Christ the King or Reign of Christ, Proper 29
Notes
Transcript
John 18:33–37 (NIV84)
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. “It was your people and your chief priests who 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 Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place.” 37 “You are a king, then!” said Pilate. Jesus answered, “You are right in saying I am a king. In fact, for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.”
So Pilate, I think you guys know, is the Roman governor of Judea, the territory of the Jews that Rome exercised power over
And here this Roman governor, the political opportunist, this power player, has a man before him whom people are referring to the king of the Jews
And so he’s obviously curious who this guy thinks he his and what power he things he has because there could very likely be this sort of power clash happening
He brings in Jesus in and asks him, “Tell me, ARE you the king of the Jews?”
And notice Jesus puts it on him. Sort of “What do you think?”
Pilate response is pretty dismissive, almost like “man I’m not Jewish you’re nothing to me”
And then Jesus responds with an answer that doesn’t quite fit into Pilates categories.
“Yeah, I’m a king, but not like you.”
“My kingdom is not like yours. It’s not of this world.”
And I want to focus on that phrase “Not of this world”
It gets used a lot. There’s even a Christian clothing brand.
What does it mean? What does JESUS mean?
To answer that we can begin by looking at the way the word “world” is used in scripture, specifically the greek work kosmos
One of the ways it’s used it to refer to the earth, the planet, the physical reality where humans live.
With this definition Jesus would be saying my kingdom exists in another place, not this earthly territory.
And that, I think, is often the popular view of what Jesus means.
Because it fits with a popular view of the gospel that says this world is going to burn and we’re all going to escape to disembodied heaven
So it’s like Jesus’s kingdom is what we enter when we go through the pearly gates in the clouds, or something.
Trouble is, that’s bad theology and NOT the vision we get for the life to come.
The biblical story doesn’t end with disembodied souls going to some ethereal heaven, it ends with heaven and earth coming together, creation being restored, people being restored, and God dwelling with his people in a city.
That’s the vision in Revelation.
The world will be renewed and fully aligned with the will of God.
And that’s the kingdom, fully realized.
So let’s look at how else “world” is used.
It can also refer to people, to everyone.
“God so love THE WORLD, that he gave his one and only son.”
Yes he loves the physical planet but the point is he loves the people.
And we can even take it a step further to see that world sometimes refers to people, captive to sin, and ALL of the life and culture and systems that emerge.
Consider this passage from John 15
18 “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.
“the world” here represents the collective life of humanity captive to sin and apart from God
To follow God then puts us at odds with “the world” that is captive to sin
And this I think gets us closer to the way Jesus is using the term.
He’s saying my kingdom is not of this world because its not LIKE this world
Earthly empires are built on violence and injustice, that is very much OF this fallen world.
The kingdom of God exists in contrast to that.
It is OF something else.
Consider the words of Jesus in his prayer in
John 17 - 14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. 17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. 19 For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.
You can see this tension even more
Jesus has given his disciples the word that points them to the kingdom, which sets them at odds with the world
Jesus prays not that they would be removed from the world but that they would be sent into the world as ambassadors of the kingdom, pointing the way
So, with that framework, let’s look again.
Pilate and Jesus. Two rulers.
Jesus says “I’m a king, but not like you.”
“My kingdom is not like yours. It’s not of this world.”
How? Jesus gives an example
My followers aren’t going to start a violent revolution to grab power.
That’s what a kingdom that is of this world would do.
Instead, I’m going to die as an expression of love.
That is a kingdom of something entirely different. Something higher.
Now, here’s the thing. Pilate may have heard this and thought “Oh, I was worried that your kingdom would be a threat to mine. If it’s not of this world I don’t have to worry about it.”
But Jesus’s kingdom, the kingdom of God, is very much a threat to the kingdoms of this world.
Because the kingdom of God is a judgment of the kingdoms of this world and a correction of the kingdoms of this world.
And every earthly kingdom will rise and fall, but the kingdom of God will be established forever.
It’s wrong for us to think Jesus saying his kingdom is not of this world means it’s about some other time and place and reality.
Jesus’s kingdom is very much about this time and this place and this reality.
It is very much about disrupting the sinful powers, the ways of violence, the pervasive injustices.
It is very much about the renewal of the places and lives that earthly kingdoms now exert power over.
And when Jesus arrived and began his ministry his message was “Repent, the kingdom of God is at hand.”
It’s arriving.
It’s breaking in and breaking through.
Cash out of the empires built on the fall and align yourself with the kingdom of renewal.
And worship the king, Jesus himself.