Year A, Christ the King
Good Shepherd on the Hill—Austin, TX
Jonathan Hanneman
November 26, 2017
“Where are you from?”
It’s a common question, one of the first we ask people when meeting them. Maybe we’ve visited their area and can strike up a conversation about our own experiences and impressions. Maybe it’s somewhere we’re hoping to go, and we want to get some inside information on what to do once we’re there. Maybe it’s somewhere new to us, and we have a ton of questions: “What’s the weather like? What kinds of food do you eat? What do people do for fun?” Learning about a place helps us understand just a little bit more about the person and how they relate to their home. Plus, it’s pretty a safe question—everybody’s from somewhere.
Saying where we’re from also helps us define a little bit about ourselves. For example, I grew up in Wisconsin, but I consider myself to be “from” Seattle. I’m a blend of both worlds, a little bit of cheese on the one hand and salmon teriyaki on the other. But Seattle is where I’ve chosen to live, and after 15 years, it’s much more “home” to me than anywhere I grew up. I can still relate well to people from the Upper Midwest and mostly blend in with the culture there, but now I’m much more comfortable with the customs and thought-processes of the Pacific Northwest and would rather remain in that environment when possible.
“Where are you from?” is generally an innocent question, but it can become complicated. Maybe a person is a refugee, and the question brings up painful memories or a longing for a place that’s lost forever. Maybe someone grew up in a military family and has no fixed sense of “home.” Sometimes the complication is on the asking end, like when someone is being sarcastic and using it as an insult—“Where are YOU from?” Sometimes the enquirer has ill intent and hopes to cheat a newcomer or to find a reason to discriminate against someone from a different background.
But there’s another group for whom this question can be remarkably confusing, so confusing that they often don’t realize they’re giving the wrong answer. Not to worry you, but we’re completely surrounded by them this morning. After all, when you’re a Christian, how do you really answer when someone asks, “Where are you from?”
Today is Christ the King Sunday. This feast is a fairly recent addition to the Liturgical Calendar, with its first celebration occurring less than 100 years ago in 1925. Moved to the very end of the Church Year in the 1970s, it both closes out “Ordinary Time,” the season of the Spirit, and helps us turn our attention to the preparation of Advent and the coming of Jesus. But above all, this celebration, born in a time of rising nationalism that led to World War II, is meant to remind us of the truth of “where we’re from.” It’s a call to remember our true citizenship—not as Austinites (or Seattlites) or Texans or Americans, but as Christians, as children of God whose actual home is the Kingdom of Heaven.
Just as we can tell when someone comes from a different place, there are ways that we as Christians naturally show that we “aren’t from around here.” And they’re the same ways, sometimes subtle, sometimes significant, we recognize if someone is from a different culture: expectations, attitudes, and actions.
How many of you have heard of “the ugly American”? It’s a phrase Europeans sometimes use to describe how people from the United States don’t fit in when they visit other countries. Compared to most European cultures, Americans tend to be boisterous, loud, and direct to the point of being rude. As Americans, we don’t recognize that we’re acting differently—we’re just living the same way we would in the United States: we look everyone in the eye; we try to be open and honest; and we show our emotions relatively easily. We expect a certain level of equality from society and often miss social cues that someone may be considered more important than we are or deserve more respect than we’re giving them. Some Europeans think Americans are uncivilized and brutish; some think that we’re charming or refreshing or even childlike and sweetly naive. The same things that offend one person may endear us to another.
It’s the same way as citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven. Someone whose home is in heaven has a tendency to stand out wherever they live, even in America.
In our Gospel today, Jesus said, “…I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ Then the righteous [respond, in summary, ‘Wait—what? When did we see or do any of that?’ Jesus answers,] ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these…you did it to me.’”
The mark of a Christian, the thing that sticks out in any earthly culture, is a unique, almost innocent humility. Christian humility displays itself in a kind of self-forgetfulness, a self-emptying. (For all you theological buffs, the formal term is “kenosis.”) Over time, this happens naturally to anyone who follows Jesus. As we become more like the First Citizen of the Kingdom of Heaven, we automatically begin to pick up on his heavenly habits and thinking.
It sounds strange, but in the Gospel reading, the righteous don’t remember doing anything kind or helpful for Jesus. Yet Jesus said that they did: they fed and clothed him; they welcomed him into their homes; they took care of him when he was in need. How could they not remember doing any of those things? On a normal day, you don’t remember waiting for a green light or tipping a waiter; you don’t recall looking someone directly in the eye as you’re talking to them. In America, those things are natural to us; it’s who we are as a culture. In that same way, what the righteous from our Gospel did was perfectly natural to them. They cared for Jesus (or his people) out of habit and cultural practice, not out of duty or requirement. Their accustomed self-emptying made those kind actions so normal that they didn’t stand out in their memory at all.
So where are you from? Is Christ really your king? Chances are, you’re like most of us who confuse our national social culture with the Kingdom of Heaven—everyone does to some extent. How do you show you’re a citizen of Heaven when you’re living on earth? It can look tricky, but the answer is simple. Read your Bible. Pray. Do the good works God places in front of you. If you mess up, start again. Citizenship is a long-haul prospect. You only become a local by engaging in local practices. You’re bound to make mistakes at first, but over time, the habits of goodness and kindness, of faith and love will become more and more natural to you. Humility and self-emptying will become your way of life to the point where you stop even noticing when you’re practicing them. Eventually, you bring your home in the Kingdom of Heaven along with you in your daily life on earth. And as you do so, as the life of Christ moves within you, people may start to ask you a simple question, one that may have an answer that surprises even you.
“Where are you from?”