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CHRIST THE KING, 11/20/2016
THE HIDDEN MADE REAL
Sermon on Matthew 25:31-46, by David Zersen
Charlie Rose, the master interviewer of the world's important people on Public Television, interviewed Daniel Radcliffe, the 19-year-old superstar who sprang to fame as a result of his leading role in many Harry Potter films. Now playing in a number of later films, it would have been interesting to have seen him on the day when he was discovered with his parents in a theatre in London. The director-to-be of the Harry Potter film series had interviewed hundreds of boys and somehow could not find the right one. One night in the theatre he looked at the boy in front of him and asked whether he had ever done any acting. No one could have guessed that in a few years, that boy would become one of the richest people in the world and surely one of the most famous. It is a story repeated in many versions from the one that recounts the various discoveries of the new incarnation of the Dalai Lama in a humble home in Tibet to the one that finds the King of Kings lying in a rude stable in Bethlehem.
In our Christian heritage, today is the day, Christ the King Sunday, when the Gospel lesson reviews that story for us. Who could have imagined that that child in swaddling clothes, surrounded by his frightened parents and astonished shepherds, might one day sit on a throne and rule over the destinies of humans of every tribe and tongue? Who indeed, given that this child become man was often criticized, treated with indifference, abused by captors and ultimately crucified. Who could have thought that this Jesus is one day to be Lord and Master of us all?
The last Sunday of the Church Year is a good day to think about this because deep within us there is an understanding not only of our own mortality, but of the ultimate finite character of the material world. One day all things will come to an end and with that notion of finality comes a belief in ultimate justice. What is more important, when all things are said and done, that everything is set rights and that the terrible injustices of the world are replaced with benevolence?
The Hidden in all things
As a high school student I once acted in a Christmas play called Dust of the Road. It was a story about a beggar who went from door to door asking for humble gifts. He was turned away at most doors. Only at the door of the home where he was admitted and attended to were the homeowners privileged to know who he really was, Jesus in disguise. Many are the writers, including the great Doestoevsky, who have thought this a worthy theme for literary exploration. People are intrigued by the question of what might be discovered in hidden places.
Of course, there is a dimension of the historian and archeologist in this quest. Every once in a while we are fascinated to learn about a tomb or a lost city that has been brought to light. There is also the dimension of the scientist in this quest for we want to know what miracle cures or chemical treatments can come from the use of ingredients otherwise not known to have any useful properties.
Most curious however are the uses to which the refuse of the world, the dust of the road, can be employed. Women in the far East have recently taken the multi-colored plastic bags from garbage dumps, washed them, and turned their twisted strands into the fabric of beautiful purses worth money on a newly created market. And in Austin, Texas the bums and the beggars have an annual art market where they attempt to sell their creations to buyers who are amazed at the interesting themes and messages conveyed by the refuse of society.
Our Gospel lesson is a snapshot taken at the end of the story. However, I think it also encourages us to seek to make snapshots at the beginnings of stories. Many are the artists who have taken an otherwise dead-looking branch or cut-off stump or rusted piece of scrap iron to fashion a thing of beauty. The message conveys not only something about the artist's creativity, but also some of the redemptive value of discarded waste.
In psychology, we talk about a capacity in maturing children called metacognition. It is a time when children can not only recognize a reality, but also reflect on it. In such a moment, children come to the point where they no longer follow your story line, but challenge it. They know that beyond what you say, there can be greater realities and bigger truths. It is this which we confess, children become adults, in the Lord's Supper, when in hidden form, in simple bread and wine, we acknowledge the presence not only of our crucified Lord, but of the King of Kings.
It is a profound and awesome world in which we live because in, with and under, to play with Luther's words for a moment, the simplest dimensions of our daily experiences, there are revelations and insights waiting to be discovered. And when the discovery comes, our day and sometimes our whole life is changed forever.
The Real that is you
Of course, today's Gospel is talking about ultimate justice, the reality that one day all things will be set to rights by the one who alone knows the distinction between sheep and goats. However, it is also talking about the fact that, here already, now already, there is a distinction to be made within each of us-- between the worthy and the unworthy, the hidden and the revealed.
Throughout the course of this liturgical year our Gospel lessons have reminded us that God in Jesus Christ has seen through the rough façade of our unworthiness and has declared us hidden gems, precious objects of his love. For our sakes and because of his mercy, Jesus came to embrace us with his love and to point us in the direction on the dusty road that only love can take. Knowing that we who are so easily lost have been found at great cost, we dare not surrender our redemption because we still choose eyes that do not see and ears that do not hear.
As redeemed children of God, we have a new birth, a new hope. We who others might easily ignore as unimportant or uninteresting have been set apart as a chosen generation to proclaim the acts of love which sought us out, one by one. The real me and the real you has been singled out as worthy, as chosen, as free to love as we have been loved.
Do you ever wonder when people saw you as a small child whether they could have imagined what you might become, not just in all terms of all those things you have done about which you are ashamed (as St. Paul said of himself), but in terms of those things which are longing to be born in you, the creative acts of kindness which make the dead come alive.
There is a wonderful term in the psychological system of the Russian Jewish psychologist, Lev Vygotsky, called scaffolding. It refers to his idea that a child can reach a place in life when he or she is ready to claim a new insight, but progress can't take place without help from outside. When a parent or primary caregiver creates a scaffold to allow or encourage the child to take the next step, then progress can be made. When the parent says, "consider this piece of the puzzle," or "do you see where something is missing in this setting?" or "what do you think this person needs most from you?" the child can make his own decision. But the scaffold is necessary if construction is to proceed.
This is a good picture of all of us here today. The Gospel provides such a scaffold for us.
If we know that we who were hungry and thirsty and sick and naked and lonely have been treated with kindness then we have been enabled to seek the otherwise hidden and invisible dust of the road who have the potential to be this world's kings and superstars.
It is the mystery of this existence that at the heart of our depravity and dysfunction we have the potential not only to surprise others with our benevolence, but to prove the power of God's love at work within us by summoning surprising realities hidden in those we have too often written off as worthless.
Today the King of Kings calls us to celebrate his claim on our lives by looking for one person in whose struggle we will seek to call forth a victory. It can come with a greeting card, a telephone call with an encouraging word, a gift of flowers or food. It can be ever so simple, yet for the one who will receive it from you, as from God himself, it will suggest a manger in the process of becoming a throne. It will provide a scaffold for someone to take a positive step in life. And perhaps our life and another's life may be changed forever.