Christ the King Sunday

We are at the Advent of Advent. Next week is the first Sunday of Advent, and through the
four weeks of this season, we remember and celebrate the arrival of Jesus on Earth. We
tend to focus on the first arrival, the incarnation as a vulnerable infant; however, Advent is
not just about preparation for Christmas. We also prepare ourselves for the Second Coming of Jesus, the one that is yet to come, sometimes called the Last Judgment.

Early Christians believed that Jesus would come again, remaking the whole world and
releasing them from oppression all at once. This would mean that the Kingdom of God
replaced all evil, earthly empires. In modern culture, this is often misrepresented as the
Rapture. Needless to say, this didn’t happen.

So, as we await God’s Kingdom, the reality for all of us is that we will face that end time at
death. Instead of an all-at-once judgment and reforming the world, we expect that life will
be transformed with our earthly demise.

Many people, especially Episcopalians, are turned off by the idea of Judgment Day, so let’s
start there. I promise this won’t be as uncomfortable as a conversation about politics at the Thanksgiving table.

On the one side, we believe in grace, and Jesus gives us plenty of evidence in the Gospel of
Matthew that God’s favor is not about our works.

We can begin with the calling of Matthew, who, as a tax collector, was considered a sinner
in Jewish society. By calling Matthew, and later dining with other tax collectors and sinners,
Jesus signals acceptance not by societal standards but through his mercy and love.
A few weeks ago, we discussed the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard. You remember
the one where the workers who only worked an hour got paid the same as those that
worked all day. Here, we are reminded that God’s currency is not money but grace. And
specifically, grace that comes from belief. The only prerequisite for payment in God’s
Kingdom is trust in God.

And, of course, everyone’s favorite scriptures from Matthews’ Gospel are the Beatitudes.
Here, Jesus reminds us that regardless of your circumstances, you will receive God’s
salvation. One might say that the humble, oppressed, and suffering are more likely to seek
God in trust and belief because they feel like they have nowhere else to turn.

There is a common theme here, God offers us grace and in return God expects or at least
hopes that we will trust in that grace and salvation. When we trust in God, then we enter a
relationship with God.

All of that is comforting. But on the other side, we also want to believe that evil people face
consequences. Recently, someone challenged me specifically to account for people like
Hitler in my theology. If we are all saved by grace, what happens to someone who
intentionally and repeatedly dehumanized and murdered innocent people?

Inherent in this question is the assumption of God’s judgment. Subconsciously, most of us
have some kind of theology of judgment because we can’t imagine that deliberately evil
people are not held accountable.

And we hold this theology of judgment personally as well. I wouldn’t be surprised if several
of you are familiar with, or even pray regularly, the Jesus Prayer, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of
God, have mercy upon me, a sinner.”

Because we are also often reminded that we are all sinners. Though we try to live a moral
and ethical life, we all must make choices and tradeoffs, so we sin. This is why we say the
General Confession and receive absolution every week before Communion.
So, how do we hold these two together in our theology? Salvation by grace and judgment
for sinners.

To address this, I find it helpful to imagine what life after death might be like. I believe that
God is love, so I envision unification with God in all God’s glory through becoming one with
God in love. At this point, my imagination gets a little fuzzy on the details since God is
beyond all our understanding. So, I rely on the metaphor of light and moving into God’s
light. Being fully encompassed by God’s light.

Now, I also believe that I am a sinner. Though I came from God’s love and light, from the
day of birth onward, I developed habits and coping mechanisms that helped me to survive
this world. Each of those is like armor that protects me from hurt and eases my journey
through life.

The problem with armor is that it can’t block things selectively. If I’m wrapped up in armor,
it blocks arrows and rocks great, but it also blocks light. The thicker my skin, the less
vulnerable I am to hurt and injury. But the thicker my skin, the less I can feel love and
mercy, too.

When I die, I expect I’ll try to take this armor with me, because I have become dependent on it. But God loves us so much, God wants us fully united in love. And as long as I wear the
armor, I am blocking God's light and love. So, God must burn away the armor, not to hurt us, but to remove all the barriers to love, to leave us completely vulnerable and open to the full light of God’s love.

This is how I view judgment. Not as a punishment for our sins, but as atonement, removal
of our armor so we can be fully at one with God. How much armor must be removed in our
refinement depends on our life choices. I take comfort in knowing that judgment will burn
away everything that separates me from the love of God.

And God calls ALL of us to the Kingdom of Heaven. We are ALL subject to this remaking.
Turning to the parable today, note that Jesus calls us all, the sheep and the goats. The goats weren’t exempted from the Kingdom; they just required more refinement. Ultimately, the goal of atonement is to be fully in relationship with God.

Then what does the parable tell us about preparing for judgment? What is the difference
between the sheep and the goats? Interestingly, neither group knew when they had served
God. That is to say, they didn’t act intentionally.

I will remind you of our earlier theme: God offers us grace but in return God expects trust.
When we trust in God, we enter into relationship with the divine. Robert Capon shares on this passage:

“Nobody knows anything. The righteous didn’t know they were in relationship with the King when they ministered to the least of his brethren, any more than the cursed knew they were despising the King when they didn’t ... Knowledge is not the basis of anybody’s salvation or damnation. Action-in-dumb-trust is.

The only question at the end is whether we trusted the truth of [Jesus’s salvation] and made it a two-sided relationship, or whether we distrusted it and left it a relationship from his side only. And Jesus alone knows the answer to that question. In this last parable of all, he deliberately deprives us of any way of even thinking about it: the only ground the Great Judgment gives us for hope is trust in his presence in the passion of the world.”

So, in a way, we end where we began a few weeks ago. God loves us so much that God
desires to be in relationship with us. What does that relationship require? Trust. Trust in
God to sort it out in judgment. Trust in God to love us so much that we won’t be hurt. Trust
in the mystery of salvation. When we trust and receive that love, then our actions will
reflect God’s love in the world.