King

Here is yesterday's sermon and I can't think anything else to say about it except that it took quite a bit of work to get it going.

Be ready and keep your lamps burning just like those servants who wait up for their master to return from a wedding feast. As soon as he comes and knocks, they open the door for him. Servants are fortunate if their master finds them awake and ready when he comes! I promise you that he will get ready and have his servants sit down so he can serve them. Those servants are really fortunate if their master finds them ready, even though he comes late at night or early in the morning.

You would surely not let a thief break into your home, if you knew when the thief was coming. So always be ready! You don't know when the Son of Man will come.’

Luke 12: 35-40

Your King comes in glory

Your King comes in glory this is the theme. But then the passage, does it describe the arrival of a great King? There’s a master coming from a wedding party – who as he arrives serves his own servants (or even as other translations say, slaves) and the other picture is that of a thief?

The problem with lectionaries is that passages are taken away from their context. It is of course my job to give you the context but the second problem is the way Bible has come to being. The stories of several people remembering different occasions have been collected to create the gospels. There are contradictions and quite simply gaps in them because stories have been placed to follow each other following a logic we today may find hard to understand.

It may very well be that as Jesus was talking about his second coming he used several different images at the same time to describe how it would be. Like in here the master and his slaves and on the other hand thief but it is also possible that these images came from two different occasions.

Therefore I won’t try to force them together. I think that if – and as I said it is as likely – Jesus gave these two images at the same time he didn’t mean them to be overly interpreted but rather as two different ways of seeing the same thing. Just as if you or I were explaining something to our friend such as how it felt in church last Sunday. Two things that are not connected can be true at the same time like that I felt very much at home and I found myself thinking about how much I like skating. Nothing necessarily to do with each other except that they are both your experiences.

So, then lets look at the two images. You’ll notice I’m concentrating on the King and not on the servants here, quite simply because the theme of waiting from the perspective of those who wait was the theme one Sunday ago. But I will come back to it, too.

Back to this Sunday then, the master has been to a wedding, expects his slaves or servants to be waiting for him, finds them to have done so and then – here’s the twist – he tightens his belt in order to serve his servants. Does this image ring a bell to you? Right. There is the evening, Maundy Thursday evening, when the disciples are to eat together with Jesus and Jesus takes on the job a of a slave and washes their feet.

Last Sunday on it’s turn took as back to Palm Sunday and to the donkey Jesus chose to ride on when he arrived to Jerusalem. Traditionally both these images have been seen to underline how different Jesus was as a king in comparison to the kings of his or any age. But this is where I came to a halt. I don’t live in a kingdom. My point of reference to kings comes from fairy tales and Disney’s kings such as Sleeping Beauty’s worried looking father and the prince’s very funny round father. Do you see my problem?

Not that it is a very big one, though, I do get why the church wants to describe Jesus as the king. Jesus is the king of all of us. He is the ruler of the kingdom of God. He is our king. And his kingship has very little to do with the kings of our world and everything to do with how God is. He is the servant king. Christ is royal and even more importantly holy at the same time as he is willing to offer everything for the sake of mankind. And this is the image we need to remember.

Now then, the other picture or image. A thief, dear me. But in fact here is another parallel to the very last hours of Jesus life on earth. Remember? God’s Son is on the cross and on his both sides there are the thieves. One insults and mocks Jesus and the other one says: “Don’t you fear God? Aren’t you getting the same punishment as this man? We got what was coming to us, but he didn’t do anything wrong.” And then these words “Remember me when you come into power!” To which Jesus replies: “I promise that today you will be with me in paradise”.

Of course, in our passage today, Jesus is talking about the way it will seem like when he arrives - in other words the follow up on what was described in the story of the thieves. He is describing the unexpected nature of the second coming, this time in a much more spectacular way than the first time around.

And here we – finally - come to waiting. As I was thinking about waiting these were the images that came to my mind. Please do not get offended I was only thinking about waiting in general and will then get to the part about waiting for Jesus.

But here’s what I thought:

A dog waiting by the door ready to greet with kisses and hugs.

A child waiting for mommy or daddy to come home and coming running straight to your lap squealing with delight.

Airport, the door to security check opens and your loved one finally comes through.

The amazing moment when the baby is finally in the arms of his/her mother or father.

The long waited Christmas Eve or morning when you were a child.

The day you graduated and then again the very first day of school.

The moment your child takes his first steps.

Birthdays, at first our own and then those we love.

We wait for many things. Many of the most precious moments in life are moments that have to do with the end of waiting for something or someone. They are moments preceded by times of expecting, waiting, getting ready and ultimately about being excited about the imminent arrival of someone or something we value very much.

Whenever Jesus arrives will it be like that for you? Will you be excited, relieved, happy, filled with gratitude and awe? My prayer for you and for myself is that, yes, we will. And you know what, I do think we will. Perfect love takes away all fear. And God is Perfect Love.