you, and pray that by your sharp wisdom you will sort out the clean from the soiled, the healthy from the infected, the true from the false, and the treasures from the rubbish. Please forgive and save us, great lover of the foolish and the weary.

Assist us to let go of things we have prized yet which have misled or corrupted us. Help us to find new delight in things we have treated as common yet which are truly beautiful in your sight. Let us restock our meagre resources with the gifts of your Spirit, and fix set our eyes again on the humble King who walks with wounded feet along the road we must take. In his name and to your glory, we so pray.

Amen!

FORGIVENESS

Sisters and brothers, our King is unlike any other; he comes not to be served but to serve and give his life as a ransom for many. You are among those who have been ransomed. Take up your freedom and live it joyfully and lovingly, for your King wants to share his gift with you.

Amen!

PRAYER FOR CHILDREN

Dear God,

here on earth

super stars and kings

live in mansions and palaces

and boss other people around.

But Jesus, our true King,

comes among us like a friend,

eating with ordinary people,

welcoming little kids like us,

and even washing his disciples’ feet.

Help us to get smart

by copying Jesus,

not following all those other

big-headed jerks.

Amen!

PSALM 100

Let the round world spin with joy!

Get with it and serve the Lord Jesus,

come singing into his presence!

Know that he is from God and of God.

God made us to be Christ’s people;

we are his friends and he our Pastor.

Walk through his gates with thanksgiving!

Enter his holy places with praise

and give thanks to our Lord’s name!

Only our God is authentically good;

Christ’s love stays firm for ever;

he keeps faith with all generations!

© B.D. Prewer 2001

JUDGEMENT

When Love sits on the throne,

issues become most clear,

pillars of rectitude

may well have cause to fear.

Then puzzled souls will say:

`“But I did nothing false

I kept religion pure

and bothered no one else.”

“My kids have all done well–

something a lot can’t say–

charity starts at home

and I did it my way.”

Alas, hell’s not confined

to those who break the law,

for those who keep hands clean

often betray God’s poor.

My enemy at work?

A beggar at my gate?

There is not much to chose

‘tween apathy and hate!

© B.D. Prewer 1998

COLLECT

God of strange reversals and healing mysteries, we thank you for giving us a Divine King who has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. Enable us, when we are confronted by the vulnerability and suffering of others, to make those choices that will keep us in tune with your generous love, and thereby create small colonies of heaven where you are truly worshipped and glorified. For your name’s sake.

Amen!

SERMON 1: THE DREAM KING

[Note: although the following is congruent with both the Gospel for today

and the O.T. reading from Ezekiel, it is not an exposition but a reflection

on “Christ the King.]

I had this dream-vision thing. A dream that give this sermon the title: “The Dream King.”

THE DREAM

I was in a city like my own yet also like all other cities. The people spoke a different language but that was okay for I seemed to speak it well myself. This pleased me immensely and I wallowed in my linguistic skill, because I have always envied those who were fluently multi-lingual.

It was a dull morning, heavy cloud. There seemed to be a high level of excitement among the citizens. I sought out the reason. They said that the King was coming and would sit in majesty in the cathedral. Like any tourist, I thought my luck was in. I patted my camera and joined the throng, making my way towards the tall towers. It seemed I was fortunate to arrive when I did; the enormous building was already almost filled. Ten minutes later and I might not have got in. I found a place among some of the common, riff raff- with the mob near the back, a long way from where the action was to take place.

We waited patiently and I tried to take in the scene. Up the front near the high altar there was an immense golden throne studded with rubies. Seated in the transept were many bishops, archbishops and cardinals in all their finery.

Nearby in the front rows, sat some brilliantly robed and wigged judges. Behind them was an array of parliamentarians, complete with the Speaker of the House in full gear. A self important fellow was there who looked like a President or maybe Prime Minister, and a Lord Mayor complete with golden chain. After these VIP’s came a parade of what I assume were leading civic and business men, dressed in the best Italian suits, with their wives resplendent in designer outfits from Paris and wearing a magnificent assortment of hats. One hat reminded me of a beach umbrella.

