Scripture Jeremiah 23:1-6
Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the Lord. Therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, 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. So I will attend to you for your evil doings, says the Lord. Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall no longer fear or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the Lord.
The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.
Sermon
This year marks the 100th anniversary of the observance of Christ the King Sunday, introduced by Pope Pius XI in his encyclical, Quas Prima (“In the first…”). Today this feast is celebrated, not only by Roman Catholics, but by numerous protestant denominations, including the PCUSA. We celebrate Jesus Christ as a king unlike any other king in history. At the same time, we need to understand that this very same observance is being used in many quarters as part of a drive toward theocracy—rule of our governments by the Christian church. And that was the Pope’s intention in writing the encyclical—that a Roman Catholic theocracy should replace secular governments.
It's complicated.
It’s complicated to talk of kings at all right now. That complication begins in scripture, with God’s stern message to the people of Israel, who came to the prophet Samuel demanding a king, only to be told by God, “You’ll be sorry. But I’ll give you a king, if that’s what you want.”
It’s complicated because. After seeing a vision, the Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity in the year 312 CE, installed Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire in the year 313. Before that, the world knew Jesus as the rabbi from Galilee who preached repentance and renewal and the kingdom of God, but never, himself, claimed a title of kingship. Jesus was the one who walked the length and breadth of Judea and beyond, teaching, healing, and feeding people, casting out demons and calling out the religious authorities of the day, and advocating for the poor, the outcast, and those called sinners. Jesus was the one who was crucified because he was believed to be a threat to Rome, and was raised again. And not once did he wear a crown, aside from the one fashioned from thorns which he wore on the cross.
It’s complicated, because we live in an era when, on the one hand, there are such things as “No King” rallies in protest of a government that was formed in rebellion against a king, and, that very monarchy against which we rebelled seems frayed and unstable at best.
Why do we call Jesus “king”? It’s complicated.
Today we have heard two passages from scripture: Psalm 46, which uses the word “kingdom” in reference to things that are tottering; and the passage I’ve just read from the prophet Jeremiah, where the word king is used just once.
But first, the prophet uses the word, “shepherd.” In this passage, Jeremiah is sharing God’s plans for those exiled in Babylon, but not before God calls out the rulers who are responsible for that catastrophe. If you have time this afternoon, by all means, read Jeremiah chapter 22, where God lambastes the last several kings of Judah one by one, accusing them of all manner of corruption and incompetence. Here are few of God’s choice words:
I will prepare destroyers against you,
all with their weapons… ~Jer. 22:7
Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness
and his upper rooms by injustice,
who makes his neighbors work for nothing
and does not give them their wages… ~ Jer. 22:13
I spoke to you in your prosperity,
but you said, “I will not listen.” ~Jer. 22:21
I will hurl you and the mother who bore you into another country,
where you were not born, and there you shall die. ~Jer. 22:26
Thus saith the Lord.
In our passage, God summarizes the divine wrath, telling the kings—still calling them shepherds—that they and they alone are responsible for the exile—the scattering of God’s people to a strange land, indeed, by this time, to many lands. And God, who from the beginning warned the people of the ways of kings, assumes again the kingship which belongs only to God, if to anyone.
Then I, myself, will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall no longer fear or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the Lord. ~ Jer. 23:3-4
These tender words describe God’s plan to bring God’s people home, and to provide them with worthy leaders. God uses the word “shepherd” to describe those leaders. The verb—to shepherd—describes various things that shepherds do—to pasture, to feed, to tend, to graze. A shepherd tends the sheep, makes sure they are fed by leading them to good places to graze. A shepherd also protects the sheep—those big staffs they carry are good for more than walking. They are also good for fighting off predators—lions, poachers, anyone who might be thinking a lamb dinner sounds good right about now.
And sheep, as Jesus notes in the Gospel according to John, know the voices of their shepherds. And shepherds know their sheep. They are not removed from them by the walls of palaces, or the rungs on the social ladder. or the customs of the day; they live with them. Their relationship is one of care, and intimacy, and tenderness.
The final oracle of the passage is why it is an offering today, on the feast of the Reign of Christ.
The days are surely coming, says the Lord,
when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch,
and he shall reign as king and deal wisely
and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. ~Jer. 23:5-6
This oracle was recognized by the early church, along with other passages, as referring to the Messiah, to Jesus Christ, descendant of David and, ultimately, the king who would save us, and execute justice and righteousness, unlike all those other kings. And Jesus was an unexpected sort of king. For most of his ministry, he had no permanent home, but depended upon the kindness of friends and strangers for lodging. He had no political power to speak of, though his words had enormous power for transforming lives and situations everywhere he went. And he certainly had a power for healing—almost completely indiscriminately; the one time he tried to turn someone away, her mother talked him into using his power for healing after all.
Jesus’ power can be summarized by the words he affirmed as being the greatest and most important of commandments: Love God. Love one another. That’s it. If Jesus is king, he is the only king in history to live entirely for others, and to die for them, too.
On the screens is an image of “The Good Shepherd” from the catacomb of Callixtus in Rome. It is an image of Jesus, young and beardless. He is carrying a sheep on his shoulders, like the character in the parable, who leaves 99 sheep to find the lost, lone animal. He is no warrior. He is slight of build. Not a crown or retinue in sight. He is doing something that undergirds all his work: returning individuals to their community.
Nothing in the gospels suggest that Jesus is intended to be a king like Constantine, or Charles, or Herod. But our passage does tell us that his rule is just. It is righteous. According to one scholar,
There is no place for corrupt leadership, oppression, and dishonest gain in the kingdom of God. Those who pursue their own interests, those who turn a blind eye to the plight of the weak, those who seek dishonest gain or profit through unethical means, were all called out in Jeremiah 22… The prophets make clear that justice and righteousness must be practiced within God’s community at all levels of society. [1]
The first images of Jesus in regal attire or on thrones appeared in the 4th century, after Constantine’s conversion. Once Christianity was “legitimized” by empire, artists began producing images of Jesus as a king. Jesus never sat upon a throne, or wore robes of gold, or non-thorn-filled crowns. He never signed edicts or commanded an army. He never sentenced anyone to death. How Jesus appears in paradise is something we will all have to wait to discover.
It is a slippery slope from Jesus as our king, the king of our hearts, the one we embrace as our Lord by faith, to imposing the acceptance of Jesus as king for those who do not believe as we believe. Jesus asked people to believe in him, to follow him, which usually meant giving up all their possessions. He never once forced anyone to believe as he believed. Our celebration of Christ as King includes our joy at being able to freely make that choice. Christ is the gentlest of kings, and comes to us only in invitation and love.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
[1] Ee Yan Tan, Commentary on Jeremiah 23:1-6: Christ the King, The Promises of Our God are Sure and Certain. Working Preacher, November 23, 2025. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/christ-the-king-3/commentary-on-jeremiah-231-6-12.