11/23/08 - Christ the King - Ezekiel 34:11-16,23-24

DAVID II: OUR SHEPHERD-KING
- He stays to tend his flock
- He comes to save his flock

This is Christ the King Sunday. And so, of course, today’s entire service is focused on Christ the King. The hymns are focused on Christ the King. The sermon is focused on Christ the King. And the three Scripture lessons read today were focused on Christ the King. In our gospel reading we saw Jesus being mocked as a king by the soldiers before he was led away to be crucified. And in 1 Corinthians 15 we saw Jesus rule as a king over all things after he rose from the dead. But the first lesson we read was from the book of Ezekiel. Do you remember seeing Christ the King there? Take a look at Ezekiel 34:11-16,23-24 again and see if you can spot Jesus in those verses. Do you see him?
If I could, I want to give you a brief timeline of the Old Testament. And this chronological timeline will actually help you see Christ the King in Ezekiel 34. Adam and Eve were created in about 4000 B.C. - 4000 years Before Christ the King came into this world. Noah was born a little after 3000 B.C. Abraham in about 2000 B.C., Moses 1500 B.C. and King David in about 1000 B.C. (this is the important date you need to remember today…). After David and his son Solomon died, the Promised Land was divided into the northern part of Israel and the southern part of Judah. Judah had its own kings and Israel had its own kings for the next few hundred years. Now fast-forward to 722 B.C. That is when the northern land of Israel was conquered by the Assyrians and many of the Israelites were taken into exile. Judah still existed. But 140 years later in 586 B.C. the Babylonians conquered Judah and the city of Jerusalem and almost all of the rest of God’s people were taken into exile by that country. This is when Ezekiel served the people: when they were destroyed by the Babylonians and taken to that foreign land as a punishment for rejecting the Lord. Ezekiel was there. He experienced the destruction of Jerusalem. He accompanied the people into exile even before 586 B.C.. And he faithfully preached the Word of the Lord to them while they lived in Babylon. And there, in and around that time, the Lord spoke these words through his prophet: “I will place over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he will tend them; he will tend them and be their shepherd. I the LORD will be their God, and my servant David will be prince among them.”
Do you remember where David was on that historical timeline? 1000 B.C. But Ezekiel is writing these words about a future David in about 575 B.C. - 400 years after David died! So who could Ezekiel’s “David” be? It can’t be the original king David. And so it must be King David II, the true Shepherd-King. The King “David” whom Ezekiel speaks about must be Christ the King, the first David’s most important descendant, the first David’s Savior, the first David’s King.
And you can be sure that the Israelites knew exactly whom Ezekiel was talking about. They knew David had long since passed away. And so this David was the one who would save them, the one whom had been prophesied about for centuries - long before they had been taken into exile. But it was probably the first time they had thought about King David II in a long time. Because that’s why they were there in Babylon in the first place: they had rejected the Lord, they had neglected his Word, and they had separated themselves from their Shepherd-King.
I would hope that this kind of prophecy shook them up a little bit, brought them back to their senses. Because this is the first time it is recorded for us that a prophecy of the coming Christ was spoken to the people since they had been in exile - and I hope they took notice! They had been separating themselves from their King for so long that they didn’t even notice that the King had never left. He had always been tending his flock and he was one day going to physically come down to this earth to prove it.
And I hope you take notice of this prophecy too. Your Shepherd King has always been tending his flock, including you, his sheep, even at those times you have separated yourselves from him. Now, I know that you have not completely forgotten your Lord or have entirely separated him from your life, but you designate him to specific areas of your life, don’t you? Right now it’s not a problem, of course, because we’re in church! This is the Christ-time of your life, isn’t it? This is when you focus on your King and worship your Savior. And maybe when you’re at home reading your Bible or saying your prayers and when you attend Bible classes - those times are “Christ times” for you, and they should be. But then there’s your “work time” - whether at a full-time job or the chores and activities you do around the house - during those times you don’t really think about Christ, do you? Your Shepherd King is the farthest thing from your mind during “work time.” And then there’s “family & fun time.” Spending a few hours with your spouse, children, grandchildren, friends, relatives… don’t you usually have a hard time including your Shepherd King in those times too? And, of course, you have your “self time” - the times you spend for yourself reading a book, watching tv, winding down after a long day, or just relaxing. Those times are good to have, but they too are strangely absent of Christ your King. And I do that as well. I have moments or activities in my life in which the mindset is almost as if Christ doesn’t belong there. There are times when I try to do things non-church related, which is fine, but then they too often end up being non-Christ related as well. And that should never be. We all tend to relegate Christ to Sunday mornings and to reading the Bible and to prayer, but rarely does he come up in any other aspect of our lives. He is separated. He is segregated. He is kept apart from our secular lives and we only bring him to mind when the time calls for it.
