Homily – Christ the King Sunday, the 26th Nov 2023
Reading: Matthew 25:31-46
A Cosmic Showdown
Next Sunday begins the season of advent, which means that today is the last Sunday in the church year. We’re wrapping it up with a bang, celebrating Christ the King Sunday. Matthew really gave us a show in the last reading—painting Christ as this majestic King, all decked out in splendour and glory, a king who means business, dishing out both rewards and punishments.
All the nations line up, and Jesus starts sorting them like you would your laundry—good-deed ‘sheep’ on one side, and those who didn’t quite make the cut, the ‘goats,’ on the other. It’s like a cosmic reality show, the ultimate royal showdown.
Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God
This passage is a challenging one. Preaching and teaching on readings like this have over centuries been used to keep people in their place, to suppress and frighten them. On the other hand, they also caused many conversions.
I don’t know if you have heard of the sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. It is a prime example of ‘hellfire and brimstone’ sermons, and was written and preached by Jonnathan Edwards in 1741.This was the time of the First Great Awakening, a revival that swept the North American colonies in the 1730s and 1740s. When he preached it in Enfield, Connecticut the response was quite remarkable: the congregation kept on interrupting him with crying and wailing, and it was reported that there were many conversions that night.
Bible passages like this morning’s gospel reading were the basis for Edwards’ graphic depiction of the horrors of Hell, the dangers of sin, and the terrors of being lost.
Let’s hear a short excerpt, shall we?
Jonathan Edwards said:
“The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked; his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire … you are ten thousand times so abominable in his eyes, as the most hateful and venomous serpent is in ours.”
It’s not quite the stuff that makes one feel nice and cosy, right?
Violence in Matthew’s Gospel
Yet, in our story this morning, Jesus too is portrayed as using this kind of vengeful, dualistic and deterministic language. He embraces one of the groups with the words “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you (…).”, while the others are rejected into “eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels”.
How disturbing, to think that the King of Glory, the God of original Shalom, would resort to violence to bring about the desired result of everlasting justice on earth! Yet, this is a notion that is typical for Matthew’s narrative of the life of Jesus: Christ promotes generous ethics, as in the Sermon on the Mount, yet also frequently talks about imminent violent judgement.
Many of the stories about Jesus are recorded in more than one gospel, often edited or with a different emphasis. It’s interesting to take note of those differences. They can tell us a lot about the sentiment of the author, and the needs of the specific community he was writing within and for.
Our story this morning is unique to Matthew, as are the stories preceding it. Here we find the parables of the good and wicked servants, the virgins and their oil lamps, and the parable of the talents. All of them have a similar, dualistic, almost brutal theme that might be off-putting for some modern listeners.
Why such a dualistic thinking?
What made this black-and-white thinking so attractive to Matthew, and doom-and-gloom preachers after him?
Historians and Sociologists tell us that narratives of eternal life versus eternal punishment are often embraced by groups that are undergoing a, real or perceived, crisis, when they feel a sense of alienation from the wider, oppressive society.
This was true for the church in the region of Syria, which Matthew wrote for, who tried to navigate life following the Jewish war. There was bitterness and hostility between them and the Jewish community. They were threatened by the violence of their gentile neighbours and rattled by news of the destruction of Jerusalem.
The 18th century church Edwards was preaching to also felt attacked. Their nemesis was the enlightenment movement, promoting a scientific and logical view of the world, and downplaying religion. Churches became more formal, church attendance dropped and those Christians that remained were disillusioned with how wealth and rationalism were dominating culture.
And in 2023? Do people feel threatened too? You bet! Some fear refugees, others fear dying from war or poverty. Some dread the advance of climate destruction, others dread the loss of their comfortable lifestyle. Some are intimidated by discrimination, others are intimidated by what they experience as the ‘dictatorship of political correctness’
Violent judgement narratives promise a reversal of the present circumstances. Is it not understandable that fear-filled people through the ages were attracted to their own version of a battle of good versus evil? Don’t we all want to believe that, despite present circumstances, God (or science, nature, reason or whatever it might be) is on OUR side?
The Greater Challenge
It is very challenging to find our position when faced with words of violence, whether from the bible itself, or neighbours, the media, politicians or the vast army of voices on the internet. Where do we even start?
Well, we start right here, on Christ the King Sunday, the feast day that spotlights Christ’s true kingship as, if you will, the final word of the church year. Christ the King is a fairly recent addition to the liturgical calendar. It was introduced in 1925 by Pope Pius XI for the Roman Catholic Church. Soon other denominations, like us Anglicans, adopted it also.
Just like the words of Matthew and Jonathan Edwards were a response to a threat the community faced,
so also was the instituting of this special Sunday, namely, the rise of nationalist fascism. Like the judgement narratives, this Sunday’s message promises the victory of good over evil by celebrating the superiority of the Empire of God! We remember that we are citizens of a realm reigned by the King of Glory: a king foretold by the prophets of old, as we heard in today’s first reading; a king that describes himself as the good shepherd, (And yes, this, too, comes from Matthew’s penmanship!).
The Reign of the Shepherd-King
And as it turns out, living as residents of the Shepherd-Kings Empire can be even more challenging than wrapping our heads around concepts like the last judgement, hell and things like that. When I take today’s passage seriously it is not Jesus’ talk on eternal life and damnation that makes me most uncomfortable, but the other things he says.
He speaks of feeding the hungry, when 828 million people, almost 10% of the world population, are being affected by hunger right now. Jesus asks us to give water to the thirsty, yet droughts and floods are getting more prevalent, as the climate destruction goes on. Christ longs for us to welcome the stranger, still, we repeatedly fail to speak up against systemic or subtle racism. He implores us to clothe the naked, however, the homeless on our streets lack warm shelter and even the garment of basic human dignity. Our king sends us to the sick, but so many people go uncared for or feel misunderstood in their struggle with disability and physical or mental illnesses. The great judge cares for the imprisoned, but those who wronged others or those who are captives of harmful ideologies are often isolated and bridges for reconciliation remain unbuilt.
How about us challenging ourselves this week by living as citizens of Christ’s empire in the realm of our own, everyday influence? Let’s follow Jonathan Edwards’ demand for repentance of where we have failed God and our neighbour. Let us act on the evangelist Matthew’s message of serving Christ in the least of these. And let’s follow Pope Pius XI’s invitation to be aware of and trust in Christ’s reign over all.
And if even an 18th century portrayal of a furious God will eventually pardon those who repent, how much more will the Shepherd-King forgive and lead us.
Christine Ghinn
26th November 2023
Freiburg Anglican Church 