(Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “Coronation”, originally shared on May 10, 2023. It was the 263rd video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)
Have you ever longed to be given a crown? It
is our sure and certain hope, and we receive it by God’s grace. And then we
throw it away. How does that work? Today, we’re going to find out.
The coronation of King Charles III as king
of the United Kingdom and other countries in the Commonwealth took place last
Saturday. You probably saw at least some of it if you were like post people on
this planet.
It was a
highly religious and mostly Christian ceremony with elements of ritual that go
back a thousand years, and roots that go even deeper. Kings of Israel were
anointed as the sign of God’s call and blessing. King Charles was anointed by
the Archbishop of Canterbury in a ceremony that took place behind a screen, out
of the public’s view.
Whatever your
view of what happened behind that screen it pointed to God’s wholly otherness,
to God’s transcendent presence in a way that is rare in public worship today.
We still call
our Sunday morning gatherings “worship”, though in many places it seems more
like the wistful gathering of people who at best seek to recapture a church
organization of the idealized past and at worst is a meeting of a social
service agency that uses religious language. It is casual, unceremonious, self-referential,
performative, and self-deprecating. We have sought to make worship accessible
and relatable.
What we are
losing is what makes it worship: a sense of the Holy and direction toward the
holiness of God.
How do we
change that?
How do we progress
to where worship points to the living, transformative relationship with the one
true living God for which we were created, that expresses more than just a
casual acquaintance?
It’s been said
that when Handel composed his oratorio, the “Messiah”, he went into seclusion. When
he was composing the closing “Hallelujah Chorus” he barely ate or slept. His
assistant grew concerned and bravely entered the room, where he found Handel staring
into space with an almost beatific glow. He said, “I think I did see
heaven open, and the very face of God.”
How many of us receive
the gifts of the arts in worship with anything close to that regard, or enter into
worship with any hope of a divine encounter at all?
Kings stand
when the “Hallelujah Chorus” is sung. Everyone stands. Why? Because both the words
(all of which come from the Bible) and the music point to the King of Kings.
The last
Sunday in the Church Year is Christ the King Sunday. It’s kind of weird for
Americans to call Jesus a King, as we had a revolution to shake off the rule of
a bad one.
We worship the
king of kings who wore a crown of thorns.
Why do we care
about crowns?
You may have
heard someone say, after you’ve done some sacrificial act, “Well, that’s
another jewel in your crown”. But there’s no reference to that in the Bible;
not that I can see. It’s just another metaphor for doing something for which
there is no reward in this world.
Either way, why
do we care?
What happens
to those crowns, the ones we get for heaven?
We see in Revelation
4:6b-11, NOTE: [lion=Mark; ox=Luke; face of a human= Matthew;
flying eagle=John],
6 Around the throne, and on each side of the
throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: 7 the first living creature like a lion, the
second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with a face like a
human face, and the fourth living creature like a flying eagle. 8 And the four living creatures, each of them
with six wings, are full of eyes all around and inside. Day and night without
ceasing they sing,
“Holy,
holy, holy,
the
Lord God the Almighty,
who
was and is and is to come.”
9 And whenever the living creatures give glory
and honor and thanks to the one who is seated on the throne, who lives forever
and ever, 10 the twenty-four elders fall before the one who
is seated on the throne and worship the one who lives forever and ever; they
cast their crowns before the throne, singing,
11 “You are worthy, our Lord and
God,
to
receive glory and honor and power,
for
you created all things,
and
by your will they existed and were created.”
All our crowns
are thrown at Jesus’ feet.
Our achievements,
even our good works, are subordinate to the work of Jesus on the cross.
Queen
Victoria, King Charles’ great-grandmother, is reported to have said that she
hoped that Jesus would return during her reign so that she could literally
throw her earthly crown at Jesus’ feet.
Ultimately the
only crown that matters is the crown of thorns that tells us the meaning of what
happened on the cross.
What happens
behind the curtain is not mystery. In fact, there is neither curtain nor
mystery in the Christian faith, but reality. God’s revelation is our revolution,
our reformation. We don’t need a pep-talk. We need a reality check.
How do we
bring that revelation to a Church in material decline?
First, I think
that we need to open our hearts to God’s transformational presence to change
ourselves, not to put our focus on changing our church.
If we are
changed our church will change. That is what the Word of God and the means of
Grace do. Those are the means of the Holy Spirit at work within and among us.