Isn’t that dangerously close to what the Israelites did to get themselves thrown into exile? Christ our Shepherd King should never be separated, segregated, or kept apart from any facet of our lives. Because he is the Shepherd-King of our lives! He tends to his sheep every day, guiding them, guarding them, protecting them, feeding them, blessing them, loving them. Why then would his sheep want to isolate themselves from their Shepherd in any way at any time? What a dangerous thing to do with all of the predators around us. What an ungrateful thing to do with all of the grace he has shown us. But we do it anyway. We even like to separate ourselves from him at times so we don’t have to think about his Word or follow his will or bother with his plans. Because we like to do what we want, think what we want, and say what we want. It’s amazing that the Shepherd-King still tends to his flock even though we keep wanting to wander off by ourselves! I can’t imagine we would be sent into exile by a foreign country any time soon, but an exile might do us good.
I would like to think it did the Israelites good. I would like to think that the exile showed them that God wasn’t joking around. It showed them how serious sin was and that sin’s punishment is never pleasant. I hope the exile was a wake-up call. And it probably was because an exile is never easy. It must have been depressing for them to be away from their homeland in a foreign country in a foreign culture with a foreign language. And so it must have surprised them after all the suffering they had to endure and after all the law that they heard from the prophets, to actually hear some gospel. It must have been a shockingly refreshing piece of news to hear about their Shepherd-King! “King David II was coming! The Lord has not forgotten! The Lord has not abandoned us! Even though he has kicked us out of the Promised Land because of our sins, he still remembers! And he is going to send his servant David to tend us and lead us and be our Shepherd-King!” What a relief it must have been to hear Ezekiel say those words. Because Ezekiel had said a lot of things to them before, and most of it was not good news. It was anger and judgment and impending doom. But these words about King David II were words of hope and salvation impending happiness. The Lord had not gone back on his promise! The Lord had not changed his mind. The Lord had forgiven them! And he was going to send them their Shepherd-King to save them.
The Lord will never go back on his promise to us either. The Lord will not change his mind. He has forgiven us and he has already sent his Shepherd-King to make it happen. And as we look back on Jesus’ life recorded for us in Scripture, we see that he proved himself to be a gentle and powerful Shepherd-King in many different ways. As a Shepherd he started this life on earth among animals in Bethlehem, and as a King his birth was proclaimed by the angels of heaven. As a Shepherd he patiently instructed the Pharisee Nicodemus, but as a King he vehemently condemned the Pharisees who were hypocritical liars. As a Shepherd he blessed the disciples with a great catch of fish, and as a King he called the storm. As a Shepherd he knelt and prayed for his people, and as a King he was transfigured before them. As a Shepherd he went out of his way to heal the daughter of a Roman soldier, but as a King he was mocked as one by the company of Roman soldiers in Pontius Pilate’s court. As a Shepherd he suffered at the hands of sinful men. As a King he allowed them to do it. As a Shepherd he went to hell while hanging on the cross and experienced an eternal punishment for us. As a King he survived it. As a Shepherd he died for his sheep. As a King he rose victoriously.
King David II, the Shepherd-King foretold by Ezekiel and adored by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, is your Shepherd-King. As a Shepherd he guides you, feeds you, takes care of you, protects you, and loves you. As a King he has fought for you, he has conquered for you, he reigns for you, he rules for you, and he will come back again for you - just like he did the first time.
Jesus had to come the first time because he couldn’t rely on us, his sheep, to come to him. We wander off, we go our own way, we separate ourselves from him and from the rest of the flock as often as we can. And so Jesus had to come to us. He had to be like one of us and live like one of us and be tempted like one of us and suffer more than one of us and die as the One in our place. The Shepherd-King came to us. He sought us out. He sacrificed his life. And he brought us back into the fold through faith in the Word. He has used his rod to defeat our enemies and has used his staff to corral us home. He truly is our Shepherd-King. He truly is King David II.
Early on his life, the original David, the sinful human being David, was standing on the battle lines as a young man. He wasn’t supposed to be there. He wasn’t a soldier. He was just a boy checking on his older brothers. But there, between the battle lines of the Israelites and the Philistines, standing in the middle of the valley, was the giant Goliath. Taunting Israel. Challenging anyone. Blaspheming the Lord. And so David said to King Saul, “Your servant has been keeping his father’s sheep. When a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock, I went after it, struck it and rescued the sheep from its mouth. When it turned on me, I seized it by its hair, struck it and killed it. Your servant has killed both the lion and the bear; this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the armies of the living God” (1 Samuel 17:34-36). And you know the rest of the story: David, this shepherd boy who had demonstrated his bravery and strength by protecting his flock, went out on that battlefield and killed Goliath with a slingshot and Goliath’s own sword. David, the shepherd, was the champion. And he soon became Israel’s greatest king.
1000 years later King David II arrived. A Shepherd who protected his flock. A King who conquered the enemy. A Champion who still lives and rules and reigns today. Your Shepherd. Your King. Your Savior, Christ Jesus our Lord. He will always stay to tend us as a Shepherd because he came to save us as a King. And our Shepherd-King will come again.
Amen.

“Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.” - 1 Tim. 1:17