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Foundry United Rev. DeeAnne Lowman, Associate Pastor |
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Law and Order Sunday, November 26,
2006 |
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John 18: 1-10
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Today is Christ the King Sunday, the last Sunday on
the liturgical calendar. Next week, we
begin the anticipation of a baby born to humble beginnings, and the stories
of those who were seeking the infant king.
But for today, we are subject to the story of Jesus’ arrest. Why do we need to hear this, as we prepare
ourselves for the rush and hustle of the holiday season, which began at 12:01
on Friday morning with the broadcast of the first Christmas carol? Why can’t we just head right to the babe in
a manger, and skip this painful part of the story, at least until Palm Sunday
and the week before Easter? There is
something we need to remember before we charge into the seasons of Advent and
Christmas. The infant king grew to be
a man we all have decided to follow, so let’s remember his earthbound end
before we celebrate his star-blessed beginning. The arrest of Jesus at the I have
often wondered what that was about.
What force, what energy could have had such power as to back them up
and knock them on the ground? Well,
John would have his readers believe it was the Holy Spirit, sent to perhaps
test Jesus and see if he was really willing to go the distance. After all, with the guards on the ground,
couldn’t he have escaped? Sure he
could have, especially since one of his guys had a sword with him. He didn’t
try it, and waited for them to get up.
Then he asked them a second time who they were looking for. Again, they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus said, “I told you that I am he.” So again, he had an opportunity to deny who
he was to save himself. Instead, he
was concerned for the others in the garden. This is
not exactly the kind of king anyone was looking for that night. Tells
everyone in a loud clear voice who he is… TWICE, doesn’t escape when he has
the chance, and yelled at one of his men for cutting off the ear of one who
was sent to arrest him – this isn’t the kind of king that the people of God
were hoping would lead them out of despair and raise them up out of where
they were. But it was the kind of king
that Jesus was sent to become. Jesus
did have some characteristics of the kind of king people wanted. He took great pains to address the
socio-political issues of the day:
hunger, segregation, poverty, illness, and gender bias to name a
few. Jesus was political, but he
wasn’t a politician. To be part of the
faithful politic of the day Jesus would have been expected to ignore those
who needed help, and he didn’t seem to have that in him. Suffering within the
community was the responsibility of the community as far as Jesus was
concerned. There
is a great deal of scholarship to suggest that while Jesus represented an
on-average peaceful presence, the people who followed him may have had more
militarist motives in mind. We know from this passage that Simon Peter was
brandishing a sword, and he used it to cut off the ear of one of the guards
sent to arrest him. Only one of the
versions of this story that’s found in all four gospels – actually has Jesus
healing the ear of the guard. (It was
Luke the Physician…not too much of a surprise.) Jesus may not have approved of such
weapons, but he didn’t send away someone who didn’t disguise the existence of
them. Just
like those who followed him then, I have a tremendous urge to
compartmentalize Jesus into the kind of king that works for me. I want a king who is all about taking on
the systems and political powers of the day so that things turn out the way I
think they should, and not have me give up anything of my own to accomplish
such a change. I want a king who
protects little children and rescues cats from trees and is kind to the elder
on the Metro, and takes down the lofty from their thrones. I want a king who rescues ME from the
messes that I make of things, and I want a king who stays out of my business
and lets me do as I please. I want a
Jesus king who gets the bad guys, and one who doesn’t notice when I might be
one of them. The
story goes that Judas is the one who betrayed Jesus in the garden. The story I want to believe is that Judas
was trying to push Jesus into being the kind of king he needed – that he
thought the world needed. Was he
hoping that Jesus would escape, or that he would just leave town after a
close brush with the law? I think he
wanted a Jesus who would round up the criminals and try them for their
crimes. Judas wanted someone to act
with the kind of power and authority that he could recognize – a “Law and
Order” king who ruled with strength and provided governance and
regulation. I don’t know, but I don’t
think I’m that far off from Judas sometimes.
I was
recently talking with a 30-something about the kingship of Jesus, and he said
that the notion of Jesus as king is lost on him. He doesn’t think of Jesus as
king or lord because kings and lords nor longer have any power in his
world. They are ornamental or
ceremonial, and that doesn’t match the image of Jesus that he has. I
didn’t take the opportunity to ask what his image of Jesus is, but it was
clear that king and lord didn’t work for him.
That does not bother me.
Perhaps Jesus as king as we understand king is somewhat dated. In So that 30-something is right on… It is odd to think
that the 21st Century church is continuing a festival centering on
Jesus' image as king. The
notion of king is either oppressive or impotent. What does it mean for us to give to Jesus
power and authority in our lives? I once
had an encounter with a pretty committed non-church person. He’d grown up in the church and knew all
the bible stories. He had been taught
to fear God, and that God was much like Santa – knowing when he was naughty
or nice. He’d walked away from the
church when he was 18 and never really looked back. When the conversation got around to Jesus –
he furrowed his brow and said, “Well, that Jesus. It seems like he really wants your whole
life, not just the part I would take to church on Sunday.” My first reaction was to say, “Exactly!”
for I had seldom heard even the most devoted church folk articulate a
relationship with Jesus so powerfully.
But I restrained myself and asked him if that’s why he didn’t go to
church – too much to give up. He said no, that it wasn’t that he couldn’t
give up what Jesus might ask him to give up. He just wasn’t sure he’d ever
find a church where anyone else would give over his or her life completely to
Jesus, and he didn’t want to be the only one. His fear was simple: in giving
up his life and lifestyle to live as he understood Jesus taught people to
live, he would be alone. Perhaps
the mistake we make as a church is forgetting to tell the rest of the
story. Jesus as earthly king didn’t
really work and wasn’t really accepted – he was misunderstood,
misrepresented, and mistreated. Jesus
wasn’t, in fact, the kind of king anyone was looking for. But the story
doesn’t end with the arrest, conviction, and execution of Jesus. It ends with the hope of new life in Christ
Jesus, or rather it continues for all of us with the resurrection. The
kingship of a risen Christ is of the one who beat death, who triumphed over
evil, who collaborated with God to bring hope to a hurting world – that’s my
kind of king. That was Judas’ kind of
king. That was even the kind of king
that Herod and Pilate feared Jesus would become. The
mark of an efficient leader is one who teaches others the way to lead, and
gets out of the way. Jesus lived as an
unusual king who gave it all away. The
only authentic way for Jesus to be considered a king was to leave his kingdom
in the hands of the people he taught and led.
He was a king who gave life meaning for those who encountered him
–those he healed, those with whom he ate, those who were deemed
unacceptable. So his kingdom – God’s
reign on earth – is up to those of us who strive to live as a faithful
disciple of a reluctant king. www.foundryumc.org |
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