Citizenship - A Sermon for Reign of Christ / Christ the King Sunday November 23 2025
God’s Word is a Living Word.
God speaks truth and grace,
God’s Spirit convicts us, moves us, changes us.
God’s speaks hope and promise
into the dark places our lives.
We have been hearing from the prophets
these past few weeks.
Amos prophesied to God’s people
in the Northern Kingdom at Carmel,
who in their prosperity,
continued to gain prosperity
at the expense of the vulnerable.
This angers God.
It was a word of judgment and encouragement:
Let justice run down like waters,
and righteousness like an overflowing spring.
Isaiah prophesied to the Southern Kingdom at Jerusalem
as they had been ravaged by war.
But the people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light.
God promised them a Child:
a Wonderful Counsellor,
a Mighty God,
an Everlasting Father,
a Prince of Peace.
God’s Living Word speaks truth and guidance
into our times of prosperity,
and God’s Living Word speaks hope and illumination
into our times of suffering and darkness.
As we turn to the prophet Jeremiah today,
you could say that, for Israel,
things had gone from bad to worse.
God’s people knew the trials of imperial conquest.
Judah had been under Egyptian control,
but following the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BCE,
the Southern Kingdom and King Jehoiakim
were then under the control of Babylon.
Eight years later, in 597,
the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar,
asserted his power over Judah’s king, Jehoiachin,
son of Jehoiakim,
sending him and other Jewish leaders
into exile in Bablyon.
Just ten years later,
after a failed rebellion,
Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem and the temple,
and sent even more people into exile.
Invite Reader Forward
This is who Jeremiah is speaking to;
a people, conquered and conquered again,
forced away from their homes,
communities,
and no longer able to worship in the Temple.
In our own transitions,
the prophet is speaking to us.
So let us open our hearts and minds
to God’s Living Word for us today…
Narrative Lectionary Reading: Jeremiah 29:1-14
A reading from Jeremiah.
1 These are the words of the letter that the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the remaining elders among the exiles and to the priests, the prophets, and all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.
4 Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: 5 Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. 6 Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. 7 But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. 8 For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let the prophets and the diviners who are among you deceive you, and do not listen to your dreams that you dream, 9 for it is a lie that they are prophesying to you in my name; I did not send them, says the Lord.
10 For thus says the Lord: Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place. 11 For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. 12 Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. 13 When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, 14 I will let you find me, says the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.
Word of God, word of life.
Thanks be to God.
The prophet is clear;
God sent them into exile,
and it is their own fault.
The people were unfaithful,
so God sent them away.
You might recall the story of Adam and Eve.
That story in Genesis was actually written
while Israel was in exile,
or shortly afterwards.
Adam and Eve sinned,
they disobeyed God,
and were cast out of the Garden of Eden
and life became miserable.
Adam and Eve is Israel,
people of God’s creating and choosing,
who now experience displacement
and abandonment.
Forced away from their homes,
communities,
and the Temple.
As much as the exile was a consequence
of Israel’s unfaithfulness,
We can’t ignore the reality of imperial conquest,
that Nebuchadnezzar conquered and oppressed.
Exile was Israel’s fault,
and they were also victims.
Maybe that’s just like us and our own problems:
a combination of outside forces,
and inner sin.
In Babylon, Mesopotamia, in modern Iraq,
some 400 miles away from Jerusalem,
exiled Israel became cultural outsiders.
Jeremiah says - Israel, exile is your own fault,
but don’t give into despair,
Live where you are at.
Exile is terrible.
God says live.
Exile means you are separated from your land,
your nation,
your citizenship.
God says live.
Exile threatens your language,
your culture,
your religion,
your way of life.
God says live.
God invited the exiles
to live and prosper where they were.
It is just like today,
yours and my welfare is absolutely connected
to Calgary’s welfare.
When I moved to Saskatoon or to Stony Plain,
then again my welfare was connected
to my new city.
We are all interdependent,
So God says to Israel;
live and prosper in your new land,
in your new city.
And God promised to bring them back.
But not everyone will come back.
70 years of exile
would be a death sentence for almost all of them.
In that hopelessness and despair of not coming back home,
God invited them into Shalom. (V7)
Verse 7 reads;
“But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” (v7)
The word translated welfare here is shalom;
a word with deep meaning.
Shalom is normally translated as peace,
but Shalom is deeper than the English word - peace.
Shalom is a peace that is infused with
justice,
wholeness,
health,
well-being,
and in this case,
the welfare of the city.
Shalom is peace with prosperity.
Shalom is something that
the people are encouraged to seek
and also a promise from God.
God will bring them shalom,
not just 70 years down the road,
not just in their ancestral promised land,
but right where they are, in their exile.
This must have been hard for Israel,
who long for the promised land.
That was part of the covenant.
The covenant also included a greater purpose:
God’s people are blessed to be a blessing
to all nations.
The people’s unfaithfulness
includes the consequence of displacement,
but they are still God’s people.
They are still blessed to be a blessing to all nations.
God’s people have a citizenship
that is greater than land or nation.
Their citizenship is with God.
