Whose In Charge? Sermon by Rev Steven R Mitchell, First Congregational UCC, Rock Springs, WY

Who’s In Charge?
By Rev Steven R Mitchell
First Congregational UCC, Rock Springs, WY 11/21/2010
Based on Jeremiah 23:1-6; Colossians 1:11-20; and Luke 23:33-43


Several weeks ago I was invited by Martha Atkins supervisor of the ELCA Lutheran Churches, to be one of her mentors for her last year in seminary, along with Father Bob Spencer of the Holy Communion Episcopal Church. One of the responsibilities is to meet with her and Father Bob, weekly to do a discussion of the current week’s Lectionary readings. At our first meeting this past Monday, we all three felt that this week’s Gospel selection about Christ’s crucifixion was out of character with this week’s celebration of “Christ the King” Sunday. For those of us who follow the church year, today is the end of our current church year; this is our New Year’s Eve so to speak. Next Sunday we start a new church year with the First Sunday of Advent. With that in mind, I have been thinking throughout this week that using the Crucifixion story is actually an appropriate end to the yearend study. We start out each new church year with the anticipation of Christ’s birth, the story of the introduction of the Messiah into our world, this “hope” that is coming to us; so it seems only proper to end the church year, with his death, with the message that Christ is King; this “hope” completed, which has changed into the “assurance” of God’s salvation.
With the start of the Hebrew reading this morning, we are told that God would be sending the world a good “shepherd”, who would be able to tend to God’s flock, showing them the true mind of God. This shepherd from God would be able to do this because he was from God, coming to us through the human bloodline of King David. God spoke to Jeremiah saying, “…concerning the shepherds who shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them…” As I think about this charge from God, my first thought goes to King Saul, who was charged to look over God’s people as their king. The problem with Saul is that he ended up turning his back to God as he became seduced by power and position.
God in turn decided to use David, a man who had been an actual shepherd to become the shepherd of Israel. Of course, David was no angel, and he had many faults, one of them was having a very lustful heart and out of that lust, committed murder. Yet David never lost sight of his relationship with God and of what God asked of him, which is why I believe he was chosen as the line in which God would use to bring the message of “reconciliation” to a world that so often forgets and goes astray.
But I also think that there is a strong message for us within the church when we look at what God was saying through Jeremiah. We as the church have too often not been good shepherds to those within the church as well as to the larger community of humanity. We often have turned our backs to God’s will and have been guilty of leading God’s people away from the fold. We do this by letting our own personal agenda’s become the “idols” that we worship instead of asking God for advice and direction.
Yet, God promised a true shepherd, which came in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. Through his teaching, in his willingness to shepherd a group of women and men, showing them that rules and rituals were not the way to experience the God who loves them, but rather through ministering to the needs of the poor and of the outcast, of giving hospitality to the immigrant, of tending to the needs of those who were sick and in prison, and of those who were possessed with spirits that were not their own. Through Jesus’ heart and of his working with all people, he showed the true message of “reconciliation” and “inclusiveness” of God’s love to every person.
So, through the teaching of Christ and in his death upon the cross, the ultimate example of humanities sin against God, we as children of God and as brothers and sisters to Christ, are enabled to share in the inheritance of Christ’s message. It is a message of life. This life is given and lived out when we act toward each other in the love of a living reconciliation to every human being, those that we meet and those that we will never have the privilege to meet.
For through Jesus’ life, we have been given the word of God, the light, that shows us how to live in harmony, not just with one another, but also in harmony within our selves, and even more greater than this, by living in harmony with God! It is in this state of being reconciled with God then, that the Kingdom of God is actually being lived out here and now, in the present! Jesus says that the Kingdom of God is here and now! When we are giving of ourselves to God’s teaching, when we are giving our hearts to the Spirit that God has sent to us, and asking through God’s Holy Spirit to fill us with love, guidance, charity and forgiveness, then we will be the continuation of that “Good Shepherd” that God sent to this world, some two thousand years ago. We will be the continuation of that Promise of hope, of reconciliation, of love, and of salvation that has been transferred unto us.
It is in the letter to the Colossians that we are given this assurance of the Promise of God that came to us in the person of Jesus Christ. It is this reason that we can say that Christ is the head of the Church. The writer of this letter to God’s church tells us that Christ himself was before all things and in him all things hold together. It might seem to us, when life has become too much to bear, due to the illness of a loved one or through our own illness, that God might not really be in control of everything. We can become so weighted down with financial problems with the loss of a job, or a decrease in our income, or by unexpected expenses, that we might wonder if God actually cares about our situation. As Christians, we are not exempt from all the stress and trials that come with life. Jesus never said to his followers, life will be an ongoing party. Jesus never told his disciples that God would spare them from pain, death, or hate directed at them by others.
In the Gospel, we see God’s own son was not spared any of the harshness that life can offer. Jesus was not shielded from the hate of those who were evil. Rather, we read where Jesus set his path to encounter those who were false teachers, those who were in leadership and doing harm to God’s world. We read where Jesus was so hated and feared by men who were only interested in what they could gain for themselves at the cost of everyone else, that he was falsely accused, tried, and put to death.
We have as our example of God’s true servant, the knowledge and assuredness that if we stand up and speak “truth” to those who are unjust and looking out only for their own benefit at the cost of others, that we will be crucified. We have a role model that tells us, that when we present God’s message of social justice, of God’s desire to reconcile the brokenness that comes when humanity hardens its heart to God, we can expect to be assaulted, be falsely accused, and have our character assassinated at the very least.
Yet, we can see that even when Jesus was up on the cross, amid the humiliation and bad mouthing of the crowd, he was able to ask God to forgive them of their ignorance and not hold their sinful behavior and actions against them. In fact, when one of the two other men who were also being crucified along with Jesus, asked Jesus to forgive him personally for his sins, Jesus, assured him that he would be alongside Jesus in paradise.
After examining today’s scriptures, you tell me who is in charge. It is clear to me that God is the one who is in charge. When we are feeling the weight of the world upon our shoulders, all we need to do is to look to Jesus and be assured God is in charge. Even in the darkest of lifes events, God has not abandoned us. We might not understand “why” life is going the way that it is going for us, but we can be assured that through God’s love for us, we are not abandoned, but that God is walking with us. We can be assured that God will not let the leadership of bad shepherds destroy God’s creation, but rather God will gather us back into His pasture. As the writer of Colossians so accurately points out, “…and through Christ, God was pleased to reconcile to herself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the
blood of Christ’s cross.” Amen