Weekly Seeds: Today
Sunday, November 23, 2025
Reign of Christ Sunday | Year C
Focus Theme:
“Today”
Focus Prayer:
Sovereign God, give us the urgency for your kindom today. Amen.
Focus Scripture:
Luke 23:33-43
33 When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. [[34 Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”]] And they cast lots to divide his clothing. 35 And the people stood by watching, but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!” 36 The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine 37 and saying, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!” 38 There was also an inscription over him, “This is the King of the Jews.”
39 One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” 40 But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? 41 And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” 42 Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come in your kingdom.” 43 He replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
All readings for this Sunday:
Jeremiah 23:1-6 and Luke 1:68-79 • Jeremiah 23:1-6 and Psalm 46 • Colossians 1:11-20 • Luke 23:33-43
Focus Questions:
What does sovereignty mean?
How does the reign of Christ impact our daily lives?
In what ways do we proclaim the realm of God?
How do we delay the coming of the kindom of God on earth?
How can we live urgently for the reign of Christ to be realized?
Reflection
By Cheryl A. Lindsay
Reign of Christ Sunday marks a transition from one year on the Christian Calendar to the next. It’s the eve of Advent. In the hemisphere where the majority of UCC local churches are situated, it occurs in the movement from harvest to hibernation as fall makes way for winter. Transitions can evoke feelings of excitement and anticipation for some and anxiety and trepidation for others, and some experience all of the above. Liturgically, this Sunday concludes the very long season after Pentecost where we emphasize the call to the church to live out the Christian faith, to continue the ministry of Jesus, and to embody the gospel in the world. On this last Sunday of the Christian calendar, we come back to proclaim what we anticipate from the beginning: the sovereignty of Christ over all.
In the third year of the scripture rotation known as the Revised Common Lectionary, the Lukan passage invites us to remember one of the moments when Jesus’ sovereignty was most in question. The narrative transports us back to the cross. His companions were criminals. His tormenters were watching him slowly perish. His disciples were largely absent, and the few who were with him were powerless to stop the horror before him. By all measures, it appeared that Jesus was defeated, vanquished by the humanity he came to redeem, and executed by the state. Yet, despite betrayal, denial, and abandonment, his words depicted a different reality. Even on the cross, Jesus remained on the throne.
The one who would be “numbered with lawbreakers” (22:37) finds himself on a cross with evildoers on either side (23:33, 39), but despite scathing ridicule from the powerful—“rulers” (v. 35) and soldiers (vv. 36–37)—the scene offers a vivid display of a righteous man facing death with equanimity, courage, and integrity. Although he will ultimately be a “saved Savior” (Neyrey, Passion 129–55), Jesus faithfully lives out a vocation that will bring him no deliverance from death, while also continuing on the cross the work of saving the lost, which has been the focus of his mission (19:10; cf. 5:32; 15:1–32). He asks for mercy for his enemies who are killing him (23:34), and he promises a merciful future to one of the criminals killed beside him (vv. 39–43). Moreover, his intimate, prayerful connection to God remains unbroken in his worst hour (vv. 34, 46). No wonder the centurion in charge will be moved to praise God and trumpet Jesus’ innocence as a righteous man (v. 47). Ironically, therefore, the capital charge inscribed on the wood above Jesus, “The king of the Jews,” speaks the truth about him, although Luke’s audience by now recognizes how strange and countercultural a royal authority he possesses.
John T. Carroll
From the Incarnation at his birth to this moment of humiliation on the cross, Jesus has demonstrated that the kindom of God does not reflect the dominance-driven kingdoms of this world. Strength does not come from exerting one’s power against the powerless or stripping power and authority from enemies. The power of the Spirit enables us to love our enemies and to share power and other resources for the good of all. In the kindom’s economy, abundance need not be hoarded because God’s provision is abundant. Scarcity is not a mindset because it does not exist when excessiveness is not commended by culture. All needs are met and exceeded. Mutual care and concern supersede selfishness, and even justice takes a new form.
Despite the beautiful and compelling vision of God’s kindom manifested on earth, the prophetic voice that calls the people (particularly those in power) to repentance often meets challenge, opposition, and rejection. Like the prophets before him throughout the biblical witness, Jesus encounters the same.
As he goes to his death, Luke’s Jesus continues to prophesy. On the way to Calvary, he warns Jerusalem’s women of the depredations to come (Luke 23:26-31). Crucified between two criminals, he suffers one last rejection. “Are you not the Messiah?” one of them asks. “Save yourself and us!” (Luke 23:39). He also delivers one last prediction, telling the other, “Today you will be with me in Paradise” (Luke 23:43). All this fits Cleopas’s summary: Jesus was “a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people” whom “our chief priests and leaders handed . . . over to be condemned to death and crucified” (Luke 24:19-20).[22]
Jocelyn McWhirter
Executions take place in response to what society deems to be an irredeemable crime. Such a thing does not exist in the realm of God. Jesus comes with redemption, reconciliation, and restoration as desired ends. The offense for which he was condemned, as Robert L. Brawley notes, was disrupting order. What had changed in his ministry that week that led to his trial and conviction, which had to be entirely sanctioned and executed by the Roman government?
