A Different Kind of King for a Wounded World

As we approach Christ the King Sunday, the readings from Jeremiah 23:1–6 and Luke 23:33–43 land with striking clarity. They speak into the themes we’ve been wrestling with lately: God’s healing presence in chaotic times, the quiet breaking-in of new creation, persistence in faith, and the call to live courageously and compassionately in a divided world.

Jeremiah doesn’t pull any punches. He names the pain caused by leaders who fracture, scatter, or forget the people they were entrusted to serve. Yet he also holds out a promise—a Shepherd-King who gathers the lost, restores the wounded, brings justice, and leads with a righteousness that lifts rather than crushes.

It’s a vision that feels both ancient and painfully current.

Then Luke takes us to a hill outside Jerusalem where our King appears in the least kingly way imaginable—nailed to a cross, mocked, dismissed, and surrounded by those who only understand power as force. Yet here, in the place of ultimate vulnerability, Christ reveals what real kingship looks like.

The world expects domination; he offers forgiveness.
The world demands proof; he gives mercy.
The world prizes strength; he welcomes a dying man into paradise.

This is a radically different kind of king—one who refuses to rule through fear, threat, or spectacle. One who reigns through compassion, reconciliation, and courage. And honestly, that vision feels especially needed right now.

We live in a moment when so many are anxious about the future—about our community, our nation, and the fractures that seem to widen every day. Jeremiah’s critique of shepherds who scatter hits close to home. We know what it feels like to be wearied by leaders who divide instead of gather, who inflame instead of heal.

Christ the King Sunday calls us to lift our eyes above it all—not to escape the world’s realities, but to see them through the lens of a kingdom that works differently.

A kingdom where mercy is strength.
Where justice is healing.
Where hope is not a wish, but a way of life.

As we prepare to enter Advent, this feast invites us to let Christ’s kind of kingship shape our lives: to resist the pull of fear, to choose compassion over cynicism, to embody reconciliation where others choose division, and to let generosity—of heart, of resources, of time—be the mark of the kingdom we’re part of.

In a wounded world, a different kind of king makes all the difference. And his kingdom is still breaking in—through us, among us, within us.