November 20, 2011 – Matthew 25:31-46

Matthew 25:31-46

Christ Reigns through You

Christ the King Sunday – November 20, 2011

First Lutheran Church – Winnipeg, MB

 

I was at a mission conference this week and there was a lot of reflection around this Gospel text.

One speaker reminded us of a well-known story about Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

It was the custom of her religious community of nuns to go and find the poorest of the poor

            who were dying in the streets and bring them back to provide them with comfort and

                        heal them if they could.

One day, Teresa found an elderly man lying unconscious in the massive train station, dying.

He had wounds that were infected and he desperately needed care,

although it was unclear how much longer he would live.

Teresa took him home with her, where she cleaned his wounds,

prayed with him and just sat with him and held his hands.

He regained consciousness just long enough to look at her and say, “Thank you.”

And shortly after that, he died.

That evening as she was debriefing the day with the other sisters, she said,

“I had the privilege today of caring for the dying wounded Christ.”

Teresa recognized who it was she was tending: Christ himself.

 

Jesus tells us that much today.

Those who are commended in the story as having been faithful are those who tended the ill,

            the hungry, the sick, the poor, the imprisoned, the excluded.

“As you did it to the least of these, my brothers and sisters, you have done it to me.”

His brothers and sisters: The poor are Jesus’s family. The excluded are Jesus’s family.

The sick are Jesus’s family.  The imprisoned are Jesus’s family.  The dying are Jesus’s family.

On the cross, Jesus has identified so closely with their suffering that from now on and forever

            his life is intimately entwined with theirs.

Jesus is a king, yes, but a strange one.

He’s the kind of king who takes off the mantle of glory, sets aside his majesty,

            leaves his throne, dissociates from his army and weaponry and goes to simply be

                        with his people in need.

You are not alone in your need: Christ is with you.

This is not a king who reigns in heavenly splendour far from you in your suffering.

This is not a king who reigns in majestic glory far from you in your need.

This is a king who has taken on our flesh, our suffering, even our sinfulness in order to be

            very, very close to us.  Because that’s what love does.

This is our God.  Jesus is present with us.  That is good news.

 

At this conference I was at we sang a lot of praise songs.

A lot of praise songs.

And a lot of them had as their theme that God is king.

Well, okay: they all pretty much had as their theme that God is king.

And that is true: God is reigning and all things are in God’s hands.

Ultimately, we are in the hands of a gracious God.

We celebrate Christ the King Sunday on the last day of the church year for a reason:

            to remind ourselves that in the end, at the end and fulfillment of all things,

                        there is not destruction, there is not violence, there is not terror:

There is fulfillment of God’s intentions for this world and every person in it.

There is healing, there is graciousness, there is mercy, there is love, there is grace.

Even in death there is resurrection.

Everything will come to a good end: Christ and his graciousness stand at the end of history.

As Julian of Norwich wrote 700 years ago:

all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.

Yes, that is bad news for injustice; yes, that is bad news for apathy.

Yes, that is bad news for greed.  Yes, that is bad news of sickness. 

Yes, that is bad news for death.

Because these things will not be tolerated in Christ’s reign of grace.

But that is good news for us.

Yes: Christ is reigning.  Yes, Christ stands at the end of history. 

Yes, nothing is greater than the love of God.

But the even better news, the really great news, is that Christ is reigning now.

Jesus invites us to make nothing else in our lives as important as his love right now.

Those praise songs I was singing? They make Christ the king seem pretty distant to me.

Way up in the clouds somewhere.  Way off.  Maybe standing only at the end of history.

But the Gospel story today won’t let Jesus remain only there.

Mother Teresa knows exactly where Christ is right now: with his brothers and sisters,

            the poor, the sick, the excluded, the vulnerable, the dying.  With you.

We can serve this king now, by serving them and by serving one another.

 By being present – I mean personally present, in friendship and hospitality and grace –

with them and with one another in our suffering, in our trials, in our distress.

Christ is personally, powerfully present when we minister.

 

There’s something really wondrous happening in the ministry of First Lutheran Church.

We don’t only write cheques and send them away to other ministries anymore.

I have noticed that our own ministries are becoming very personal.

Our caregivers ministry I think was on the ground floor of this,

            our ministry to our shut-in members.

But more recently this personal kind of ministry has been extended.

At food bank where we place food into the hands of the poor and where

            there’s time to actually sit and befriend the vulnerable of our neighbourhood.

In our food hamper ministry, where each Christmas we get to place food into the very hands of

            families in need in our neighbourhood.

In our Urban Meal Team ministry, where our members serve the poor regularly with hot meals,

meals at which the guests actually get to sit and be served, something that rarely happens.

It really happens at our Kids Klub Free Drop-In ministry, where our own young adults

befriend and are present with the children at risk of this neighbourhood,

a ministry that is continuing on Saturday mornings this winter.

Through these people Christ’s reign of grace is being extended into the world.

Christ is present through these people.  Through this ministry.  Through you. 

That is wondrous. That is miraculous.  That is something to give thanks for.

Christ’s future fulfillment of all things is wondrously being made present here,

            in this neighbourhood, in the present time, through you.

 

This day – Christ the King Sunday – is a day to consider what we have to offer this king.

This king who leaves everything to be with us. 

This king who leaves majesty behind to shepherd us . 

This king who prefers shepherding to kinging.

This king who gives us his life and his love,

who will give us his life and his love again at his table this morning.

What could we possibly offer in response to that?

The theologian and writer Brian MacLaren recently told a story on his blog about

            returning to his home congregation after being a keynote speaker at a conference.

During the offering, as the offering plates were being passed up and down the pews,

            he noticed a plate being passed in front of a child with mild mental disabilities,

                        a child whose family has faithfully attended worship for years.

On this day, something clicked.

As it passed in front of him the child took the offering plate in both hands and appeared to be  

            attempting to bang his head repeatedly into the bottom of the plate,

                        behaviour that baffled everyone until they realized what the child was doing:

                                    he was trying to put himself in the offering plate.

He realized that what he needed to give the one who was with him in his distress,

            was himself, his whole self.

May we all be found that faithful.

Remember that the condemned goats in this morning’s Gospel were not bad people.

They aren’t condemned because they engaged in sexual immorality or anything else.

They simply did nothing when they could have done something for sisters and brothers in need.

The worst thing you can do, Jesus seems to be saying, is nothing.

May we, on the other, be found as faithful as the child who sought to give his whole self.

As you return your pledge forms and put them on the offering plate this morning,

think about that.

When a member of council invites you to consider offering your gifts in some other way,

            in some ministry of this church, think about that.

If you have a fleeting or a nagging thought about how you’d like to serve or

some ministry you’d like to start here, think about that.

May we all be found to be as faithful as that child.

Christ is reigning.  Christ is present. 

His kingdom is breaking into this world in personal, grace-filled ways –

through you through the ministry of this congregation.

So together let us say, “Amen.”

 

Pastor Michael Kurtz

Sermons

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