Next Sunday, we are celebrating a very special day on the Christian Church Calendar. It’s called “Christ the King” or “Reign of Christ” Sunday. You’ll hear it referred to both ways. It is always celebrated on the last Sunday before the season of Advent begins
The Christian Church Calendar that we follow was established a really long time ago at the Council of Nicea, all the way back in the year 325 A.D., so this calendar is almost 1,700 old!
This calendar established the dates for Advent and Christmas, Lent and Easter, and various feast days like Epiphany, Pentecost, and Palm Sunday. Over the centuries, the Church as added other special feast days.
This feast day of “Christ the King” Sunday is a relatively new one. It was established less than 100 years ago, and it grew out of a time of immense political turmoil in the world.
The year was 1925, and if you know your history, you know that that was the time when people like Stalin, Mussolini, and Hitler were coming to power.
It was a time around the world of dictatorships and authoritarianism; a time when we saw the rise of ideologies like nationalism and fascism, communism and Nazism.
So, the Christian Church at the time established “Christ the King” Sunday to remind believers around the world that there is only one power: and, that is, the power of the Christ!
“Christ the King” Sunday was established to challenge political leaders and political movements at the time that valued power over peace, dominion over justice.
“Christ the King” Sunday reminds us that Jesus, the Prince of Peace, wanted us to build a new kingdom together, one which would be ruled by love, where peace and justice would reign supreme…a kingdom where, he said, the last shall be first, where the lowly and oppressed would be lifted up a high, where the “least of these” would be given the “most importance.”
And, that is in direct opposition to how kingdoms are usually built. Most kingdoms throughout the world’s history have been built on wealth and power, dominion and oppression. The kingdom Jesus had in mind was very different, but, then again, Jesus was a different kind of king.
In today’s Gospel reading, Pontius Pilate, the ruler of the Roman Empire, asks Jesus: “Are you a King?”
Now, Jesus here has been arrested and imprisoned. And, I’ve told you before, Jesus wasn’t arrested because he was a nice guy spreading peace, joy, and love.
Jesus was arrested because he was leading a popular counter-cultural movement that was trying to establish a new Kingdom, a New World Order.
And, as you can imagine, that was very threatening to the people in power, like Pontius Pilate.
So, Pilate is asking Jesus here, “Are you trying to be a King?”
And, as we just heard this morning, Jesus doesn’t answer that question. In fact, he resisted the title of “King” throughout his ministry.
And, yet, here we are today celebrating the feast of “Christ the King.” I wonder how Jesus would feel about that.
I wonder how he would feel about all the works of art created by some of the world’s greatest artists, which depict him wearing a gold crown, holding a bejeweled scepter, and sitting on a mighty throne.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t really see Jesus that way. When I think of a “king,” I think of someone with great wealth, power, privilege, and control. Someone who has lots of ‘yes’ men and servants at his beck and call. Someone whom people fear.
When I think of a “king,” I think of someone who lives up high in a mighty castle, a fortress surrounded by gates and moats; someone far removed from people’s daily lives.
And, that just wasn’t Jesus. In fact, that was the exact opposite of Jesus.
That’s why Jesus is a different kind of king.
Rather than establishing a kingdom in the worldly sense, Jesus wanted to establish a KIN-dom, a world where all people see one another as kin, as brothers and sisters of one another.
In John 10:10, Jesus said that his wish for us is that “That they may all be one.” He wanted us to recognize our oneness with one another.
So, if we truly wish to call ourselves “Christians” (followers of his Way) then we must be about the task of continuing to build that kin-dom together: a world where all are one…a just world for all, ruled by love, where peace and justice reign supreme.
So “Christ the King” Sunday, my friends, is not a coronation of Jesus. I think Jesus would have hated that!
The focus of this feast day is on the Reign of Christ. And, I’ve told you before, Christ existed billions of years before Jesus of Nazareth was born.
The Bible tells us that “The Christ was the first born of all of Creation.”
Which means (at the Big Bang) when God said, “Let there Light!,” there was the Christ. Christ is the Presence, the Power, the Light, and the Life of God.
So, today, my friends, as we celebrate “Reign of Christ” Sunday, may we recognize that there is only One True Power at work in the world, and that is the Power of God, the Power of Love.
May that love reign in our hearts, and may Justice rule in our land.