They are all
we need, because the Holy Spirit is all we need.
Second, we
will not renew the church by inviting people to pay the bills, to meet people
superficially like themselves, to support the current leadership, or to carry
on the traditions of what we think our churches have done in the past.
Third, breaking
down the church to whatever pleases people does not make it less formal. It
just makes it less of a church. Mocking the church does not make it more
relatable. It just enters us in a race to the bottom. Dumbing down the church
doesn’t make it more accessible. It just tells non-members that we have a low
opinion of them. Lowering our expectations for membership or the Christian life
does not make us less legalistic. It just makes us a less attractive
alternative to the world.
Fourth, we are
called to be a Christian community, not a secular institution with a Christian
tradition. A Christian community does
not place institutions and traditions in the forefront. It exists to point
people to the living God who changes lives. Changed lives change the world.
Fifth, repentance
and forgiveness are at the beginning of our worship services for a reason, yet
for many people they have become just another element to finish and check off
the list in the Order of Service. Why not receive them joyfully and actively as
a reminder of the restoration of our true selves at the start of every day, as
a daily reminder of the new life that is begun in Jesus Christ, the King of
Kings, within us?
Sixth, the
world is longing for connection. We are made for it, and we have lost it during
the pandemic. We can bear witness to what we have been given by demonstrating a
sense of energy and enthusiasm for service that is not dismissive and worn-out.
We can live the outcome of transformed lives by embodying the fruit of the Holy
Spirit. What is that fruit?
Paul writes in his letter to the church at Galatia, in Galatians
5:22-23,
22 By contrast, the fruit
of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity,
faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and
self-control. There is no law against such things.
Seventh,
selfless love is our hallmark. It is showing actual boundary breaking love for
one another. It is living lives that show that we actually believe what we say.
Living with integrity, not just in my faith or in my truth but in the living relationship
with the one true living God for which we were created, is who we are and
therefore what we do. Faith is not something we make up; it is reality itself.
We don’t
worship out of a force of habit, or a tradition, or a fear that we “have to”,
but from a desire to be in communion with God and in fellowship with other people
whose lives have likewise been changed, who have been redeemed, who have
received power from on high!
There are
always stresses that threaten to divide us, but a focus on Jesus, and not “my”
journey, will bind us together across every wound of division.
This is the
only “enlightenment” that matters. The epiphany of the Word made flesh.
Crucified, risen, and coming again.
So what if
we’ve lost the power as a result of the loss of numbers? That was never our
superpower anyway. So what if some have lost their confidence, if they
experience a spiritual emptiness? We are a Christian community, the Body of
Christ. We are God’s agents, we are called and equipped to build one another up
again.
I ask you to
go inside yourself right now and look around. God is there and will encounter
you. Ask Him. God will build you up so that you can build others up in God’s
Name.
I’ve read that
the coronation of King Charles III cost over $126 million. Other estimates run
from $63 million to $315.5 million, and there has been some controversy over
who should pay for it all.
Sally and I
attended the installation service of a local pastor last Sunday. Sally was
representing The Southern California Christian Forum and the Ecumenical
Interfaith Relations Committee. When pastors start a new call at a new church
they aren’t crowned, they are installed. Like the plumbing. 😊
The service
was elegant, it contained elements of ancient tradition, and it featured people
from many walks of life pointing to the roll of pastor that includes pointing
to the transcendent in the Christian life. It didn’t cost much in money, but
its foundation was paid for with the blood of Jesus Christ.
But the same
Christian community was present at both events, the same hope was referenced,
and the same Lord was Lord of all.
Our foundation
is the death of Jesus on the cross that has reconciled us to God and restored
the relationship for which we were created. Let’s live into that gift.
Athletes who
won their events in the ancient Olympic Games were not awarded a medal but a wreath,
translated in the King James Version of the Bible as a “crown”, of laurel
leaves.
Paul says in 1
Corinthians 9:24-25,
24 Do you not
know that in a race the runners all compete, but only one receives the prize?
Run in such a way that you may win it. 25 Athletes
exercise self-control in all things; they do it to receive a perishable wreath,
but we an imperishable one.
Receiving this
prize is our coronation, the imperishable wreath, the one that matters forever,
and it comes as a gift from God, who we worship, and for whom we live in the
power of the Holy Spirit from the inside out.
We may pray
for and respect King Charles and all worldly leaders, but let us worship
Jesus, the King of Kings.
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