Surprise!
Do you remember a big surprise?
Perhaps an unexpected gift or a sudden glimpse of beauty that takes your breath away?
Then there is the other kind of surprise, a bad surprise.
A theft, an accident, a failure, sudden shame, when we are mugged by the gruesome violence that is so often hidden away, the surprise of death, a sudden cessation that takes our breath away.
The vision of Divine Judgment as surprise.
That is what Matthew leaves us with this morning.
This is how we finish up the Christian year, next Sunday we begin a new year.
We finish up with a vision of Judgment, with Christ as the King of the Universe, setting all things right, it is a vision of judgment that is much more than just punishment; it is a vision of judgment as restoration.
What is the surprise?
That when Jesus returns after a long absence we are told that he has never left, that he has been here all along.
Surprise!
Where has he been?
The stranger, the hungry, the suffering, the prisoner, the thirsty, the naked.
This is a different kind of Christmas, a different kind of Feast Day, a different kind of Incarnation of God in human flesh.
How do we welcome this King of the Universe? Whose swaddling clothing lies not in a manger, but in the gutter?
What gifts do we bring to the King of Kings and Lord of Lord’s?
Not frankincense, gold and myrrh, but rather food, drink, clothing, shelter, comfort, dignity, compassion.
The Magi bring their gifts for the King, Jesus has never left, he is present.
It is interesting that the terms of the final Judgment says nothing about confessing Jesus as Lord, nothing about creedal orthodoxy, nothing about sin and grace, forgiveness or faith, nothing about religion or Church.
It is simply love.
Love that is concrete, that cares for those in need.
That’s it.
It isn’t about earning or buying our way to heaven, it isn’t about earning extra credit, it is about having the capacity to love, to care, to reach out to those in need and in doing so we do so to God, in receiving the needy we receive Christ
It brings a whole new meaning to the question of, “Have we received Jesus into our lives as Savior and Lord?”
Love as sacrament.
Love as conversion.
The needy as the incarnation of God.
Surprise!
Scripture describes salvation and faith and ultimate Judgment in so many ways, and Matthew shows us a way of faith that is universal yet particular, that is mystical yet deeply practical.
This isn’t about how to make God like us.
It is about how God is revealed and known and received.
The incarnation of Christ in those in need is the gift that reveals God, it is the Good News that in Christ God is totally and fully present in the worlds pain and lostness and that we are to meet God there.
Do we hunger and desire God? Then descend into the pain and need of the world. That is the sacrament of Christ in the Gospel according to Matthew.
I really don’t know anymore what people really need or want. But I do know what I desire in my heart: a vision of God and a place to belong.
In this other sacrament, in this other Christ-mass, we are given both: the vision of God in need, and that we belong in that place need, that place of God’s need enfleshed in the need of the world, this is the feast of the Nativity of our Lord, this is the Advent of Christ the King.
We have been given a vision of God present in the world. We have been shown where we belong.
This is where our own pain finds meaning, our own lostness finds home, our own hunger finds food: in the pain and need of humanity.
Anderson is a place that lavishly welcomes the King.
Grace Church is a Church that welcomes the King.
Let us never lose that surprise of seeing Jesus.
May each of us carry the sort of love that touches the pain and need of the world in real and tangible ways, in doing so we worship the Lord.
In doing so we confess the faith, the faith of the God who loves surprises.