Sermon: Luke 23:33-43, “You Only Have to Need It”, November 23, 2025 - Reign of Christ Sunday

Scripture: Luke 23:33-43

Preacher: Rev. Ryan Slifka

 “You Only Have to Need It”

Jesus was mocked. Jesus has been tortured and stripped of this clothes and his dignity. After having his hands and feet nailed to a cross between two criminals, he’s mocked by leaders saying if he’s the Messiah everyone says he is then maybe he wouldn’t be where he is. The soldiers who hung him there join in on it, sarcastically bowing to him as “king of the Jews.” The worst indignity, though, might be that one of the criminals hanging beside him gets in on the jeering. “Are you not the Messiah?” he laughs. “If you are, climb off the cross and bring us with you!”

Jesus was mocked. Though not by everyone.

The other criminal on the cross on the other side. Traditionally, this guy’s been called “Dismas,” even “St. Dismas.” Whose name comes from the Greek word for “dying.”[i] Which is appropriate for sure, but you might wonder why his parents would choose that name out of the baby book.

But this criminal rebukes the other one. After all, the two of them are actually guilty. But this guy Jesus is innocent of all the charges. And after this rebuke, he turns to Jesus. “Jesus,” he says. “Jesus, remember me, when you come into your kingdom.” To which Jesus replies, “sure thing. Truly, I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

It is a story of forgiveness. Though this man hangs from a cross, condemned, deserving death even, he turns to Jesus in faith. And in spite of it all, is assured by Jesus of his place in paradise. His future in God’s kingdom is assured.

It’s a beautiful story, isn’t it? At least in theory, anyway. But what about in practice?

Following the Second World War, the leadership of Nazi Germany was brought to trial for crimes against humanity in the city of Nuremberg. For instigating the most destructive war in history, war crimes, and the murder of six million Jews. Most of whom were sentenced to death by hanging.

One of those condemned to death was Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, former head of the German army. Colleagues hated him, considering him Hitler’s perpetual “yes man,” one who signed numerous orders that authorized many atrocities. He wasn’t Hitler, but he was just as guilty as the man himself. Even the most ardent pacifist would probably agree–if anyone deserved death it was him.

Nonetheless, Keitel appeared to have come to his senses in the time leading to his death.

The chaplain Henry Gerecke, a Lutheran minister assigned to visit Keitel and his fellow prisoners, reported that Keitel was reading a Bible when he first knocked on his door. “I know from this book,” said the Field Marshal. “I know from this book that God can love even a sinner like me.” Gerecke had spent several decades in prison ministry, so assumed that this was yet another example of false sincerity. But his mind was changed after the prisoner invited the chaplain to join him in his devotions.

“He knelt beside his cot and read a portion of Scripture,” the chaplain wrote. “Then he folded his hands, looked heavenward and began to pray. Never have I heard a prayer quite like that one. Though I cannot break confessional confidence to share it, I can say that he spoke penitently of his many sins and pleaded for mercy by reason of Christ’s sacrifice for him.” This, and other later visits convinced the chaplain that the Nazi’s contrition was genuinely sincere.

Then finally, the day of execution came. When the chaplain led him to the gallows, Keitel told him that he was grateful to God for him, and those who’d sent him. And, as he stood with his arms tied around his back, a black hood over his head, and a noose over his neck, he was asked if he had any last words. To which he replied: “I place all my confidence in the Lamb who made atonement for my sins. May God have mercy on my soul.” Then he turned towards the chaplain who’d ministered to him in his last days. “I’ll see you again [in Paradise],” he said. “I’ll see you again [in Paradise].” Then the trap door opened and he was dead.[ii]

Of course, his last words were echoing our scripture passage, when Jesus told the criminal that he would be with him in paradise.

I gotta admit, this story makes me uncomfortable. When I was working on this sermon this last week the two people I told this story to were rather skeptical. Like, oh so this means ok go ahead and be a Nazi mass-murderer and as long as you repent from it in the end you’ll go to heaven. Like I said–it’s a beautiful story in theory.

It’s relatively easy to stomach when it’s a criminal guilty of much lesser crimes. But much harder when applied to the likes of somebody like this. I can only imagine what it would be like to hear this as one of his victims. Or really, the victim of anything like this. Such an assertion seems grossly unjust at best. Deeply criminal at worst. This kind of forgiveness is outrageous. It’s offensive.

This kind of forgiveness is outrageous. This kind of forgiveness is offensive. Unless, of course, you’re the one who needs it.

Some of us have done some things that, though likely not on the level of war crimes and genocide, we’ve hurt others deeply. We’ve wasted potential, bungled opportunity. We’ve thrown away love, blown up our lives, or crossed a line that was never meant to be crossed. And it’s left us with a weight of guilt that we’ve never been able to relieve. For some of us this kind of forgiveness is less offensive than it is too good to be true. Maybe that’s you. Maybe this is you.

It's offensive… unless you’re the one who needs it.

And if that’s you, then it’s good news.

As outrageous, or offensive or unbelievable as it may sound, this is the gospel. This is the Christian message: and it’s this: simply that there are no limits to the grace of God.

