Grace to you and Peace from God our Father and our Lord and
Savior, Jesus the Christ. Amen
A reading from 1 Samuel, Chapter 8:
Then all the elders of
Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him,
"You are old and your sons do not follow in your ways; appoint for us,
then, a king to govern us, like other nations." But the thing displeased Samuel
when they said, "Give us a king to govern us." Samuel prayed to the
Lord, and the Lord said to Samuel, "Listen to the voice of the people in
all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have
rejected me from being king over them. Just
as they have done to me, from the day I brought them up out of Egypt to this
day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so also they are doing to you. Now then, listen to their voice; only—you
shall solemnly warn them, and show them the ways of the king who shall reign
over them."
So Samuel reported all the words of the Lord
to the people who were asking him for a king.
He said, "These will be the
ways of the king who will reign over you:
he will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his
horsemen, and to run before his chariots; and he will appoint for himself commanders of
thousands and commanders of fifties, and some to plow his ground and to reap
his harvest, and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his
chariots. He will take your daughters to
be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He
will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give
them to his courtiers. He will take one-
tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and his
courtiers. He will take your male and
female slaves, and the best of your cattle and donkeys, and put them to his
work. He will take one- tenth of your
flocks, and you shall be his slaves. And
in that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for
yourselves; but the Lord will not answer you in that day."
But the people refused to listen to the voice
of Samuel; they said, "No! but we are determined to have a king over us, so that we also may be like other nations, and
that our king may govern us and go out before us and fight our battles." When Samuel had heard all the words of the
people, he repeated them in the ears of the Lord. The Lord said to Samuel, "Listen to their
voice and set a king over them."
Garth Brooks sings a song I like.
The chorus is:
“Sometimes I thank God
For unanswered
prayers.
Remember when you’re talking
To the man
upstairs
That just because he doesn’t answer
Doesn’t mean he
don’t care.
Some of God’s greatest gifts
Are unanswered
prayers.”
I find myself wondering today,
What life would have been like,
What life would still be like,
If God had simply steadfastly refused
To grant
Israel’s request for a King.
Would we have sung Garth Brooks song?
Would that have been one of God’s greatest gifts?
Israel’s demand for a king didn’t work out so well for
them.
·
First it was Saul, a handsome man. But he was disobedient.
·
Then there was David. As great as he was, he had Uriah killed so
that he might take Bathsheba for his wife.
·
Solomon was wise. But in his wisdom, or lack thereof, he took
on 700 wives and 300 concubines, and then he, in the end, allowed his wives to
introduce pagan worship practices into Israel.
God wasn’t pleased.
It gets worse from there.
From the Prophet Jeremiah we hear these words:
“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the
sheep of my pasture! says the Lord. Therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who shepherd my
people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and
you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil doings,
says the Lord.”
“The days are surely coming, says
the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous
Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice
and righteousness in the land.”
Enter Jesus.
We crucified him.
It was Pilot who acknowledged who
he really was on the inscription that hung over him on the Cross.
“This is the King of the Jews.”
I had a parishioner in Sandpoint, Frances
Newell, by name. She was a character.
She’d devoted much of her adult
life to studying the scripture.
And she’d wait anxiously for my
visits so that she could depart the knowledge she’d gained on me.
When I’d arrive to give her
communion, her Bible would be laid out before her, and often there would be
notes on the table as well.
She wanted to get her message
across.
Her conviction was that the Church
had abandoned the message of Jesus. That
we had been led astray. And that it was
her mission in life to call the Church back to be faithful followers of Jesus.
It all boiled down to just one
thing.
The Kingdom of God.
It was all about the Kingdom.
And it couldn’t be about Jesus,
If
it wasn’t about his Kingdom.
Jesus was, is, and always will be
the King.
He wasn’t a rabbi,
Or
a pastor.
He wasn’t a spiritual advisor, or
even a healer, though he certainly healed people as well.
First, and last, Jesus came as
King.
“The Kingdom of God is at hand!”
was the message he brought.
And Frances made clear her
conviction that when Jesus spoke about the Kingdom, he wasn’t talking
figuratively. Nor was he talking about
the far and distant future.
The Kingdom of God is at
hand.
And Jesus was, is, and always will
be the King.
“Democracy is ungodly!” Frances would declare.
There is nothing godly at all
about a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people”, because,
to be blunt, “the people” are sinners.
Probably one of the most regrettable
things Jesus said regarding the Kingdom, was in response to Pilate:
“My kingdom is not from this
world.”
Frances would say that “Yes, the
Kingdom is not from this world, it is from God.
The Father gave the Kingdom to the Son.”
But we have dismissed any talk
about the Kingdom of God being relevant to this world at all.
And that is the problem, Frances
would say. That is the problem.
One more thing about Frances’
message.
It’s not just that we should elect
a “Christian President”, there have been many.
Her point is that we should not,
as Christians, submit to any earthly ruler.
Jesus is Lord, and no other.
I used to dread my visits with
Frances. I didn’t like getting brow
beaten every time I came.
But with time, I’ve come to
believe that Frances had many things right.
Oh, I don’t think that we as
Christians are going to overthrow the United States government and replace it
with a theocracy.
No, not happening anytime soon.
But this I have come to believe:
·
When Jesus came
proclaiming that the Kingdom of God is at hand, he didn’t mean that one day in
the future it would come to be. He meant
now.
·
To say “Jesus is Lord”
is also to say that no one else is. You
cannot simultaneously declare that “Jesus is Lord”, and that “Caesar is Lord”.
·
I am becoming
convinced that there is no such thing as dual citizenship in the Kingdom of
God. You cannot serve two masters. Either Jesus is our King, or we willingly
submit to the reign of the earthly rulers.
·
If “Jesus is Lord”,
then in the end, it really doesn’t, or shouldn’t, matter who is the kings of
this world are. In declaring “Jesus is Lord” we are submitting ourselves
to the reign of Christ.
·
And finally, one of
the most important things we pray for, in the Lord’s prayer, is “your kingdom
come.”
In the small catechism, Martin
Luther explained this petition. He
writes:
What
does this mean? The kingdom
of God certainly comes by itself without our prayer, but we pray in this
petition that it may come to us also.
How
does God’s kingdom come? God’s
kingdom comes when our heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His
grace we believe His holy Word and lead godly lives here in time and there in
eternity.
Christ the King
Sunday.
Food for thought.
God never wanted to
give us an earthly king, in the first place.
And when that didn’t
work out, he gave us his Son, that Jesus might be our King.
An earthly king.
Or Jesus.
The choice is
yours.
Just know that only
one can save us.
Amen
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