CHRIST THE KING,
CHRIST THE CRUCIFIED
Jeremiah 23:1-6; Luke 23:33-43
“Today you will be with me in
paradise.”
It’s puzzling and perhaps somewhat disturbing, isn’t it, to
be celebrating Christ the King yet studying Christ the Crucified on the same Sunday?
How can we do both? How can Christ be
both? Maybe we are being challenged to accept that both Christs are necessary
to know that Christ, and Christ alone, is the reason for our hope and the
promise of our salvation. Both King and Crucified are not to be separated.
It is understandable that we tend to
separate Christ the King and Christ the Crucified because that’s how we study
the life of the Lord—and the human brain likes to compartmentalize. Sunday by
Sunday we move through the scriptures: we hear readings from an Old Testament
text and a New Testament one.
We approach the scriptures this way for
the gift of fullness—both texts are related to each other—though it can be
quite unclear how they complement one another. The parts are put together on
each Sunday to shed whole light on God’s testimony of truth.
Who is this Jesus? Who is this
Christ? I do not think there are enough words in any language to give us a
complete compilation and comprehension of just who our Savior is. Let’s look at
these two texts together and collect our common thoughts of what we do know about him.
In Christ the King, we have a king
·
who
is crucified;
·
Who
forgives even the very people who nailed him to the cross;
·
Who,
while hanging on his cross, grants salvation to a criminal nailed to a cross
next to him;
·
Who
brings a criminal into Paradise with him rather than banishes him from heaven;
·
Who
stands in solidarity with us amid our suffering;
In Christ the Crucified, we find that
·
The
cross of Christ is not just about Jesus’ death.
·
The
death of Jesus was a death that speaks volumes against evil.
·
Like
the criminal, we may receive salvation even before we die.
·
Our
Savior sees our suffering.
·
Our
Savior is willing to hang with us in our suffering.
·
Our
Savior understands our suffering and seeks to redeem it.
As I said, the texts do complement each other. Jeremiah also gives
us an understanding of what God does—and who we are called to be in his Son’s
name. We are
· not to scatter nor destroy the sheep
of God’s pasture;
· not to drive God’s people away from
God;
· to attend to them and their needs,
for we are the hands and feet and voices of the Son;
· to gather the scattered remnant and
bring them into the fold, which is the Church;
· to encourage the ostracized and
oppressed to become faithful and fruitful;
· to become like shepherds and guide
the flock, go looking for the lost ones, to heal their woundedness, and share
the hope we have even when evil is done to them;
· to lead the way out of fear & dismay
by faith in Christ the King and Christ the Crucified.
Earlier this month, the great musician and composer, Leonard
Cohen, died. He composed the amazing song, “Hallelujah.” Mr Cohen clearly had a deep understanding of
life and love. He said, “There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light
gets in.”
We all have cracks in us, don’t we? The cracks in our
personal lives—as well as our life together as Church—we bring many names:
weakness, character deficiency, vulnerability, sinfulness, selfishness, apathy,
let’s begin to think of those “cracks” all of us have as the very same places where
the light of Christ wants to and can shine in, if only we were open to it.
Listen to what can happen in our
lives and, more importantly, the ways our world can get off the cross if we
know Christ the King and Christ the Crucified: If we admit to the cracks in us
rather than keep them a secret, then we can ask Christ’s Light to shine through
those very places.
When we allow ourselves such exposure
not only will others be healed and helped, so will we. As members of Christ’s
body, as members of his Church, we share the grace of Christ the King and
Christ the Crucified.
We belong to Christ, who is King and
Crucified, and his passion mission in our ministry is to:
• Shed light on all that justifies and validates hatred and
violence so we can expose evil for what it is;
• Shed light on those who have been ignored, overlooked and
silenced; and
·
stop
pretending ignorance is acceptable, that prejudice is acceptable; that war is
acceptable.
Don’t be afraid! Let’s look for the cracks in us and around
us; these all are places where the light of Jesus Christ longs to come in. It
is the world’s brokenness that Christ the King grants the promises of his
amazing grace. It is in the world’s great suffering that Christ the Crucified
suffers with us in solidarity because he loves us.
This is how Christ is King and
Crucified at the same time: he knows what it is like to be broken, beaten,
betrayed, accused; he desires to stand in suffering and in solidarity with us.
for his name’s sake. That’s when Christ shines his light of love, forgiveness,
mercy and peace, and he is King.
When Christ walks with us every step
of this hard-won way, he is Christ the Crucified. Christ can do both roles at
the same time. He can do anything and everything. Is it any wonder that every
knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, the Light of
the World?
Let’s carry this light, for this light
is salvation: it belongs to Christ the King, Christ the Crucified…and Christ,
our Everything. Amen.
November 20, 2016
Croydon Congregational Church,
UCC
The Reverend Donna Lee Muise,
Pastor