You know how Presidential pardons in the U.S. have been all over the news in the past few years? Where the President has the power to pardon any offense–even before the person has committed it now, apparently. And usually the person pardoned is a friend of the President, someone who’s done something for the president in the past? The gospel is like that. Except that in Jesus Christ, the One who was whipped and stripped and hung on a cross to die is the one who has been given all authority in heaven and earth, including the forgiveness of sins. All of them.

This is what today “Reign of Christ” or “Christ the King” Sunday in the Christian calendar means. That Jesus is the ultimate judge of our lives, and he has chosen mercy. He has chosen pardon. And unlike Presidential pardons, which are often quid pro quo, the divine pardon is done for no other reason than the love of the Creator for the creature in his or her need. The great Reformer John Calvin puts it this: “In this wretched man,” he says.

In this wretched man there is held out to us a singular picture of the unexpected and unbelievable grace of God… that he was suddenly changed in the hour of death into a new man, from the gate of hell raised to heaven, that he had won pardon in a moment for all the crimes in which his whole life had been sunk… [therefore] we may state for sure that if He remembers us, we shall be saved. [and] it cannot be that He will forget those who entrust their salvation to him.”[iii]

Which is to say if there’s forgiveness for the criminal on the cross, if there’s forgiveness for the Nazi in the dock, then it means that there’s forgiveness, too, for you and for me. As unexpected and unbelievable as it may be, it’s ours. All the faults, all the failures, all the guilt and the shame, in the end wiped clean by the cross of Christ. From the tree of death comes the first seed of paradise. And the most astounding thing of all? All you have to do is need it. And it’s yours. “Jesus, remember me,” “truly you will be with me in paradise.” All you have to do is need it. And it’s yours.

To be clear: this doesn’t mean our lives here and now will be magically reversed. Remember that the criminal still dies on the cross, and that Keitel’s execution was not stayed. We will still reap many consequences of that which we’ve sown. What it does mean, though, that none of it will ever be the end of us, and our lives can always start again, no matter how little of them we have left. Perdition is not our destiny, but paradise, no matter what. Whether we’re to die tomorrow or live a hundred more years, there is always more life to live, and more forgiveness to receive. All thanks to the pardon of the one true King.

It’s good news! The best news! Not too good to be true, but too good not to be true. Forgiveness is ours, yours and mine. All on account of the unexpected and unbelievable grace of God. 

Now, there’s something about this kind of grace of God. It’s been said that “the grace of God comes to us on its way to somebody else.”  The thing about this kind of forgiveness, is that when it comes to you, it doesn’t just stay there with you.

If you back up a little bit in the scripture, you’ll notice that even before he gives the assurance of paradise to old St. Dismas, Jesus speaks these words: “forgive them, they know not what they do.” And the ones he speaks these words to are not penitent. They are not sorry, nor are they repentant. But they are the ones who are in the middle of killing him. The ones who heckle and mock. The ones who not only don’t believe in Jesus, but they outright blaspheme him. Jesus forgives them, even though they don’t seek it.

Presumably, this extends therefore, even to the other criminal–the one who mocked Jesus instead of receiving him. What are we supposed to make of that? Maybe it means that the God’s grace extends even beyond our willingness to receive it on this side of the grave. We can hope, maybe. Could very well be. Though I’m not sure.

What it does suggest for sure, though. Is that those of us who know the grace of God, the limitless forgiveness of the crucified king, it says that, we too, can extend that same forgiveness near and far.

As Gary said earlier in the service, we’re holding a workshop on Saturday on faith sharing. Which has a bad rap, cuz honestly some of us Christians can be jerks about it. But we share the hope that is within us, not because we’re better than other people, or because we need to change them, or fix their lives–we can’t even fix our own lives! That’s the work of the Holy Spirit through and through. But like Martin Luther once said, we’re just beggars telling other beggars where to find bread.

If we know ourselves to be forgiven, if we know ourselves to be loved beyond all merit, and all deserving. Then our response is not to condemn, but to extend the same grace and forgiveness that we need, and we know, even to those who don’t need it. Or–more precisely–don’t think they need it. In the hope that they, too, will come to know the beauty and the joy of the mercy that is already theirs. You could say that our job is—in the same way the Lord did from the cross—plant paradise with seeds of forgiveness like he did. Because we have been met, and rescued, and remembered by Jesus, we are sent to carry that same mercy into a world starving for it.

So, dear friends, may you and I, by God’s grace, we live as people who know we are pardoned. May we offer what we ourselves have received. And may the world glimpse, through us, the unexpected and unbelievable grace of the One who remembers us—even now—and promises paradise.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

[i] Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3rd ed., ed. F.L. Cross and E.A. Livingstone (Peabody, Henrickson, 1997), 489.

[ii] Quoted in Jason Micheli, “Law, Gospel, and the Chaplain to Condemned Nazis,” Mockingbird Ministries website September 21, 2022.  https://mbird.com/history/law-gospel-and-the-chaplain-to-condemned-nazis/

[iii] John Calvin, A Harmony of the Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, vol. III (Edinburgh: St. Andrew’s Press, 1972), 201.