Text: John 18:33-37 (New International Version)
33 Pilate then went back inside the palace, summoned Jesus and asked him, “Are you the king of the Jews?”
34 “Is that your own idea,” Jesus asked, “or did others talk to you about me?”
35 “Am I a Jew?” Pilate replied. “Your own people and chief priests handed you over to me. What is it you have done?”
36 Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.”
37 “You are a king, then!” said Pilate.
Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.”
In the Name of God, the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Amen.
Today is the Sunday between Pentecost and Advent. Its traditional name is “Christ the King” Sunday, but our UCC calendar notes it as “Reign of Christ” Sunday.
It’s not a very longstanding tradition at all. It goes back only to December of 1925. It started during a time when the future of Europe was looking pretty bleak. Europe was still reeling from the aftereffects of World War I. The economies of Germany, especially, but also other nations were on the ropes. Mussolini had been dictator of Italy for about three years by then, and Hitler had recently been released from prison and the Nazi Party was beginning its rise to power.
In response to this growing nationalism and creeping secularism, Pope Pius XI designated the last Sunday of October as Christ the King Sunday as a way of reasserting the truth that in spite of all the rulers and dictators and the false, misleading values of the world, there is but one ruler of the Universe: Jesus Christ. Our King. Our Lord. Our God. Eventually, Christ the King Sunday was set for the last Sunday of the liturgical year – today.
Growing up, I don’t recall Christ the King Sunday ever being mentioned, much less observed. Over the course of time, our United Church of Christ, as well as other Reformed denominations adopted the observance of Christ the King Sunday, particularly those denominations which use the common set of Scripture readings.
And the Gospel lesson appointed for this day is not at all one you would expect for this time of year – we’re looking ahead to Advent, and here we have a lesson that’s taken from Holy Week! It strikes a rather discordant note, doesn’t it?
So – what’s it all about?
I think it’s about many things. Let’s start with the word “king.” In this passage of five verses, it’s used five times. So it is one of the key words for today – and it’s no doubt why this passage was selected.
Jesus as “Rex Mundi” – the Latin for “King of the World” is no surprise to us. Medieval art is replete with paintings and statues that depict Jesus holding the orb of the world in his hand. I’d be willing to bet that every one of us grew up with that assumption.
When I read this passage, that’s how I automatically interpret it.
We tend to think that when Jesus says “My kingdom is not from this world,” he is asserting his independence – as if he’s saying to Pilate, “You may think you can, but you really can’t determine my fate. I belong to – and I am the king of – a higher world than you can ever imagine. My kingdom,” said Jesus, “doesn’t consist of what you see around you.”
And then he says: “If it did, my followers would fight so that I wouldn’t be handed over to the Jews. But I’m not that kind of king, not the world’s kind of king.” In essence, Jesus says that if this conflict were happening in his kingdom, then indeed his followers would fight, but since it was happening in this other kingdom, a kingdom that cannot keep hold of him, a kingdom of weak and transient powers like Pilate’s and Rome’s, his followers do not get involved.
Jesus came to redeem and to restore the world. The world Jesus is talking about is the world as God intends it to be, which is much, much different than the world we see around us. Jesus is not of this world and so Jesus will not defend himself the way we so often see matters settled – through win and lose, us and them, you or me, and all too often through violence. Sadly, our world seems to be based on the old formula that “might is right.” But Jesus will not make his case or prove his claims by violence. Jesus will not usher in God’s kingdom by violence. Jesus will make no followers by violence. Because God is not a God of violence, or subjection, or “might is right.” God is a God of love – and you can’t usher in a Kingdom of love by violent means.
That was hard for Pilate to understand. Even the disciples had a hard time grasping this concept. That’s why it’s so often hard for us to imagine God, as well. When we think of God as the Ruler of the Universe, when we think of Jesus as “King,” we might think in ancient terms of white chargers, armor, spears, bows and arrows, and the clanging of swords. Or, to use modern terms, we think of what military strategists today call “projecting power.” Individuals and nations have to right – even the obligation – to defend themselves. That’s the way the world – the earthly “kingdom” – works.
But it would be an enormous mistake to think that that’s the way God’s Kingdom works. And, in fact, God’s Kingdom has already gained a foothold in this world – we are witnesses to that. Slowly, but surely, God’s Kingdom is dawning and casting light into even the darkest corners of our world. The joke is on Pilate and all the Pilates of the world, for God chose a symbol of barbaric punishment, the cross, and made it a symbol of sacrificial love.
A kingdom of sacrificial love that redeems – that’s the Kingdom we are part of!
Another key word in today’s passage is “truth.”
Pontius Pilate – unbelievably – spoke the truth when he said, “You are a king, then!”
I say “unbelievably,” because Pontius Pilate was the last person from whom we might expect the truth to come. Yes, the truth sometimes comes from unexpected directions. Pilate was no friend of the Jews, much less of Jesus. What he was looking for in this interview was a way to solve an annoying problem, which is really all this Jesus was for him. Pilate needed a way to get rid of Jesus, preferably in such a way that he wouldn’t take the blame. Having him executed was the least desirable option. So this interview between Jesus and Pilate is almost a transcript of how Pilate tried to pin him down so he could throw him back to the Sanhedrin and let them take care of him – “Look, this is your guy who broke your religious laws, so he’s your problem.” But in his conversation, he stumbled – completely by accident – on the truth of just who it was who stood before him. God Incarnate was standing there, right before his very eyes. And yet that truth didn’t sink in.
Yet that truth is the truth that defines truth, that is the ultimate measure of truth: That Jesus is God. He is the Messiah. The King of Kings. He is our King whose Kingdom is breaking into this world but which is beyond this world. And we are its citizens.
These last few weeks have been very hard. We watch the news and read in the papers about all the horrible attacks, first in Paris, and then in Mali, and we feel every emotion the human heart is capable of: Revulsion, pity, sadness, anger, and fear, to name just five of them. It is perfectly natural to feel these emotions, just as it is natural and justified to feel a sense of relief when the perpetrators are stopped. We need to feel what we feel and to process our emotions without feeling as though there’s “something wrong” with us for feeling them. There’s nothing “wrong” with us.
But today we need to look beyond the news. What the world is experiencing in these times is what the world has experienced, in one form or another, in every time and period of history. We need to look past that to see God at work even in the midst of these unspeakable acts – to see how the people of Paris and people all over the world defied fear and rallied in support of peace; to see how Muslims everywhere have shown their faces and stood up and said “Not in my name;” to see how Muslim clerics have said more forcefully than I have ever heard before that ISIS has no legitimacy and no right to makes the claims it does; to see the many, many acts of kindness on the part of common, ordinary people toward those who have suffered – one such example is that of Ann Sophie de Chaisemartin, a French journalist who lives across the street from the bar that was attacked and risked her own life to run over and use her first aid skills to help the injured.
Things like these are the real news. We will always have bad guys among us. But the bad guys will always lose, because our King, the King of Kings, makes it so.
In the Name of God, the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Amen.