Further back, other immaculately dressed people were filling most of the body of the church. Finally, close to the rear of the building were the obvious commoners, and right near me a large mob that looked as if it were the first time they had ever been in a church, let alone a cathedral. Some were in T-shirts and wore thongs. A few had bare and grimy looking feet. More than a few looked as if they could do with a hot bath and plenty of soap.

As the time arrived for the arrival of the Great King, excitement built up. Exactly on the hour a priest, maybe he was the Dean, asked that we all kneel in readiness for the arrival of his most Serene Majesty. We knelt and waited.

And waited, and waited. Nothing was happening. I eased myself up a little from the kneeling position. I saw the Dean lift his head, look at his watch and fidget. One of the bishops whispered to another. A woman with an extravagant hat adjusted it. A few of the commoners at the back near me giggled. We waited. My knees were aching.

Then one more common fellow arrived late, squeezed his way in from the back and knelt among the riff raff. An over-painted middle aged women, whom I had noted as a likely sex industry worker, well past her ‘use by date,’ made room for him. I’m sure some of the other fellows around the new arrival were the ones whom I’d earlier noticed smoking a “joint” in a side alley. And some young women just in front of the latecomer with their short skirts, seamed stockings and heavy make up were most certainly “on the game.” One bloke just to the left of them looked like a pimp. His companion with flattened nose and face may have been an ex boxer, now an enforcer? We waited and waited. I suppose the highest royalty are entitled to be late whenever they wish.

Outside the sun had evidently come out. One ray of golden light from a clerestory window

penetrated down to the rear of the cathedral and fell on the common fellow who had come in late; that chap now kneeling amongst the unsavoury types. For a few seconds, maybe a minute, he was suffused with radiance.

The middle aged tart smiled at him and he smiled back. In that radiance I noticed that this latecomer had heavy scars just below his ankles. I edged sideways to get near him, to the annoyance of some the other worshippers. I reached his side as the ray of light left him and fell on the woman. Kneeling there I looked at his hands; they were folded on his chest and holding, of all things, a wreath of thorns. His wrists, like his feet, bore purple scars.

Could it really be him?

I whispered: “Friend, what are you doing here? And what is it with that ugly wreath?”

He smiled and softly replied “I am here in majesty among my own people. And these thorns are to remind those who would follow me of my true crown and true throne.”

I felt immense awe tingle through my body from the back of my head to my heels. I gasped: “My Lord and my God.”

The pro near me grinned and whispered: “Good on ya luv. Bit slow, but. Ya took a while but ya finally got it huh?” With that she shed tears on his feet and washed them with her hair. An usher on duty was furious at what he saw as our utter irreverence. He beckoned three other ushers and they came and hustled the prostitute, the man with the ugly wreath, and me out of the cathedral.

The dream seemed to wane at that point. Yet as I awoke I remembered standing outside with the middle-aged prostitute, and heard her saying to me: “Luv, ya one of us now; ya know what I mean?” I nodded and answered: “Yep! I think I do know where I really belong and to whom I belong.”

THIS PERSON JESUS

I now realise that in my dream-vision thing, maybe I was seeing Christ the King separating the sheep from the goats?

We name Jesus of Nazareth our Teacher and Master, but he comes not to be served but to serve and give his life for others.

We name him the Judge of the living and the dead, but how can it be that the judge himself ends up in the prisoner’s dock and is sentenced?

We name him our King, but his kind of sovereignty makes nonsense of our elaborate expectations of royal majesty.

We name him Immanuel, God-With-Us, but his Divinity is unlike anything the religious zealots want us to believe in.

This person Jesus breaks all definitions, and throws us into a paradox which bluffs the worldly wise. Yet he is often intuitively understood by the beggar and the homeless, or by little children, and by sinners who stand at the back of the temple and beat their breasts with shame.

