Putting the Christ Back in Christian

 

Luke 23:33-43

 

            No sooner do we shove our chairs back from the table on Thanksgiving Day than the barbarians of the Christmas season beat down our doors and the rampage begins. It seems to come earlier each year. This year, it’s not even Thanksgiving and yet even the sermon sign outside of our church brings in the Christmas season. And there doesn’t seem to be much we can do about it. You just can’t stop it.

 

            Amid all the bustle and parties and Santa Claus and shopping sprees, will come frustrated pleas to put the “Christ” back in Christmas. To set aside all this hectic commercialism and take some time to remember what Christmas is really about. 

 

            I actually think that’s getting ahead of ourselves. We have a more basic task to accomplish first, one that comes before we can even think about putting Christ back into Christmas. That task is to put the “Christ” back into Christian.  

 

            It doesn’t do any good to try and put Christ back into Christmas if we don’t have a clear view of who Jesus Christ is. Those who constructed the church calendar that we follow, wisely placed Christ the King Sunday just before the Christmas season for this very reason. Let’s spend at least one Sunday making sure we are solid on who Christ is, on who it is we want to put back into Christmas before we try to put him there.

 

            You wouldn’t think that would be really necessary, would you? I mean, this is a Christian church. We all know why we’re here. We all know who Jesus is. We declare so often in our hymns and creeds and prayers who Jesus is that we can hardly forget it, can we?

 

            You would think so, but what Jesus did was so outside the box of human thinking that it’s awfully hard to really get a handle on it. It’s like thinking about black holes and antimatter and negative infinity. Can you truly comprehend the idea of matter so dense that its gravitational pull becomes overpowering to the point that not even light can escape it; overpowering enough to take entire planets and crush them into a space so tiny it cannot even be seen?

 

            We can’t, yet such things exist. We deal with that fact by acknowledging that they exist, and marveling at such strange phenomena, and then pretty much ignoring the implications. We go back to focusing on our everyday world where things like that don’t exist and we don’t have to deal with them.

 

            We do much the same with the person of Jesus. We hear in the Gospels of who Jesus is and what he did. And it is all outside the box of human thinking. The God and creator of the universe reduced to a helpless human criminal dead on a cross?

 

            Such a thing is so far beyond our understanding of reality that we cannot fully comprehend it. So we deal with that fact by acknowledging that it happened, and marveling at such a strange phenomenon, and then pretty much ignoring the implications. We go back to focusing on our everyday world where things like that don’t exist and we don’t have to deal with them. 

 

            That leaves us with a problem, though, because we claim to be Christians who believe in Jesus, in the saving power of Jesus, in the reign of justice and in the kingdom of God. So we have to make Jesus fit into our life and into our world view somehow. Often, the only way Jesus fits is with a lot of reshaping and hammering and bending and twisting. Until the Christ of Christianity no longer has much in common with the Jesus Christ of the Bible. And the Christ we want to put back into Christmas looks nothing like the Christ of the Bible. 

 

            Christ the King Sunday is an effort to stay connected with the Christ of the Bible.

 

             According to traditional, inside-the-box thinking, kingship means might and power, pomp and privilege, wealth and fame, and authoritative rule.

            On our visit to Europe this year, we saw the normal definition of kingship.

            We visited the treasury of the Rosenburg Palace in Copenhagen. There we saw the crown jewels of Denmark, golden crowns intricately crafted and slathered with more diamonds and rubies and sapphires than you can count, golden sword hilts encrusted with jewels, a chess set in which all the pieces were solid gold.

            In St. Petersburg, Russia, a city built on a marshland upon the order of the Tsar, at the cost of 100s of thousands of miserable laborers who died in the effort, we toured a 300-room palace, one of many built for the rulers. It contained an entire room paneled in gold. The palace was filled with so many priceless works of art that if you spent one second looking at each of them, it would take years to see it all.

            In our way of thinking, that’s what kingship is all about. It’s everybody giving it up for the one who is better than they, for the one who commands their allegiance, their money, their fear, and their adoration in exchange for keeping them safe.

 

            That’s where they wanted to put Jesus, back in the day. The people proclaimed him the Messiah and wanted to install him as a king even more mighty than the kings of Denmark and the Tsars of Russia. High and mighty upon a throne, ruling in power, imposing his will, crushing his enemies, blinding the world with his splendor, enforcing the peace. 

 

            But that’s not who Jesus was. He did not come to rule through force, was not interested in power, in wealth, in crushing his enemies, in taking over the reins of government, in blinding the world with his splendor. He came to show that love and justice are what lies at the heart of the kingdom of God.

 

            What he did was so far outside the box, that few of the people in Jesus’ time understood him. They kept trying to put him back on the throne of Israel.

            Jesus was not interested. He would not participate. He stayed true to who he was, and to his mission: to show how much God loves us in being willing to take on human form to be among us, and suffer and die for us, and forgive us, and destroy the grip of death to bring us new life—eternal life. That’s who Jesus was—he had nothing to do with that other stuff. 

 

            This behavior was so far outside the box that despite the existence of over a billion and a half Christians in the world and a 2000-year history, few in our time seem to understand what he was doing.

            We continue to get stuck on the old definition of kingship. That’s where we want to put Jesus, especially on Christ the King Sunday. High and mighty upon a throne, ruling in power, imposing his will, crushing his enemies through force, taking over the reins of government, blinding the world with his splendor.