It is a heavenly citizenship.
Dear followers of Jesus Christ the King,
our citizenship is in heaven.
This has a two fold meaning -
Our citizenship is in the heaven
that awaits the faithful when we die.
Christ the King bought your citizenship
it is yours.
Hold onto that hope,
that not even death can separate you from Jesus.
And our citizenship is in the Kingdom of Heaven,
the Kingdom of God
that Jesus ushers in our midst,
today, here and now.
When Jesus spoke about the kingdom of heaven
or the kingdom of God,
it was always in present,
earthly terms.
The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed,
a sower,
a lamp,
yeast,
a lost sheep,
a lost coin,
salt,
treasure hidden in a field,
the unforgiving servant,
labourers in the vineyard.
The Kingdom of Heaven is a promised future,
and a present reality of God’s presence in the world.
Our citizenship is in the Kingdom of Heaven;
Heaven that is found around the baptismal font
and around God’s table.
Our citizenship is in the Heaven that is found
in that scuzzy bar you’d never set foot in,
Heaven that is found in the break room at work,
at the food bank,
and all over our communities,
in places we’d expect,
and places we’d least expect.
Our citizenship is found
in the places where Jesus is found.
If you want to know where to find Jesus,
Matthew 25 offers some insight:
Jesus is found in the hungry and thirsty,
the naked, the prisoner, the stranger.
God always allows Jesus to be found.
Jesus is found here in this place,
Jesus is found in our neighbourhoods,
Jesus is even found in various kinds of exile.
Many people find themselves
in a place kind of like an exile today.
117 Million people in the world are refugees,
they are in an exile,
displaced, oppressed.
Indigenous peoples are figuring out
how to live and reconcile
amidst their own occupation.
Many of us in this time and place
have found ourselves in circumstances and situations
that have changed our lives drastically,
and life will never be the same.
Many of you know this pain and separation too well;
a feeling of being uprooted or displaced,
the loss of loved ones
and the loss of wellbeing,
loss of mobility, vision, health.
As we get older, we might find ourselves forced to move,
forced to transition from so-called independence
to interdependence,
or utter-dependence.
An exile from the old way of life
that we will not be able to return to.
The church is finding itself in a place like exile.
In our country there is no
imminent physical threat to Christians.
There is no threat of being uprooted
and forced from our homes.
But the Church in North America,
is experiencing an exile of influence,
an exile of normalcy.
It’s not normal to be church anymore.
It’s not expected that people be Christian.
It is an exile from a certain kind of church prosperity,
as if people from our pews have been uprooted,
as if the Christian life is being uprooted.
It is an exile of worth;
as if the church no longer matters in society.
Faithful people like us just want to know what to do
to right the ship,
to get out of this exile.
Like Israel in Exile,
or Israel in captivity in Egypt,
God alone can save.
God is calling us into faithfulness.
Amidst this time of despair, confusion,
and hopelessness,
when our lives look bleak,
We can look to the cross of Christ.
It was the greatest failure for a King
to be shamefully crucified on a Roman cross,
But God is a God of reversal,
and God turned the greatest failure
into resurrection and new life
even for the very people who rejected Jesus
By your baptism into Christ,
you are promised this:
resurrection and new life.
Christ will always offer you
the peace that surpasses all understanding,
peace that is yours in your transition,
in your suffering,
in your exile .
Christ the King is turning the world around.
I believe it. I cling to it.
This is our hope, God’s reversal is our hope.
This was Hannah’s hope that she sang
when her barrenness was reversed
and she bore Samuel.
This was Mary’s Magnificat,
sung when she was promised a child.
And we will sing our hope in Christ
with the Candle of the Turning in a moment,
But, sometimes, it also just feels like God’s reversal
is taking too long,
like Jesus is asleep on the cushion in our storm.
We want God to act on our timeline.
God is going to act,
not necessarily in Chronological time,
but in Kairos time,
in God’s perfect time,
in the in-breaking of God into the world kind of time.
We ought to learn from the prophets:
even when we don’t experience God,
or we only perceive God’s absence,
God is here,
and God is faithful,
even when it hurts.
Perhaps when we don’t see God,
God is found in thick cloud and darkness.
Perhaps God is found in sheer silence,
or perhaps in a roar.
God is certainly found here and now
in the Kingdom of Heaven.
Your citizenship is in the Kingdom of heaven.
You can call on your King,
Jesus the Christ, who reigns eternally,
wherever you are.
In the sanctuary,
in the living room,
in a forced transition,
in a hospital bed,
Trust that there is no place you can go
where God is not.
Trust that Christ,
who reigns now,
will always reign.
Trust in your citizenship with our God.
Find joy in your citizenship with Christ.
“For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the LORD, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.”
May we trust that Christ is Lord and King eternally
and find our citizenship in heaven.
May we call out to Christ in our suffering,
wherever we are at,
and trust in the Hope
of Christ’s death and resurrection.
May we trust that our God is a God of reversal,
who is turning the world around.
Thanks be to God! Amen.
Silence for reflection follows the sermon.
