King of the Jews

Watch the video version of this sermon here!

Hello and welcome back to another week here on Making Waves! I want to apologize for the messy past few weeks of missed blog posts and the such. Unfortunately, my computer has been at the doctor and it has made editing the video feed a little challenging, but they should be back on schedule after the brief hiccup soon.

We have an incredibly interesting message this Sunday. Today is actually a holiday within the liturgical calendar of the Methodist tradition and several other doctrinal branches. It’s a fairly recent addition to the calendar (in fact, some might remember it’s inception!) and was added to the list in 1925. It’s known as Christ the King Sunday, and it just seemed so fitting for where we are at right now that I had to preach on it  today.

We’ll get to the scripture soon, but first, where did this young holiday get it’s roots? Well, it began in Mexico after the harsh religious persecution suffered by the Christians of that area by their own government. The Roman Catholic Church responded to this persecution by setting up this holiday as a reminder of the overall, overarching power of Christ above any other kings,monarchs, or governments. Now, I know what you’re thinking: Oh, Lord, Nathan is about to regurgitate some kind of Facebook-like nonsense on me about this silly election and it’s events following. Well, yes, and no. I find this holiday so incredibly appropriate for us right now, and it ties in slightly with something election-related, but I promise that I’m not rooting for the candidate you likely think I might be.

Anyway, before I ramble any longer, let’s dive into the Word. I have two passages for this sermon (I know, I’m feeling incredibly risky). The first will be from the Prophet Jeremiah, hear now these words.

“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the Lord. 2 Therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil doings, says the Lord. 3 Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. 4 I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the Lord.

5 The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. 6 In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. And this is the name by which he will be called: “The Lord is our righteousness.”

Jeremiah 23:1-6

And now here these words of Christ  and those who persecuted Him, from the gospel of Luke.

33 When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. [[34 Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.”]] And they cast lots to divide his clothing. 35 And the people stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!” 36 The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, 37 and saying, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!” 38 There was also an inscription over him. “This is the King of the Jews.”

39 One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” 40 But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? 41 And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” 42 Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” 43 He replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

-Luke 23:33-43

Will you pray with me? Dear Heavenly Father, I ask that the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts together be acceptable in Your presence. You are our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.

Now, I told that this sermon had a brief tie-in with the unavoidable  old news of the election on Facebook, but I am starting out with that to get it out of the way. So, during the midst of these past couple years of campaigning, I noticed one picture above all that started out slowly, but by the time the election was just around the corner, I began to see it posted nearly every day by one person or the other.  It was an image of big, bold words that read out:

‘NO MATTER WHAT, JESUS CHRIST IS STILL KING.”

Now, as a good Christian, I got all fired up and rearing behind that, because it is such an awesome claim. But to those of you who were able to attend the final night of our Revival, you know that I also had some difficulty wrestling with this stance. Having Jesus as a King seems like a pretty huge undertaking. I wondered if people who posted such a thing knew what they were really saying by claiming that Jesus is their King. So, I started to think and ponder on this Kingship of Christ and then, dontcha know it! I see on my calendar that a day called Christ the King Sunday is coming up soon. It seemed like more than just coincidence, so I began my research with the question in mind, “What does it mean for Jesus to be King?”

First, I turned to the Old Testament, to the lives of the prophets. Prophets did not have it easy. They were a response from God in the Old Testament days. You see, God didn’t want to have a king to rule over the Israelites, but the Israelites were jealous of other nations that had such brave and courageous kings. They demanded a king, and God chose to oblige, however, knowing that any king chosen by Israel would be imperfect, God sent the prophets to help keep the king and his people in check.

You’ll have to forgive, but I’m about to go a little super-nerd on you all right now. If you know anything about Spiderman and power, then you know this famous quote from good ol’ Uncle Ben before his climactic death, “With great power comes great responsibility.” Well, this is especially true of a king. When these kings ruled over Israel, they took on a huge undertaking. Some kings did better than others, and some kings did downright awful things to undermine the people.

In this great passage from the book of Jeremiah, we hear this prophet basically telling the people how terrible some of these kings have been. He calls out these horrid men, who seek only to divide and disseminate the people of Israel (the “sheep”) and tells them that a day will come where this reign of awful kings will come to an end.

Jeremiah inspires the people by telling of a prophecy of a man who will descend from the lineage of David and come to the earth to be it’s rightful king and Savior. Jeremiah hits all the keywords we like to hear right? This Savior will be wise, righteous, He will  execute justice and provide safety and security.

Spoiler Alert!! This “guy” who is supposed to the foretold Savior? A little known fella by the name of Jesus. So, this Jesus guy is supposed to come into the world and fix all of the problems. He is supposed to be wise as can be, He will execute justice, He will  be righteous and He will provide safety and security. My goodness, what an incredibly blessing this Jesus guy must be. Surely he will come break down the walls of the temple with his high-military-grade tank, swinging a sword in one hand and a minigun in the other hand. He will be taking out demons on one side and giving out safety and security to the other side.

Then we fast forward a bit. Jesus has come to the people. But, He didn’t bring the tank. He didn’t  come wielding His sword. No,  instead we catch up with Jesus in this passage as He hangs on this cross between two thieves, murderers, liars. Jesus was supposed to this Chuck Norris-esque kung fu master, but instead He is about to die.

But then you look above Jesus’ head and you see a sign. In grotesque letters of mockery and jaded cynicism, the sign reads:

“THE KING OF THE JEWS”

So, what am I supposed to get out of this? We’re about to celebrate the birth of Christ, the welcome of the light into the world, and this final week before Advent, we look at the bitter and ugly death of Christ. Not even in an effort to talk about resurrection, just talking about the death?

.

Well, it’s more than just death, folks. It’s a calling. You see, we still desire a king. We are no better than the Israelites of the Old Testament. We crave to be ruled by someone. Which, of course, is not a problem until it becomes a priority over Christ. But sometimes Christ just isn’t that kind of kick-butt mentality that we want. We want our king to be like the Savior of the Old Testament. We want someone who comes out kicking and screaming. We want someone who wields a sword in one hand and a minigun in the other. We want someone abrasive and tough as nails.

Christ isn’t the King that we want.

If we had it our way, then Christ would be played by Bruce Lee or Liam Neeson. But Christ is the King that carries His own cross, and, in His own dying words, He calls out to the sinners around Him and forgives them and says that they are saved. That’s the King which we serve. We serve a King who is the King of Humility. He calls us then to pick up our own crosses and live our lives as He did: confident in the grace and love of God, and without fear of death because of eternal life.

There is no doubt that Christ is most definitely King, but is He YOUR King? It’s time to take up your cross and follow His ways. Christ may not be the King that we want, but He is more than we could ever deserve.