{"id":538,"date":"2019-11-24T14:51:00","date_gmt":"2019-11-24T14:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/?p=538"},"modified":"2019-11-25T14:53:06","modified_gmt":"2019-11-25T14:53:06","slug":"christ-the-king","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/2019\/11\/24\/christ-the-king\/","title":{"rendered":"Christ the King"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Colossians 1:11-20<\/strong>,\nJeremiah 23:1-6, Luke 23:33-43<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grace to you and peace\nfrom God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like\nmany of you I grew up with an idealized image of a king. A king was a man valiant\nin war; his judgments were righteous; he wore a crown of gold and jewels; he\nwas a leader of men; he wore purple and he sat on a throne. King Arthur, from the\nmovies and story books was who I envisioned. Jeremiah had a very different king\nin mind; Jeremiah was thinking of King David, the king who grew up as a\nshepherd, who was valiant in battle and a leader of men. He envisioned a\nshepherd king, coming to restore and protect all the lands of God\u2019s promise and\nall the people who trusted in God\u2019s care. Luke and Paul, saw Jesus as their\nking, he was greater by far than all other kings, but different, very\ndifferent; he was a king who loved his subjects to such a degree that he was\nwilling to live a humble life, spend his life out among his subjects, caring\nfor them and he gave up his life for them, for us, for the forgiveness of our\nsins and for our salvation. Most kings, of the far past, were willing to give\nup their lives in the defense of their people, at least within the throws of\nwar; they would, most of them, lead their armies into battle, more or less with\nsword or lance in hand; they surrounded themselves with the best of warriors\nbut not a small number of these ancient kings were wounded. Some of these kings\ndid, in fact, die in battle, but the differences between these kings and Jesus were\nsubstantial. Jesus carried no sword or lance; maybe he carried a walking stick;\nbut he did not set out with violence to hurt a single soul. He did not send his\nfollowers into battle with sword or lance and he stopped them from responding\nin violence to his arresters. Jesus simply gave himself up as a ransom for all,\nas a sacrifice for our sins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Growing\nup, I would think about the Sunday called \u201cChrist the King\u201d with a bit of\nconfusion; king and Jesus just did not seem to fit together; approaching\nadulthood I could envision Jesus sitting on a thrown in heaven, but still could\nnot fully connect that heavenly king with the Jesus we hear about who preached\nand told stories, healed and fed people, slept along roadways and sometimes as\na guest in people\u2019s homes, who died on the cross and was placed in another\nman\u2019s tomb. Where was all that kingly power? Where was the royal wealth? Everything\nabout him appeared all too human, not normal, but also not regal. Some of my\ndifficulty, was that I held kings up, as being so very special, maybe even\nbetter than all of us; Jesus lived as we do. My image of kings did not change until\nI went to Europe; before that trip I couldn\u2019t imagine a king even having to go\nto the bathroom, though I knew that they did. This fantasy though, was dashed\nwhen upon visiting an ancient castle, Cathy and I were shown the king\u2019s royal\ncommode and were told how individual members of the king\u2019s court were selected\nto be given the honor of inspecting the king\u2019s bowel movements so that they may\nwitness to and proclaim the king\u2019s health. I myself would not have wanted to be\nso honored. In truth, I think what has been most difficult for me, in\nunderstanding Christ the king, is that I have no direct experience with kings\nof any kind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jeremiah,\nLuke and Paul lived in a world dominated by kings, both puppet and real. But, I\nsuspect, Luke and Paul, both of them, had to adjust their understanding of\nkings, in order to speak of Jesus\u2019 kingdom, Jesus\u2019 rule and his judgment of all\nhumankind, knowing Jesus\u2019 willingness live a normal human life and concede his\nown death without any attempt to, with sword or lance, to vanquish his apparent\nenemy. Luke and Paul had to, find a new way of looking at things and come to the\nunderstanding that with Jesus there were much different weapons being put at\nplay; the true enemies of God and faith could not be conquered or harmed by\nswords and lances, but only by the weapons of love and self-sacrifice. These\nweapons, could only be wielded by the one true king and by those called upon to\nfollow and serve him. Including among these called followers were people like\nLuke and Paul, also people like Martin Luther and Henry Melchior Muhlenberg,\ngreat men all of them, but also people of much less renown like you and me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nstill seems strange to me, thinking of Jesus as a king and sitting upon a\nthrone, in fancy garments and jeweled crown and scepter. But, what do any of\nthose things matter? I too have to change my image of a king; Jesus is the kind\nof king who is like no other, wanting to walk among us, probably wearing a\nt-shirt and jeans, listening to our questions and ideas, sharing with us\nstories and wanting to make our lives joyful. I wonder sometimes if the\nchildren\u2019s book, The Prince and the Pauper, was fashioned after Jesus life. If\nyou don\u2019t remember the story, the prince put away his fancy apparel to put on\nthe clothes of a pauper so that he could go out of his castle and mingle with\nhis people. I think this is the kind of king that we can expect in his kingdom,\na kingdom with no taxes! A kingdom as described as a great banquet! And in\nrevelation it says that there will be no Temple (no church) in Jesus\u2019 kingdom! But\nthen, with such a king as Jesus, why would we need them? Jesus will be with us;\nGod will be with us! Jesus wants of us, only that we be in relationship with\nhim and having Jesus with us, walking among us, we have no need to go into a\nbuilding to find Jesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Christ\nthe King, is a very different king! He is our ruler, now and in the life to\ncome, but he is less inclined to Lord it over us as he is to want to be our\nfriend. So, we celebrate today Christ the King, different from all other kings,\nspecial who has patterned for us a humble and loving life. I can\u2019t think of\nanything better to say than, thank you Jesus. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Colossians 1:11-20, Jeremiah 23:1-6, Luke 23:33-43 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ Like many of you I grew up with an idealized image of a king. A king was a man valiant in war; his judgments were righteous; he wore a crown Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons-and-services"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":539,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions\/539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}