Jesus had entered Jerusalem to begin the feastal week. While Christian tradition portrays it as a grand procession, historical accounts would suggest that Rome did not perceive that moment as a threat. Throughout his public ministry, Jesus taught, preached, healed, delivered, and engaged in countless ways without any suggestion of criminal activity justifying any sanction from the state. The tipping point seems to have occurred when Jesus disrupts the order of the temple. He through over tables and denounced the exploitation occurring in a system originally instituted as a means of grace, and while that was highly problematic for those in power,
perhaps the most damning action was chasing the moneychangers out. He reclaimed the temple as the Holy One’s territory. That threat to the human designed economy could not stand.
Throughout his passion, those who oppose him and feel threatened by him attempt to discredit him and his movement as well as torture him and terrorize his followers into inaction. Even in this and despite his seeming defeat, Jesus prevails.
Luke portrays attempts of Jesus’ opponents, from mockery to crucifixion, to reduce him to absurdity. Crucifixion is not only castigation but shaming to the uttermost. The other side of the story resists reduction to absurdity by irony and scriptural figurations (Brawley 1995, 42–60). The other two victims crucified with Jesus (23:39–43) reflect the division among the people anticipated by Simeon (1:34–35). One mocks Jesus; the other declares him innocent. The second accepts crucifixion as deserved justice (v. 41) and thereby unjustly internalizes the values of the empire. Crucifixion was a vile form of capital punishment designed to terrorize resistors to the empire administered without “equality under the law” (compare executions of “terrorists” today). Traditionally, the second rebel has been called “penitent.” But more than confess his deeds (v. 41), he confesses Jesus’ commonwealth beyond the crucifixion before anyone else does (Wolter, 760): “Remember me when you come into your commonwealth” (v. 42). Jesus’ reference to Paradise (v. 43) is too brief and inexact to build definitive pictures of the afterlife.
Robert L. Brawley
Crucifixion could last from a few hours, like Jesus, to a few days. When Jesus responds to his companion with an offer of paradise today, the traditional interpretation suggests that the convicted man will join Jesus in heaven. At the same time, while the Bible is silent on what happens between his death and resurrection, tradition also affirms that Jesus does not spend that time in heaven. What then does he mean by today?
The thief’s request is to be remembered when Jesus enters his kingdom. Jesus’ response affirms that the kindom has already come and Jesus is already in it. Even on the cross, the reign of God was in effect. Every moment and movement of Jesus’ life and ministry ushered in the kindom of God displacing and disrupting the kingdoms of this world. Even capital punishment was insufficient to overcome God’s realm.
The man on the other cross who recognized Jesus’ sovereignty entered the kindom while still suffering an unjust death. He received the redemptive power and love of Christ and his acceptance delivered him from death, not of the body, but of the spirit. His story has been reduced to a promise of glory in the afterlife, and while that is a wondrous hope in itself, the kindom of God is not restricted to heaven. It is fully intent and committed to life on earth.
Today.
Reflection from Voices of People of African Descent
The 33rd General Synod adopted a Resolution to Recognize the United Nations International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024). As part of its implementation, Sermon and Weekly Seeds offers Reflection from Voices of People of African Descent related to the season or overall theme for additional consideration in sermon preparation and for individual and congregational study.
“Bury Me in a Free Land”
By Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
Make me a grave where’er you will,
In a lowly plain, or a lofty hill;
Make it among earth’s humblest graves,
But not in a land where men are slaves.
I could not rest if around my grave
I heard the steps of a trembling slave;
His shadow above my silent tomb
Would make it a place of fearful gloom.
I could not rest if I heard the tread
Of a coffle gang to the shambles led,
And the mother’s shriek of wild despair
Rise like a curse on the trembling air.
I could not sleep if I saw the lash
Drinking her blood at each fearful gash,
And I saw her babes torn from her breast,
Like trembling doves from their parent nest.
I’d shudder and start if I heard the bay
Of bloodhounds seizing their human prey,
And I heard the captive plead in vain
As they bound afresh his galling chain.
If I saw young girls from their mother’s arms
Bartered and sold for their youthful charms,
My eye would flash with a mournful flame,
My death-paled cheek grow red with shame.
I would sleep, dear friends, where bloated might
Can rob no man of his dearest right;
My rest shall be calm in any grave
Where none can call his brother a slave.
I ask no monument, proud and high,
To arrest the gaze of the passers-by;
All that my yearning spirit craves,
Is bury me not in a land of slaves.
For Further Reflection
“Today will die tomorrow.” ― Algernon Charles Swinburne
“The beginning is always today.” ― Mary Shelley
“The timeless in you is aware of life’s timelessness. And knows that yesterday is but today’s memory and tomorrow is today’s dream.” ― Khalil Gibran
A preaching commentary on this text (with works cited) is at //ucc.org/SermonSeeds.
The Rev. Dr. Cheryl A. Lindsay, Minister for Worship and Theology (lindsayc@ucc.org), also serves a local church pastor, public theologian, and worship-practitioner with a particular interest in the proclamation of the word in gathered communities. You’re invited to share your reflections on this text in the comments below this post on our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/SermonSeeds.
About Weekly Seeds
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Weekly Seeds is a service of Local Church Ministries of the United Church of Christ. Bible texts are from the New Revised Standard Version, © 1989 Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.