Reflection for Sunday – November 23, 2025

Readings: 2 Samuel 5: 1-3; Colossians 1: 12-20; Luke 23: 35-43 
Preacher: Margot Van Etten

“King of the Jews” the sign over him said.

Over the bleeding, battered, dying man who had done no wrong yet was crushed by Imperial might, colluding with religious elites who should have honored him and the mob who should have loved him. Bound and helpless like every victim of state cruelty, humiliated like every outcast, bleeding like the victims of every war down to our own day in Ukraine, Sudan, Gaza… Immersed in the suffering of all humankind.

“How should a king come?

Everyone knows the answer of course:

in a golden robe on a milk white horse…”

This little Christmas carol has it right: What humankind expects in a king is power, domination, a warrior who will conquer all the bad guys and hurt those we hate: a dazzling showman winning crowds with spectacular, dramatic exhibitions. Someone who will bend the world to his will by any means needed till it looks the way we think it should.

We got something quite different.

Something no one in their wildest dreams would expect. (Though the prophets of Israel got glimpses, gave hints.)

Holy Being Itself, the Love which brought forth the Universe and all within it, the Source of all beauty and life itself contracted and poured into a tiny human life in an insignificant village in an occupied and impoverished land…to share our life, to serve, to love without limit, to accept everything and everyone, to give until the final breath, the last drop of blood…to make us whole. To bring all creation into union. To share Divine life with all of us.  “God became human so that [humans] could become God,” St Athanasius said. We don’t hear it, but at every Mass when a drop of water is commingled with the wine in the chalice with the whispered prayer that in the same way we might share in Christ’s divinity, Who came to share our humanity..

When Christ burst from the tomb, Death was shattered. And when he returned to the Father at the Ascension, he brought all our human life with him into the very divine life of the Trinity. This means that each one of us is invited to share that life. Unimaginable. But that is the ultimate goal of Christian life.  What a gift!

There are two things we can take away from this.

First, when in our grief or pain or discouragement at all the darkness in life we are tempted to ask “where is God”—we can look at the Cross and hear God say “right here.”  In Jesus, God has entered into all our suffering and is with us in every bit of it. (As well as into our joys.)

Secondly, God is more than with us: the God who is everywhere present and pervades all things is also withinus, meeting us in the very deepest core of our being— beyond all the worries, doubts and fears; beyond all the personal weaknesses and failings; beyond everything we think we are. In the depths of our hearts God whispers “Do not be afraid; I am here. I am with you. I will help you.” In Christ we are inseparably united with God, and while we only catch glimpses of this here, we are promised that where Christ is, we shall find our home as well.  The call is to grow fully into what we already are: channels of that invincible light and love here on earth.  And in the meantime, to trust in his promise. The King of the universe has overcome all that the world or the darkness can do, and ultimately all shall be well.

We can take this into our meditative prayer, in our quiet time breathing the words Isaiah gave us …”do not be afraid. I am here. I am with you. I will help you in time with our breath, drawing the words deep into our heart. Then as we breathe them in, we can let our mind’s eye see the Light filling our heart like a bright flame, growing with each breath in… “I am here…I am with you….”, growing to fill our entire being with its warm radiance.  After sitting with it for a while, we can let the light flow forth with each outbreath, into all the world, everywhere that seems dark …. And fills it.

God-With-Us overcomes the darkness. This is how a king comes. How Love wins.