Sunday, November 23, 2008

Christ the King

They will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with great power and majesty; then He will send out the angels...-Jesus (from Mark's gospel 13th chapter)

Today the Church celebrates Christ the King. St. Paul tells the Ephesians, "All things are under His feet! He is the exalted Head of the Church, which is His body." Glory to our King! This is the last Sunday before Advent begins, before the waiting begins! We go out of "ordinary time" into the time of great expectation! The Church is constantly reminding us of the Salvation Story. We are constantly in it! When we call Jesus our King, we are also saying we are a Kingdom. We do not call him president, we do not live in a democracy as followers of Jesus. He is King forever! We live in a kingdom. And where does this kingdom exist until He comes in the clouds?, within each of us. Jesus said people will say, "there it is.", or "it is there.", but no, the Kingdom of God is the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit making Their Home within us. Our lives are where God wants to be! How amazing! He loves us so much! Therefore, Christ reigns in each of His holy ones. So we must stop sinning and living as though we can do what we want! This idea is not part of the Kingdom life, the Kingdom of God is not the American Dream. In fact, it is mostly opposed to it. So when we pray the prayer Jesus taught us to pray, and say, "Thy Kingdom come..", remember that we are asking Him to come and live within us again. We are saying, 'I do not want to rule over myself, I turn from a life of selfishness.' We are asking Him to rule over us. We give Him the key to our lives and souls. And if Jesus is truly King of our hearts, one day we will see Him coming in the clouds, and we will be ready to stand on His right with the other sheep when the angels are sent out to gather every soul.

wkm

Christ the King, a detail from the Ghent Altarpiece by Jan van Eyck.

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