The powerful and the rich, and those who believe they were born to rule others, cannot abide such irreligious nonsense. They want to give Christ a make-over, change his image into a gorgeously robed Emperor, wearing the imperial signet ring, a jewel-encrusted crown, and looking imperiously down from his throne. They expect him to judge from a lofty height those lesser breeds that will not pull their forelock and say to the elite classes: “Yes Sir! No Sir. Thank you very much Sir for allowing me to clean your shoes.” They want their own type of Christ (a haughty, pompous judge) to set the non-conformist mob aside, and like in the parable of separating goats from sheep, consign them to the scrap heap.

But this Jesus is himself the quintessential nonconformist. He tells stories about the hungry and thirsty and the stranger and the sick, and those shivering without clothing, and the prisoners in gaol.

He says we will find the King there with them, and that when we respect them, care for them, befriend them, we will have been truly worshipping his true majesty. He says his judgement does not work from a lofty height, but from the lowest point; being with us in the mass of humanity and encouraging us to make the hard choices.

As I reflect on the parable of the sheep and the goats, I come up with this fearful possibility: The initial gap between those who part to the right of Jesus and those who consign themselves to the left, is thin– as thin as the difference between worshipping the Christ of the Gospel stories or worshipping our preferred image of him. But in time that gap widens into a monstrous gulf.

Jesus us has emphatically told us where the King is to be found in all his glory. “Inasmuch as you do it unto the least of these my sisters and brothers, you do it unto me.” I picture the King with the wounded hands and feet, still carrying his offensive thorn crown with him to remind us who he is, and where he is to be found today.

May God help us all.

SERMON 2:

* Below are two mini-sermons in verse.

YOU CALL ME KING?

When I was hungry you gave me food;

when thirsty, you gave me drink;

when I was a stranger you gave me a home,

when I was naked, you clothed me,

when I was ill, you came to my help,

when in prison, you visited me.

King is your word, not mine.

I am the hungry crowd

weary and underfed,

I am the willing boy

sharing five rolls of bread.

King is your word, not mine.

I am the thirsty rabbi

waiting by Jacob’s well.

I am that thrilled woman

with the good news to tell.

King is your word, not mine.

I am the prodigal son,

stranger in foreign place.

I am the waiting parent

full of prodigious love.

King is your word, not mine.

I am the mugged traveller,

left naked by the road.

I am the good Samaritan

ready to bear the load.

King is your word, not mine.

I am the crying leper

outcaste to lonely lands.

I am the wounded nurse

with healing in my hands.

King is your word, not mine.

I am the condemned man,

alone in prison cell.

I am the sinners’ friend

sharing the deepest hell.

King is your word, not mine.

When I come in glory

my sheep will all know me;

branded with my own love

which sets the captive free.

King is your word, not mine.

If you must give me a title,

before you find some rest,

let king describe your servant

and that will serve you best.

Ó B.D.Prewer 2004

THE SON OF MAN

Matthew 25:46 & 27: 11

King is what you call me.

The son of man has come

not for power or money,

but as a true servant

and give my life for many.

King is what you call me.

Wild birds have their warm nests

and the fox has its bed,

but I have nowhere safe

to rest my weary head.

King is what you call me.

I am the good shepherd

well known ‘round Bethlehem;

my sheep know my own voice,

I give my life for them.

King is what you call me.

I show love to the gracious,

give the world to the meek,

joy to the persecuted,

and peace to all who seek.

King is what you call me.

I sail with fishermen,

teach the unteachable,

break my bread with beggars,

touch the untouchable.

King is what you call me.

My realm is not this world,

for me the last comes first,

the blind shall see the light,

the deaf shall hear the best.

King is what you call me.

For those who starve and thirst,

for strangers who’re afraid,

the naked slave or felon,

all debts will now be paid.

King is what you call me.

No man robs me of life,

I give it up with love

and with my bloody wounds

I heal the human race.

King is what you call me.

Golden thrones shall totter

your proud kingdoms shall fall

but my spirit and truth

shall become all in all.

Ó B.D.Prewer 2004

THANKSGIVING

King of the poor to whom belongs the kingdom of heaven,

we thank you for your mercy