Sermon for Christ the King Sunday

 November 24, 2024, Christ the King Sunday

By Kristin Berkey-Abbott

John 18:33-37

In today’s Gospel, we have a flash forward to Holy Week, where Pilate asks Jesus questions.  In some ways, it’s a court room scene, with Pilate trying to figure out what to do with this person accused of crimes.  Some have depicted Pilate as looking for a way to free Jesus, perhaps even feeling guilt or foreboding, but if you look into the historical Pilate, it’s hard to believe him as a sympathetic character.  He was brutal and ruthless, as a Roman ruler would have to be to hang onto power.

In some essential way, this interchange is about the very nature of that power—what does it mean to be ruler, to be king, to be the one in charge?

We have just been through a turbulent election season which asked those very same questions.  Of course, every election season during my lifetime has seemed turbulent, seemed to ask the question of what it means to be in charge, what is means to have power, and how power should be used.  What does it mean to have a mandate?  If one really does have political capital, what projects are worth spending that political capital?

In most political cycles, we see at least two groups with very different answers to those questions.  In our Gospel today, we also have two very different groups with very different answers.  There’s Pilate, most obviously.  But there’s also Jewish religious leadership, which the writer of the Gospel of John, calls “The Jews.”  The Gospel writer doesn’t mean every Jew, even though Pilate seems to think that they all speak with one voice.  Even though Pilate and Jewish religious leadership might not have seen it at the time, both have a similar vision of what power is and how it should be used.  Both of them see themselves as serving God (whether God was the Roman emperor Caesar or the Jewish God Yahweh) and that the best way of doing that was to follow the Law. Pilate has one set of Laws in mind, and Jewish leadership has a different set, but the idea is the same.  Adherence to the Law is what God (Caesar or Yahweh) wants, and strict observation can lead to salvation.  Pilate and the Jewish leadership see themselves as representatives of God, the best ones to interpret the Law and to keep people safe and out of trouble.

Here we might say, “Doesn’t Jesus see himself that way too?”  It’s an important point.  Jesus says at various points that he’s come not to abolish the Law but to fulfill it.   But Jesus also emphasizes that there is more to the Law than a set of rules to follow to keep God happy and society out of trouble.  Jesus points to the intent, to God’s intent, behind the Law.  And always, Jesus asks who is being left behind, left out, when we follow the Law too strictly, and he asks the same question, regardless of whether or not it’s religious law or laws handed down by the state.

Let’s go back to the exchange between Jesus and Pilate.  Jesus seems unconcerned with these earthly issues of power:   who is king, who is in charge, who controls who.  Jesus is concerned with the Truth. Of course, both Pilate and Jewish leadership would say that they are concerned with the Truth too. 

Jesus tries to redirect the conversation.  In some ways, his conversation with Pilate feels similar to those he has had with the disciples:  who do others say that I am?  Who do you say that I am?  What are we actually doing here?  Pilate has some additional layers to navigate:  he’s ruling a turbulent land, far away from the power center of Rome, and he never can figure out these strange people he’s been sent to govern.

In short, he’s a stranger in a strange land.  You may be familiar with this feeling, particularly during various political or life cycles:  unable to sort out why people feel the way they do, struggling to interpret events as they unfold, trying to figure out the best path forward.  We may want to believe that Pilate is trying to be fair and even handed, but it’s much more likely that he’s trying to make sure that revolutionary forces don’t have a chance to take root and disrupt his rule.  The Jewish religious leadership has similar goals:  both are trying to keep their earthly leaders and Divine rulers happy.

When I think of the narrative of God that we see across the scripture, I often see God in a similar position:  trying to figure out why humans feel the way they do, why humans behave the way they do, trying to keep creation on a path towards full flourishing.  A God who gives humans free will certainly has not made it easy to rule—at least not in the way that earthly leaders like Pilate or like Jewish leadership would prefer to rule. 

The readings for this week, and the Advent/Christmas texts that are coming next remind us that we don't worship a God who has a belief in power the way that the Romans used it, the ways that Jewish leadership wielded it, the way that all empires have used power, the ways that we are tempted to wield power today. 

Instead, we worship a God who is willing to become one of the most vulnerable kinds of creatures in our world: a newborn baby, born to underclass parents who must leave their homes to go register in a distant land, born to an underclass minority, living in an occupied land. We worship a God so radical that he is crucified as a political criminal, a God who is killed for declaring that a different way of living is possible. 

Again and again, Jesus reminds us that God who wants nothing to do with our human visions of power.  Throughout his ministry, Jesus shows us that power comes from service.   Jesus offers us a different vision of wealth, a wealth that doesn’t come from having one’s picture on a coin, but from giving those coins away. Our God calls us to a radical generosity and invites us to share all that we have. Jesus shows us the power that comes from serving and sharing, and it’s antithetical to the political power prized by Pilate or the power of controlling people’s religious yearnings that the Jewish leadership sought. Our experience of God, in Jesus, reminds us that if we behave in the way that God wants us to behave, we will come into direct conflict with the dominant power structures of our day.  Again and again, Jesus reminds us of the cost of discipleship, but always he promises that in losing the power that our culture tells us we should want, we will find lives that are worth living.

Unlike earthly rulers, who will make any number of promises and compromises to maintain power, Jesus shows us all the ways that God keeps that covenant made with a few people so long ago, a covenant enlarged to include us all.  

In the fulfillment of this covenant, God shows up in the oddest places, like in a manger or in criminal court.   Festival Sundays like today remind us God is not a ruler like the ones we know on earth.  Our liturgical year tells us that we need to always be alert to the possibilities of God at work in the world, but that it likely won't happen in the way that we've prepared for or expected.  All of Jesus’ life and ministry points to this God who will meet us where we are and take us to the promised land.