Zion, Spokane Valley – Nov. 26, 2023, Matt. 25:31-46, Zion Lutheran’s 75^th Anniversary

It’s the end of the church year, Reign of Christ Sunday. At the beginning of Matthew’s gospel, we heard the lineage of Jesus—linking Jesus to King David, the most famous king in Israel’s history. We heard the story of wise men from the east following the star, searching for the new king so they could pay homage.  

Again, and again, we have listened in as Jesus described the new kingdom, not the kingdom of David and Solomon. God is doing something new. It is not a far-off kingdom but a kingdom here and now in which everything is turned upside down—the poor, the meek, the merciful are blessed; we are to love our enemies; and Jesus is king above all others. It started with the strangest upside-down story of all—a king born in a barn and laid in a feeding trough.  

Like all trials, today’s passes judgment not on thoughts, but on actual deeds–in this case, deeds done to the judge: feeding him when hungry, giving water to him when thirsty, welcoming him as a stranger, clothing him when ragged, comforting him when sick, and empathizing with him when in prison. 

Those judged are equally surprised, whether rewarded or condemned. “When did we do such deeds to you?” The reply, “when you did these things to the marginalized, the outcasts, the weakest and neediest in society.” Christians see Jesus in the least, if they see him at all.

What your own love of neighbor looks like might reflect today’s passage. You might actually feed people, clothe people, care for people in prison, or care for the sick. It might be neighbor love with a different expression. Most people we admire who love their neighbor do it so naturally. Like the characters in the parable, they wonder when they served Jesus. When was it? They ask. They have already been embodying what one scholar called “joyful living in mercy without calculation.”

The thing about today’s parable that I find fascinating is that it actually is not about the kind of individual acts of love I have mentioned. Those actions certainly fit a reading of Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan, and certainly our individual actions matter. But today’s text starts this way, “When the Son of Man comes in glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. All the nations will be gathered before him…” All the nations. 

So, we might say that this is just addressed to the leaders of the nations, and we are off the hook. But in this particular nation, we all get to participate, not just on election day, but every day. Systems are made up of individuals. Individuals make up neighborhoods, communities, and systems.

Jesus, it seems to me, is not only concerned with how we care for our neighbor individually. How we do it communally matters too. It is always unfortunate, when reading scripture, that the English singular “you” is the same as the plural “you,” but it is especially unfortunate with today’s passage from Matthew. The parable would read more accurately if the king answered, “Truly I tell you, just as you nations did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family,” or “just as you all did it to one of the least of these.”

What precisely does this communal neighbor love look like? What does the reign of God look like for an entire community or country? It certainly makes us curious about the statutes, practices, laws and systems that create problems in the first place. 

Neighbor love expressed by an entire community, not just one person, not only helps someone move out of homelessness, it asks, “what is causing the affordable housing crisis right now?” Neighbor love expressed by a community wonders why the income gap has gotten so wide? Are the poorer people lazy, because it sure does not look like it—not when they are working three jobs. What laws and practices need to be changed to create more equity, more flourishing for all people? What needs to change so that all people are blessed, not just spiritually but physically?   

These are the questions and framework used by German Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer. The church, and really the entire German country, were basking in God’s grace and needed to be reminded of how to faithfully respond to that grace. Bonhoeffer wrote “Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without the living, incarnate Jesus Christ.” In contrast, costly grace is the hidden treasure in the field. “It is costly, because it calls to discipleship; it is grace, because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly, because it costs people their lives; it is grace, because it thereby makes them live.”

We might still wonder what costly grace will actually looks like in daily living. Bonhoeffer asks, “But how should disciples know what their cross is? They will receive it when they begin to follow the suffering Lord. They will recognize their cross in communion with Jesus.”  Discipleship is not about looking for the triumphs of Christianity or of Jesus. We look to the suffering of Jesus. Bonhoeffer writes, “The cross is at once what is necessary and hidden, and what is visible and extraordinary.” We are completely dependent on God for grace and mercy. There will always be conflict between the way of the world and the reign of God. The cross, including why Jesus ended up there, and resurrection remain central. 

Immediately following our gospel passage Jesus says to his disciples, “You know that after two days the Passover is coming, and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.” This is a king who continues to surprise. What kind of god shows power by dying on a cross? The same one who leaves the 99 for the one lost sheep. The same one who heals and feeds and restores the outcast to community. The God we worship is loving and tenacious. God’s reign is going to break in; it is in fact already happening. It is always both already and not yet here.  

In a variety of ways, you and your predecessors at Zion Lutheran have been part of this already and not yet for 75 years. You have shared the love of Jesus in Millwood and beyond by fostering pastoral interns in the 1960s, partnering with Habitat for Humanity, and hosting the Zion Zoo Crew Preschool for over 30 years, just to name a few.

We celebrate all of your history today, a history of the Holy Spirit moving through this congregation as it serves the larger Millwood community. We also celebrate that this has been a place and will continue to be a place for people to hear about the radical love of the Good Shepherd, that love that through this congregation has comforted the afflicted, brought peace to the grieving and broken-hearted, given hope to hopeless, provided welcome to the outcast. 

Christ the King or Reign of Christ is often referred to as the end of the church year. But it is also the prelude to the season of Advent, that time of hopeful waiting and anticipating. What a perfect day then for an anniversary celebration. What will the future be? None of us can be sure. But knowing that Jesus Christ has come and will come again, we wait full of hope and expectation.

Today our calling is not to cringe before an angry Judge who will wreak apocalyptic havoc on a creation gone bad. Instead, we have responsibilities as agents-in-Christ of God’s reign for a renewed creation. We are encouraged to look toward a hope whose vision is perhaps best realized when it is set to the glorious music from George Fredrich Handel’s oratorio The Messiah: “the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our God and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever. Halleluiah.”