"Christ and St. Vincent" - Sermon for Christ the King Sunday 2015

Sermon:

Text:

Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ who transforms us to work for peace.

            Today we find ourselves on Christ the King Sunday, a day where we remind ourselves and others that the true ruler of ourselves and this world is not the president, whoever that may be, nor congress, not a king or queen, not an emperor or empress, not a prime minister, not any kind of human head of state, but the ruler is Christ, enthroned not on a golden throne but a wooden cross.

            When we think king we usually think powerful, mighty warrior ruler. And Revelation tells us that to Christ be glory and dominion forever and ever. We think dominion, and understand it to be destructive violent authoritative rule. That is what the Jews of Jesus time understood the coming Messiah to be, a violent powerful ruler to lead armies to overthrow those oppressing them.

            But, That’s not who Christ is.

I saw the movie St. Vincent the other day, if you haven’t seen it I highly recommend it, maybe not for younger kids, it is rated PG-13. It starts with this Old Man Vincent, a drunk, seemingly loser who wastes his money on booze and a pregnant woman of the night. His house is in shambles, front fence broken from him hitting it with his car, when next door moves in a mother and her 5^th grade son Oliver. The mother works for the hospital in the area as a MRI technician which results in many late hours, and Oliver is supposed to go home after school by himself and just do his homework. The first day however, bullies steal his phone and keys from his gym locker leaving him locked out of the house. The only one around is his neighbor and so he heads over, and over time the two of them get to know each other more. At the end of the movie Oliver has a project to describe a saint that he knows in his own life, and he chooses Vincent. I’m not going to spoil reasons why, you have to go watch, but this seemingly drunk, wasteful loser is in his state entirely because he is indeed a current day saint. Our and the worlds idea of who he is has been transformed right in front of our eyes. We assumed he was one way, the world told us he was one way, when in fact he was completely different.

            In our Gospel reading we see Pilate talking to Jesus after the chief priests have handed him over to be crucified. And Pilate doesn’t really know who Jesus is either. He asks Who are you? Are you the king of the Jews like they say? Do you know what that means, how being called a king here would be an insurrectionist move against the Emperor in Rome? How if you did I would have no choice but to execute you?

            We think we understand what’s going on, but really it’s totally different than what we would think. Pilate, Rome, and the Chief Priests assume that if Jesus is king and they kill him, it will stop the problem. That violence will solve the issue. But, Jesus then gives this response. And I think it’s the heart of Jesus’ message to Pilate. “Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.”

            Jesus is an entirely different kind of King than what we would assume, where we think we will see power and might, Jesus offers service and grace. Even our understanding of kingdom is different. I read an article by David Lose, president of Philadelphia Seminary, this week, where he talks about this text. He says:

            “For most of my interpretive life, I’ve read Jesus’ statement as disavowing his connection to this worldly kingdom of which both Pilate and Jesus’ own accusers are a part. [That] Jesus is essentially saying that if this conflict were happening in his kingdom, then indeed his followers would fight, but since it was happening in this other kingdom, a kingdom that cannot keep hold of him, his followers do not get involved.”
 “But not too long ago, a colleague suggested I’d been misreading it entirely, and I’ve come to believe she’s right. What Jesus might be saying, this colleague proposed, is that were he and his followers of this world, then naturally they would use the primary tool this world provides for establishing and keeping power: violence. But Jesus is not of this world and so Jesus will not defend himself through violence. Jesus will not establish his claims by violence. Jesus will not usher in God’s kingdom by violence. Jesus will make no followers by violence. Rather, Jesus has come to witness to the truth, the truth that God is love”

            I think we still see Jesus just like every one saw St. Vincent at the beginning of the Movie, entirely wrong. Seeing things and assuming they mean what we think, thinking that Jesus would work the same way that we work. That the only reason Jesus doesn’t use violence is because this world has no power over him, where in fact Jesus doesn’t use violence because his method of love is more powerful.

           

A favorite quote of mine is from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his book, “Where do we go from here?”

“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”

I look at the world right now and see so much violence and see most saying that the answer to this is just more violence. We can see that spiral Dr. King talks about. We can see people not put Christ as king, but putting their own ignorant understanding and fears as king. We are not acting like Christ, we are acting like the Chief Priests and Pilate, thinking that violence will solve our problems.

We need to be like Christ and St. Vincent who put the needs of others in front of themselves, even if it got them labeled as the neighborhood drunk or killed on a cross.

If we declare that Christ is our King, we have to then ask, what does that make us? Do we declare Christ as king and then act like his subjects, doing what he commands: to turn the other cheek, heal the sick, care for the outcast, welcome in the stranger and refugee. To be Good Samaritans, caring for those who are our enemies.

Or do we declare Christ as King and then move on as if we hadn’t.

Let us pray,

Jesus our king, transform us to see the world like you do, help us to turn swords into plowshares, use our hands to welcome instead of saying no. Help us to overcome our ignorance and fear to see God in the face of the other.

Amen.