Sunday Stretch: Vol. 57 - Christ the King Sunday

Start off your week with a grounded take on Bible, prayer, the world, and your life ...

Hi Readers,

First - a quick personal note. As I move into the second full year of writing these Substacks, I want to thank you all for sticking with me. Pastors sometimes comment that the second year of ministry in a church is the hardest. The *shiny newness* has worn off, and people are often more open with criticism, critiques, and complaints. At the same time, it’s your second time doing things with people. Sometimes that makes things easier, and other times it seems difficult to come up with interesting or innovative ideas.

I like to think of what we do here together on Sunday mornings as a congregation of sorts, though I also hope you’re feeling integrated into a local faith community, of course. And so in that sense, there’s a part of me that feels a bit of anxiety as we move into our second year together. Will I still have helpful things to say on Sunday mornings? Will God continue to bless our space and time together, bringing new revelation and hope amidst a busy and ever-shifting and violent world?

Of course, all it takes to answer these questions is my own weekly time of reengagement with the Bible texts and prayer, to be reminded that - yes! - God is in the space with us, bringing ever-new insights, hope, truth, and sometimes challenge. I’m so grateful for that blessing, and for your continued journey with me, especially as I learn to balance this writing work with my upcoming book deadline for Our Boys, which has consumed the majority of my attention and energy lately.

Today is an important Sunday, so let’s get to it!

This is Christ the King Sunday. I wrote last year in this space about the important role Christ the King has played in my own ministry journey. This year, I’m reminded of the ongoing warning this Sunday gives to us against the unconscious embrace of Christian Nationalism. (By the way, the Rev. Leah Schade and Christians Against Christian Nationalism offer some important insights here about the relationship between Christ the King and CN, read it here)

I recently had an experience that challenged my own willingness to “put my money where my mouth is,” so to speak, when it comes to my advocacy against Christian Nationalism and my desire to support marginalized and victimized people of other faith groups. Last week, the teachers union for the school district where my kids attend released a statement calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and support of the BDS movement in boycotting the state of Israel, using terms like “genocide” and “apartheid.” My kids attend a school in that district that has a high population of Jewish families, and many of the kids and parents are friends and neighbors of ours. In conversations with our Jewish neighbors since Oct. 7, I knew intimately how much pain and suffering and outright fear those neighbors had been enduring after Hamas’ attack on Israel. The statement from our teachers’ union, in the midst of a large rise in anti-semitic incidences and hatred in our schools, was immensely painful and fear-provoking for our Jewish neighbors, leading them to worry that our schools might not be a safe place for their kids.

At the same time, my own denomination (the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America) had also released a statement on the situation in the Holy Land, a statement again that seemed to single out Israel for blame and failed to mention the role of anti-semitism at all. I spoke out in our clergy groups and in conversation with other pastors at the time, feeling that it was irresponsible and cruel of our denomination not to also offer our support and solidarity to our Jewish siblings, particularly given our own Lutheran history of anti-semitism and general support of Nazism in German in World War II. For me, a white Lutheran of German descent, I really felt a particular calling to name these realities even while at the same time lamenting the violence and death and suffering endured by Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, noting also the difficulties and oppression faced by Palestinian Christians in Gaza and the West Bank, whose example has always been one that has humbled and inspired me, especially since my travel to the Holy Land during seminary.

When our Jewish neighbors and fellow school parents reached out and asked for my support and witness against the teachers’ union statement, and its omission of naming the realities of anti-semitism, I felt compelled to support them and stand with them in solidarity in whatever way I could. This involved sharing thoughts with our school administrators and our Site Council, on which I serve, and ultimately also joining the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas for an interview on local news.

As a former newspaper journalist, I think there’s probably always a part of me that can feels nervous about advocacy or political work that could be interpreted as partisan, even as I see how the biblical witness and the life and Gospel of Jesus often calls followers of Jesus into political activism, however fraught that might be. I knew there would be people who I respected who probably would disagree with what I had done, even as I come from a family of public school teachers who are and have been members of teachers unions, and we have been staunch supporters of public schools and would hate to do anything to harm their work. At the same time, I was also aware that many of those who I’d worked with in the past on anti-racism activism had been proactive and outspoken in their criticism of the state of Israel. And finally, I did not want to be perceived as taking space or oxygen away from the witness of Jewish families and neighbors who were directly affected by the statement.

Ultimately, after a great deal of prayer and discernment, and a lot of research into the work of JCRC (which impressed me, and on which I could find lots of common ground, especially in work against Christian Nationalism) I decided to move forward, still feeling intimidated by the task ahead.

I have to be honest and say I haven’t watched the local news segment yet. I think as a journalist myself it’s always kind of awkward to be on the other end of an interview. But I do continue to feel that my decision to speak out on behalf of my Jewish siblings was an important one, especially in line with the faith commitments most important to me.

What, you might ask, does all of this have to do with Christ the King Sunday or Christian Nationalism?

When preaching on Christ the King Sunday, I’ve always found it critical to remind people of Jesus’ words in John 18, which I also use to teach on Christian Nationalism.

My kingdom is not of this world.

Jesus’ reason for coming and living, dying, and rising again among us was not to create a Christian Kingdom here on earth. Jesus was not a national Savior. Instead, my faith in the incarnation of Jesus is rooted in my belief in a God who created us all in God’s own image, a debt and a heritage that Christians like myself owe to the Hebrew Bible, to a theology rooted in the Hebrew people, a Savior who was himself a Jew.

Ethan Roberts, the MN/Dakotas JCRC deputy executive director, said something that stuck with me about how it felt to be a Jewish family in Minneapolis reading the statement from the teachers union. He used the word dehumanizing about the way that he and many other American Jews had experienced reaction, especially among progressives, to the Oct. 7 Hamas assault on Israel, and the resulting war in Gaza.

This is the same danger: dehumanization - that compels me to fight so hard and speak so strongly against Christian Nationalism. The pernicious effect of nationalistic and triumphalist religious ideologies (theology of glory, if you will) is to prioritize groupthink and reactivity against an ability to see the real human suffering, pain, and despair even in complicated and deeply entrenched situations like the ongoing conflicts in the Holy Land. To be able to name anti-semitism and the atrocity of the terrorist attacks by Hamas against Israel does not have to be a zero-sum game that sanctions violence and hateful rhetoric committed by right-wing Israeli government officials and settlers. Instead, naming anti-semitism and standing in the breach of pain and loneliness with our Jewish siblings as well as our Palestinian siblings, does the hard work that Jesus calls us into of being willing to stand side by side with those who are in pain and offer comfort and solidarity.

As a Lutheran pastor and writer in Minnesota, I have little wisdom to offer on a potential two-state solution or end to war in Gaza and protection for Israelis against ongoing terrorist attacks by Hamas. There are so many instances of intersecting identities and oppressions, and the most frequent victims: children, the elderly, peace activists, journalists, medical workers - are those who are often the powerful witnesses to peace and human solidarity.

In this moment, though, what I could do was offer my support, witness, solidarity, and comfort to my Jewish neighbors who were rightly feeling alone and afraid in the absence of protection against the ever-enduring hatred and threatening violence of anti-semitism. I could acknowledge the ways in which white Lutherans and white Christians had failed to stand up in the past against the violence of anti-semitism, and how we have continued to fail to acknowledge our role in allowing its endurance in America. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to stand alongside my Jewish neighbors in this moment, knowing that no one’s witness is ever perfect, least of all my own.

Let’s get to the texts.

Photo by the Rev. Leah D. Schade

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Ezek. 34:11   For thus says the Lord GOD: I myself will search for my sheep, and will