Today is the last Sunday of the church year. In Lutheran and Roman Catholic tradition it is called the Sunday of Christ the King, commemorating Christ’s final victory over the powers of the world and the complete reconciliation of the world with God. The powers of evil are finally vanquished. Humanity flourishes as God intended.
Today we tend to think of a general image of kings and kingdoms as anti-democratic, infested with nepotism, and woefully outdated. It has been claimed that the original title of this day was largely designed to bolster the ancient divine right of kings and was intended to prop up tottering and corrupt European monarchies.
In Western art and music there are many images of the final judgment where the damned to their horror are driven down into the fires of hell. Some scholars would claim that the fear and terror of judgment provided the only check available on the egos of tyrants, although one must wonder if such warnings did any real good. Yet in Biblical times, where democracy was unknown, and chaos a constant threat, good kings provided the security, the regular administration of justice, and the promotion of prosperity that no alternative could ever provide. If we can get past our negative images we might be able to grasp a large truth that this day is not about the justification of an autocratic form of government or about earthly kingdom building or glorification of imperial power.
The Bible balances the images of terror and woes of the final judgment with God gathering together the lost sheep, of binding together those who were lost, of bringing together not only nations, but even the whole animal order, where the lamb will lie down with the lion, and the wasp will not sting a child. The last judgment is also a reunion celebration after a long separation.
The lesson from the prophet Ezekiel was written during the exile in Babylon. Most of the people from what had been the Northern Kingdom of Israel had been forcibly scattered and had vanished from the pages of history forever. The smaller nation with Jerusalem as its capital had lingered on for a century and a quarter more, but then its people were driven from their homes, with a remnant of them taken to Babylon. There they had been allowed to live as a group and retain their cultural identity, but as the decades wore on, it was an open question whether their children and grandchildren would be gradually assimilated into the larger Babylonian culture. Ezekiel wrote of a future, when God would gather the lost, and restore the people to their land, and Israel would be reconstituted once more. Ezekiel was a prophet of hope who urged the people to hold on, to remember their heritage, to pass it on to their children, to be proud to be people of faith and to remember their mission to be a light to the world. In time, the exiles were allowed to go back and rebuild Jerusalem, and Ezekiel’s hope became real.
Today’s Gospel passage in Matthew is not found in the other Gospels. It is a picture of a final judgment when all will be put right and Christ will reign in full glory. Yet like Ezekiel’s vision, while it uses the royal images of kings and kingdoms, it is about God bringing people together. The phrase translated as “all the nations” is referring specifically to all the foreign nations, not just those populated by people of faith. The great judgment is not in terms of military prowess, or how obedient they were to either their king or religious authorities, but how well people had cared for one another. Note everyone is completely surprised. There is no mention of great deeds of the high and mighty. God comes not like a warrior dressed in shining armor riding a chariot. Rather He is like a shepherd who cares for the sheep. God commends people for very ordinary, everyday acts of kindness that anyone can do. Visiting the sick, offering a cup of cold water or some comfort food or giving a word of encouragement to one who is distraught, even a child is capable of doing it.
That is why on this last day of the church year it is more helpful if we picture Jesus as riding a donkey rather than a cavalry horse; dressed in shepherd’s clothes rather than royal robes of purple; and holding a staff to guide a flock rather than wielding a jeweled sword. A Cardinal by the name of Paul Leger (lei sure) once remarked, “Life is not a succession of extraordinary things; life is just the loving attention to the need of others.” Perhaps we need more music written for words like these rather than to the words sensationalizing the terrors of hell and damnation.