 

            And instead we are forced to read these words: “When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus, there with criminals, one on his right and one on his left.” They cast lots to divide his clothing. They mocked him and offered him sour wine. The idea that Jesus was any kind of a king was so laughable that they made a joke about it, labeling him “King of the Jews.”

 

            It’s the ultimate downer. Jesus seems the farthest thing from a king. He is utterly helpless, utterly without respect, without material goods, without comfort.

           

            Yet while in this pathetic condition, Jesus performs two of the most powerful acts in the world, acts that not even the most powerful earthly king or tsar can accomplish by himself:

            First, he forgives sin. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Without the message of the gospel, without the grace of God seen in the person of Jesus Christ, forgiving your tormentor is not something that people do, no matter how powerful or regal.

            Secondly, he grants new life. The request is made, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

            He answers, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” With all of their wealth and power and pomp and privilege, there is not a king on this earth who has ever been able to do that. Kings in our world have had the power to take a life, to spare a life. But not to give new life.

 

            Forgiveness and new life. Those are the trademarks of the reign of Jesus the king.

 

            It should not be surprising. The entirety of the Old Testament tells us that the two trademarks of the reign of God Almighty are love and justice. Are those concepts too vague? Too inaccessible? Don’t know what they really mean?

 

            Jesus came to show us up close and clear detail what they mean. It’s there on the cross. The meaning of love can be seen in the act of forgiveness. The meaning of justice can be seen in the transformation of this world from a broken mess into a place in which all of creation works together the way God planned it.

 

 

            Christ the King Sunday reminds us that love and justice, forgiveness and new life are the foundations of the Kingdom of God. Not power, not privilege, not wealth, not crushing our enemies by force, not taking over the reins of government, not blinding the world with our splendor.

 

            If we are truly followers of Jesus Christ, we accept who Jesus is and what Jesus taught. Jesus is about love and justice, forgiveness and new life. That is the message of the Gospel. As Jesus said himself, all the rest is just details. Love and justice, forgiveness and new life. That is the kingdom of God.

 

            As followers of Jesus Christ, as Christians in this community, this nation, and in this world, this should be our identity. Is it? Ask any unchurched member of this county what we stand for; ask any Moslem in the Middle East. Is that what they would say?

 

            Or is that message so outside the box that we have made Jesus fit into our life and world view, with a lot of hammering and bending and twisting and reshaping. Until the Christ of Christianity no longer has much in common with the Jesus Christ of the Bible. Until the Christ we want to put back into Christmas is not the Christ of the Bible, but our own puppet ruler or proxy or invention.

 

            I have seen and heard Christians proclaim that being a follower of Jesus Christ means agreeing with whatever particular political agenda or social they have. I am told that being a Christian means being in favor of anything from strict constructionist judges to the low taxes, and being opposed to anything from affirmative action to test ban treaties.

 

            As a pastor, I constantly get letters urging me to adopt these agendas as part of a campaign to put Christ back into our nation. Just like the people in Jesus time ran a righteous campaign to set up Christ as their champion and king.

 

            The truth is that individual Christians can be for or against any number of issues. Jesus had nothing to say about a great many subjects that we debate today. He actually spoke out against some of the things people do under the banner of Christianity.

 

            The people discovered 2100 years ago, that being a follower of Christ means letting Jesus lead, not trying to drag Jesus where he won’t go. Not in crushing enemies, in taking over the reins of government, not in blinding the world with our splendor. Jesus won’t go there. It’s a lesson we have such trouble learning.

 

            There is no mistaking where Jesus leads. It’s there on the cross in the gospel lesson for today. Christians stand for love and justice, forgiveness and new life. That is what we proclaim, because that’s what Christ proclaimed. Anything else we do, we do as individuals on our own time, seeking our way through this wonderful and complex world.

 

            So if putting Christ back into Christmas means another round in the annual wrestling match between the secular and sacred, to see who can dominate the season, to see who can assert their power and enforce their will over others, don’t look for Jesus to have your back. He’s not interested in the least. Never has been.

 

            If putting Christ back into Christmas means taking Jesus seriously when he says we are to forgive, let’s not just talk about it; let’s do it. If putting Christ back into Christmas means taking Jesus seriously when he says we are to care for our neighbor as ourself, let’s do it. If putting Christ back into Christmas means taking Jesus seriously when he urges us to work for justice, let’s do it. If putting Christ back into Christmas means sharing the message and the joy of new life, let’s do it.

 

            Because that’s where Jesus leads us, and Christians follow Jesus. 

 

            If putting Christ back into Christmas means anything else, it isn’t Christ we’re putting back into Christmas. It’s our own proxy, our own puppet, our own invention, our own version of a king.

 

            There are many times and situations in life where we’re just guessing; and that’s okay. God leaves us free to do that. God isn’t giving us all the answers.

 

            What Jesus has shown us is this: He has shown us what the kingdom of God is like. We can reject him. We can join the millions of people throughout the ages who have tried to make Jesus into their ideal of a king. Or we can put the Christ back into Christian, and follow him where he leads. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

strong national defense, retention of the Panama canal, state-led prayer in public schools, capital punishment, low interest rates, low taxes, law and order, strong morals, protection of marriage, strict constructionist judges, crackdown on illegal immigrants and being against flag burning, test ban treaties, the Kyoto agreement, affirmative action, gun control, inheritance tax, the teaching of evolution, and women’s rights.