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The Last Sunday after Pentecost: Christ the King
Almighty and everlasting God, whose will it is to restore all things in thy well-beloved Son, the King of kings and Lord of lords: Mercifully grant that the peoples of the earth, divided and enslaved by sin, may be freed and brought together under his most gracious rule; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. (Proper 29)
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Scripture citation(s): Luke 23:33-43
A Sermon by
The Rev. Preston Gonzalez-Grissom
on
Luke 23:33-43
✛
Sermon for the Feast of Christ the King
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I come to you in the name of the Father of the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
You may not know this, but this is the last Sunday of the year in the church calendar. Next week is Advent, which starts a new year in the church calendar, and we turn our gospel readings from being mostly in St. Luke to mostly in St.Matthew. And we’ll let Luke do the telling this morning. It’s the tale of two kings, and you must choose the one you want.
Like any good story, there’s a background. There’s Israel, and the whole surrounding area is occupied territory. There’s always rumblings of Jewish uprisings, whether it be small spats are full -on threats of overthrowing the Romans. Rome is ruled by King Tiberius, but this king is mostly absent, mentioned only at the beginning in St. Luke’s story, but his lackey pilot does his bidding.
We know that Jesus is presented as another king, a threat to roam from the very beginning. When he’s arrested, he’s given the crown of thorns, and a king’s robe is put on him to mock him. Now we read in the epitaph on Jesus’ cross, this is the king of the Jews.
Those in the story do everything they can to make this king seem unappealing. This is not the king that you would want. I mean, look at him. He’s weak, helpless, beaten, useless to his followers. Some king this is.
Our lectionary drops us right in the climax of Luke’s gospel story. Let’s listen in. Jesus is brought to be crucified at a place called Golgotha, the skull, and he’s brought with two malefactors, or criminals. Death and the threat of death is evil’s most powerful tool in crucifixion is made for such a time as this.
Historian James Edwards puts a point on it. He says every totalitarian regime needs a terror apparatus. And this is theirs. They have perfected the art of pain, but pain is far from the point, according to St. Luke. This is not Mel Gibson’s passion of the Christ with its brutal depictions. Luke’s is different.
It’s clear that crucifixion is not just for pain, but for public embarrassment. Each criminal plastered on the side of a highway, so all could see this is what happens when you come for the king. Once the Romans have made their point, the criminals get disappeared. Can’t have any of them becoming martyrs.
Conservative estimates, based on archaeological records, suggests that Rome crucified at least 300 ,000 people before Jesus, and we don’t know the name of a single one of
them. They were used as a political point, tokens of law and order, and then they were
thrown away.
This Jesus is not the king you want. Luke draws us in deeper. He introduces us to the characters.
First, there’s the people. They show up all over Luke’s gospel. They’re largely not held responsible. They’re just not good or bad. They’re just kind of there, watching, witnessing. I mean, you tell me, what are they supposed to do here?
The king, Rome, is too powerful. If they demand Jesus be taken down, they’ll be stolen and never heard of again, or end up on a cross right next to his. And I know you understand this character, the people. We see so much cruelty and hatred and violence. What are we to do? It’s not always obvious that we, the people, can do much more than watch and witness. For the people, it’s not what they want in their king. This king on a cross, we thought he was the one. That’s the people.
Then there’s the religious leaders. They’re supposed to shepherd the people, and there’s little breadcrumbs in the Old Testament of what they’re supposed to be looking for in a Messiah, but no one expects a king who dies. So if one rose up claiming to be king, and this happened somewhat regularly, if they died, it’s a pretty good way to know they’re a fake. They want a winner. One they know for sure can lead them to victory over Rome or it is not worth it. If you come for the king, you best not miss. He claimed to save others. Let him save himself, this chosen one of God. They mock him. This is not the king they want, these leaders.
Then there’s the soldiers. They’re much closer to the action. They know all too well, the evil of the world, but someone’s got to do it. In Luke’s telling, the soldiers are mostly just doing their jobs. We may say that they’re there for the salary and the healthcare, but their work has made them jaded. They make sport of Jesus’ death, playing rock -paper scissors for his tailored cloak. They join in. Yeah, if you are the king of the Jews, save yourself. Here’s your chalice, my king, drink this vinegar. This is not their king, these soldiers.
All this mocking and all the while the people stand, crying, some in shock, all of them just staring, waiting, watching. And Luke’s gospel narrows to the scene he foreshadows at the beginning. It’s the climax. This is the climax of his gospel. It’s Jesus and it’s two criminals.
The other gospels tell us their crime by saying that they were revolutionaries. But Luke just calls them criminals. One of them joins the crowd of subjects, and we’re told he derided or blasphemed Jesus, save yourself and save us. He’s depicted as one of the mockers, as one who’s blaspheming Jesus, and he’s also suffering unspeakable pain. He’s about to be forgotten. So he cries out. Don’t you want to avoid this? Even for yourself, don’t you care? Surely the Messiah, the real king, would save us.
And I believe this is perhaps the clearest, most honest depiction of the king that we really want.
We want a king who will save us from having to experience pain, who will rise up and make our pain stop. This criminal wants a king who will save him from having to die. And so far, we have the mockers, the religious leaders, the soldiers, the one criminal, they all mock Jesus in unison.
But then there’s this other voice.
Another criminal, he rebukes, saying, you knew the risks of failed revolution. We knew what we signed up for when we started. This Jesus is innocent, and we don’t know what changed in this man. He, too, was a failed revolutionary, hoping for the overthrow of Rome. This is not the ending he expected or the king that he wanted. We don’t know what changed in this man. He still believes in the coming kingdom. He’s still a revolutionary, but his vision of the kingdom and its king have changed. He’s the only one who doesn’t demand to be kept from death. This may not be the king that he wanted, but it is the king that he gets. He realizes this, that he will not be spared from death, but that death is not the end.
In a world where crucifixion was designed to erase you forever, he looks to Jesus and asks for the one thing that Rome will not allow to be remembered. He says, remember me when you come into your kingdom. He sees that in this kingdom, this king Jesus conquers not by killing the enemy, but by defeating the weapon, death itself. Jesus does not take away every moment of pain or suffering. He does not save us from death, but he steals it of its power. Death is no longer our greatest fear, terrible, though it actually is. In Christ, death is now the place where life is changed, not ended, not destroyed. In God’s kingdom, you are not forgotten when you die. You are brought into the king’s courts.
And Jesus replies to the man. Today, you’ll be with me in paradise.
Today. it won’t be too long. You’ll be with me. You’ll be with me. You won’t be alone. In paradise, the peace you look for, it’s coming for you.
This is the king we get. Which king will you choose? The people who are remembered by Jesus, they are the real revolutionaries. You cannot control them. You cannot buy them. They are not deterred by failure or pain. Threats of violence, false bravado, they cannot win them. There are people whose first convert was a criminal on a cross. You cannot entice us with other kings. We will not follow them.
Jesus is not the king that we expected. But he is the king that we got. He is the king that we needed. Our king did not conquer others. He conquered death. And it turns out, that’s the king we wanted all along.
This king lives.
In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
