Christ the King - 2019

I. Kanye

Kanye West is the highest paid entertainer in hip-hop. His first studio album came in 2004. Titled The College Dropout – it won the Grammy for Best Rap Album of the year and has since been named one of “The Greatest Albums of All Time” by both Time Magazine and Rolling Stone. Kanye also holds the record for having the most consecutive studio albums to debut at number one (yes, in front of The Beatles). Kanye is not a minor star, and is also married to celebrity Kim Kardashian to boot.

After his first album, Kanye became widely known. Early interviews probed some about Faith because his first huge song was titled “Jesus Walks.” Back then he said that he had accepted Jesus as his savior. That’s all.

Something more dramatic happened in the past year. Kanye was “born again,” and last month released a full-blown Gospel Album titled Jesus is King. It hit #1 on the Billboard chart two weeks back. (How could I not mention this on Christ the King?)

To hear Kanye tell it, what Jesus as Lord and King means has dramatically shifted for him. Whereas previous albums mention Faith and religious topics, they also contained a lot of profanity, descriptions of violence and drugs, and very unflattering descriptions of women.

Not on Jesus is King. No profanity, no violence, no negative attitudes towards women; a lot of glory to God, talk about his insecurities in Faith, and his struggle to put Jesus first every day. Here’ the point: Kanye would not have denied that “Jesus is King” 15 years ago, but what that means has significantly shifted in his life. We call this “conversion.”

II. Jesus is King

With Kanye’s journey in mind, today I trace what is many persons’ journeys in coming to a different, more real and mature understanding of Who Jesus is and what it means to affirm that Jesus is King, because, this is relevant to all of us.

Level Zero

On the most basic level, we have the “functional agnostic”: a person who believes that God exists (or is at least open to the idea), but denies that God is personally involved in the

Christ the King - 2019 world in any meaningful way. Here, that Jesus is God is unimportant or outright denied. This person might not argue with the statement “God is King,” but it wouldn’t impact one’s life.

Level One

The next level likely represents Kanye’s Faith when his career began 15 years back, and probably describes where many of us are (or were at some point) in our Faith journey. Here a person believes in a Trinitarian God, and that the Eternal Son took flesh 2000 years ago out of love for humankind, and also has some sense of personal sin. Here one would say “Jesus is King”, but this has little effect on how one experiences day-to-day life.

Level Two

Not knowing exactly where Kanye is in his faith journey, we could probably say, nonetheless, that Kanye is NOW at least at the next level. Kanye, you see, had some sort of life- changing encounter with the Lord Jesus in the past year or so. It convinced Kanye of his King’s love and power in his life.

That encounter is leading Kanye to grapple with MANY ASPECTS of his life, and he has repented and mourned the time he’s spent living outside that love and perhaps leading others astray as well. That is not my judgment on Kanye, it’s his own sentiments expressed in recent interviews and on Jesus Is King.

To use Kanye’s own words in the album:

Made a left when I should've made a right Told God last time on life …. Told the devil that I'm going on a strike I've been working for you my whole life

Kanye here owns St. Paul’s words today – that

He delivered us from the power of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Christ the King - 2019

Kanye now knows this truth through experience, and has declared that his life-mission is NOW to glorify God. To say Jesus is King means a lot more than it used to for Kanye.

Some are graced by God to basically be born here at this level and never regress. Meaning, since childhood, “Jesus is King” has meant something concrete and real in day-to-day life: a keen sense of the Lord’s love, their own failings, and desire to serve God. But most of us have to come to this “conversion” in our teen or adult years. At least in theory, here at this level, one’s entire life is committed to glorify God.

Level Three (and beyond)

It is still a ways to move from this level, “I have declared that my life is for God” to that declaration coming to fruition in reality through prayer and action. In other words, beyond here, almost infinite further progress in intimacy with God is possible. According to St. Teresa of Avila’s magnum opus, The Interior Castle, there are at least 5 distinct levels of spiritual growth beyond this. Each of the next levels becomes more mature, stable and self-sacrificial.

I will not probe much further here because of the complexity, but I want to emphasize the point that to say that – over the arc of our lives – to say “Jesus is King” hopefully means something more significant and concrete in daily life as we go – that we can perceive over the arc of half-decades (if we are younger) or decades (if we are older). We are never done, and this should not be cause for discouragement, but of awe and wonder that He is offering us more and more of Himself.

Saint Paul in today’s Second Reading describes in vivid terms what it means that Jesus is Lord:

in him all things hold together… He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he himself might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile all things for him, making peace by the blood of his cross

Christ the King - 2019

Jesus being “all in all” is a pretty intense statement – but this will be the reality in the END. To fully declare that Jesus is King actually means that Jesus is everything.

III. Type of King

Today’s Gospel passage emphasizes that Jesus’ Kingship is not based on domination, or taking our freedom, or taxing us, or using us as pawns, or asking us to grovel before Him. Jesus’ Kingship is grounded in His self-sacrifice on the Cross out of love for us. That’s how He has earned our allegiance beyond any doubt. The Good Thief’s conversion shows us it’s never too late, that God’s love is not earned through good deeds, and if we call out to Him we already begin to live in His Company.

IV. Conclusion

As He hung upon the Cross, His side was pierced and Water and Precious Blood poured forth. Meaning: the water of Baptism derives its power through His passion, and makes us clean as it brought us into relationship with the Trinity. That same Blood is literally contained in the chalice, and offers us life and communion with Him, a communion limited only by our lack of thirst.

Wherever we feel we are in our relationship with the Lord, He accepts us, and loves us as we are. That love is infinite and unconditional (unconditional love, again, means that there is literally nothing we can do to make Him love us less, OR more).

As we close out this Church year and a new year begins with Advent next weekend, let us resolve one concrete way to draw closer to Him, so that our confession of Jesus as Lord and King may more and more be all in all in us.

Praised Be Jesus Christ