Singing about the Cross

A sermon for the Last Sunday after Pentecost: Proper 29
(Commonly called Christ the King)
November 23, 2025, at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Hot Springs, AR

Readings: Jeremiah 23:1-6; Canticle 16; Colossians 1:11-20; Luke 23:33-43

Our gospel takes us to that most familiar and disorienting scene: the death of Christ on a Roman cross. Scourged, tortured, and beaten, we see him in the moments before he breathes his last and commends his spirit to God the Father.

Today is the last Sunday of the Church year. Another name for today is the feast of Christ the King. Our gospel gives us Christ’s portrait at this final moment of his coronation: his throne is a rude cross that lifts him high for the world to see; his crown is a cruel twist of thorns pushed into the brow; his crimson is not a fine robe, but blood from his very body; his scepter is a nail, pierced through his human flesh. Unexpectedly, in this image, we see the majesty of God–not high and lofty above our cares and concerns, but fleshy, among us, sharing our very death. 

From the beginning of his ministry, we have known it would come to this. John the Baptist on the banks of the Jordan cries to his disciples: behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. And that is what he does on the cross. Our sin laid upon him, the perfect lamb. 

By sin, I do not only mean the errors we make in thought, word, and deed. Those are sins. We hurt one another; we stray from what is noble and honest and true; we turn to our own way. But sin is deeper than that, as well. Fundamentally, sin is not what we do or don’t do. It is who we are. It is the orientation, inherent in our souls since the fall, that points us away from God and the love and goodness of God. It is the separation of humanity from God, a separation we all feel, a separation that brings evil and pain and death into the world. 

It is this that is laid upon Christ: this separation, this fundamental orientation away from God. With it, every error of omission and commission, every stray thought or word or deed, is also laid upon the perfect lamb of God. Not only that, but every pain we feel; every agony that grieves our spirits; every burden that is too heavy to carry; every unimaginable situation made reality; every hurt, every tear, every sorrow–it is all laid upon the cross of Christ. It is felt and borne by the Lamb, God in the flesh.

It is all of this that Christ has come to heal through his saving life, death, and resurrection. It is this that the Son of God, our King, has come to conquer with his victorious and reconciling cross–a cross that now bridges earth to heaven, our souls to God, and gives us strength to go forward even when we do not know the way. 

In Christ, there is nothing on earth that is not felt in heaven: no pain, no sorrow, no grief, no burden, no confusion, no evil, no sickness, no disease, no death. There is no longer a separation between us, the agony of our human condition, and the Divine. Through Christ and his obedience to the Father, we have been brought close to the heart of God, and we bring all of our burdens with us. There at the foot of the cross, we are given strength to face those pains and agonies and griefs, those burdens too heavy to carry alone. And we don’t have to carry them alone, for Christ bears them with us. 

And the cross is really enough to do all of this. The cross accomplishes what it claims. But we human beings turn from the true medicine for our souls and toward our own power, suspicious, perhaps, of claims about the cross’s power. Oh sure, we will sing about the cross in church – when I survey the wondrous cross – but out there in the world, we rely on our own strength, our own agendas, our own power. We will sing about the cross – the old rugged cross made the difference – but we will put our trust in wealth and riches. We will sing about the cross – O sacred head sore wounded – but we will put our trust in children of earth, chanting slogans of empty promises, confident that they can usher in the unending day of peace by their strength. We sing about the cross, but we buy into everything else. 

My friends: the cross is more than a song. It is the power of God. And it is enough to reconcile us and the whole world to God’s heart of love and justice. 

The Feast of Christ the King, which we Anglicans only unofficially commemorate, was first instituted in the 20th century by Pope Pius XI. It was instituted as authoritarianism and strongmen swept across Europe, including in the Pope’s own backyard with the rise of Mussolini. Crowds, yearning for true peace, flocked to them. They put their trust in them. They would sing about the cross on Sunday morning, sure, but they put their faith in tyrants, in promises of peace and order, in the fallen state of mankind. But tyrants never die for us and cannot reconcile us to God. They cannot bring true peace to the earth.

Let us not just sing of the cross. Let us not just sing of Christ being crowned with many crowns. Let us not just sing of it and go out into the world, selling our faith to the highest bidder, the loftiest oratory, the biggest promise, the strongest man. This world will not save us. Today, and everyday, let us put our trust in the One who gave up everything for us, who is crowned with our sorrow and sin and death, and who promises to raise us to God. And if our true King has promised, he cannot lie. He cannot lie.

Jesus, remember us when you come into your kingdom.