OLJC King

 

On my way home after mass yesterday (the feast of Christ the King) I found myself wondering about ‘the kingdom of Christ’. The kingdom of Charles III is Great Britain and sundry other countries, but how about ‘the kingdom of Christ’?  Although the concept of kingdom occurs throughout the old and new testaments, how do we understand the rather nebulous concept of the kingdom of Christ, a kingdom without national boundaries?

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Jesus gives the answer himself when he addressed by Pilate at his trial ‘’My kingdom is not from this world’ (John 18:16).

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St Paul takes the life and death and kingship of Jesus into a more cosmic, a more eschatological, a more mystic dimension. The Christ of St Paul is a totally universal yet unwordly king but by taking flesh and offering himself with outstretched arms on the cross he embraced everything we do, our thoughts, our words and our works, active or passive, and so reconciled creator and creation. It is certainly more difficult to assimilate the mystical transcendent king than the baby in the crib or the man on the cross but I believe that was what Jesus alluding to when he answered Pilate ‘My kingdom is not from this world’.

 

We cannot particularise, we cannot exclude, divide or classify creation when we preach the kingship of Christ, the cosmic Christ – that Christ

 

Who is the Christ of the rich and supercilious

The Christ of the poor, the homeless and the oppressed

The Christ of the unbeliever and the communist

The Christ of the prisoner, the murderer and the thief

The Christ of the gay, the Lesbian and the transgender

The Christ of the Jew, the Muslim, the Hindu and the Buddhist

The Christ in whom all things exist

And who is the Christ in whom all things shall have their eternal rest.

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Deacon Douglas MacMillan

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The Collect

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O Lord Jesus Christ,

who at your first coming sent your messenger

to prepare your way before you:

grant that the ministers and stewards of your mysteries

may likewise so prepare and make ready your way

by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,

that at your second coming to judge the world

we may be found an acceptable people in your sight;

for you are alive and reign with the Father

in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and forever.

Amen.