Sunday, November 27, 2005

November 20, 2005

Christ the King, 2005

Today is the feast of Christ the King. The image of Christ, reigning on the cross, is one of many identities we give Christ. In a way, its an uncomfortable image to us. Americans don't care much for royalty. We don't like people having that much authority over us.

Most of us don't have much problem with the image of Christ as our Savior. The saving power of Christ, who saved us from a life oblivious of God, and shackled to sin and death, gives us all reason to rejoice. But accepting Christ as our Lord, or as our King, is another matter. Christ as Lord asks for our obedience. We are to obey Christ, for our own sakes, as well as for the sake of the kingdom of God. We are a people who are under the authority of Christ.

This week, we will commemorate Thanksgiving. One remarkable thing about thanksgiving is that it hasn't become as commercialized as other holidays. And there are many families who normally never say grace before meals who will suddenly feel compelled to offer some form of thanks before carving up the fattened bird and diving into the dressing.

I think that Thanksgiving can become more than this country's sacred day of overindulgence. I think it could be the day when we acknowledge our blessings, offer our thanks to God, and then pass on the abundance of God's love that has so freely been offered to us. If Christ is our King, then maybe we need to listen to him. Maybe this thanksgiving we need to hear our King, as he reminds us that we are to use our blessings to bless others.

Henri Nouwen, a famous theologian and writer, offers some insights into how we might share our abundance of blessings with others. He quit the faculty of Harvard to join the staff at Daybreak, a residential community for handicapped people. He went from working with the world's brightest and best to working with people the some would rather forget.

In his book, In the Name of Jesus, Nouwen shares his insights on this radical expression of servanthood.

"Most of my past life has been built around the idea that my value depends on what I do. I made it through grade school, high school, and university. I earned degrees and aw2ards and I made my career. Yes, with many others, I fought my way up to the lonely top of a little success, a little popularity, and a little power. But as I sit beside the slow and heavy breathing of Adam, (a resident of Daybreak), I start seeing how violent that journey was. So filled with desire to be better than others, so marked by rivalry and competition, so pervaded by compulsions and obsessions and so spotted with moments of suspicion, jealousy, resentment and revenge."

Can we know Christ without knowing those whom Christ identifies with in today's Gospel text? Can we know Christ without knowing the weak, the poor, the hungry, and the prisoners among us?

As we look for Jesus, we soon begin to see his faces in the faces of our brothers and sisters, especially in those faces twisted in pain.

Mother Teresa once asked some visitors to hold up one hand. "The Gospel is written on your fingers," she said. Holding up one finger at a time, she accented each word. "You did it to me." Then she added, "At the end of your life, your five fingers will either excuse you or accuse you of doing it unto the least of these. You did it to me.

We share our blessings with others. We do this not because we are good people. We do it because our king has commanded us to do it. We help others, with their physical, spiritual, emotional and mental health as our goal. We offer them compassion, we meet their immediate needs, and we introduce them to Christ. Not the other way around. One of most powerful witnesses as Christians is the compassion of Christ. As William Barclay has said, "More people have been brought into the church by the kindness of real Christian love than by all the theological arguments in the world, and more people have been driven from the church by the hardness and ugliness of so-called Christianity than by all the doubts in the world.

Let us honor our king this Thanksgiving. Let us offer our thanks to God for our many blessings. Then, let's find a way to share those blessings. This thanksgiving, commit yourself to being the hands of Christ in the world today.

Saturday, November 26, 2005

Allrighty, Then...

It looks like our blog gets caught in the net of search engines whose owners like to leave spam in the comments. Fortunately, Blogger has a function that allows us to moderate the comments. Please be patient if your comment doesn't appear immediately. Thanks.

And happy Advent!