Sermon at Parish Mass, Christ the King 2012

Daniel 7:13-14

Revelation 1:5-8

John 18:33-37

What are kings for? What do they do? If we’re asked that we might think perhaps of our own United Kingdom. It’s been a good year for our monarchy, with the celebrations of the diamond jubilee, our own visit from Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall, and signs that the monarchy is more popular than ever.

Of course, ours is a constitutional monarchy in a parliamentary democracy. It wasn’t always so. This year has also seen the discovery of what may well be the remains of Richard III, killed at the battle of Bosworth Field in the deadly struggle between two rival dynasties, the Plantagenets and the Tudors. Those were days when Kings had real political power, which could be arbitrary, capricious and cruel. 

And it was much the same in Biblical times, as Jesus himself tells us in today’s gospel reading. This is a scene of contrasts, Pilate and Jesus standing for two completely different understandings of power. Pilate represents the earthly power, that of the Emperor, by whose authority Jesus in the end will be put to death. But Jesus reveals the power of God; he is the Word of the Father come to reveal God to the world.

Jesus says, “If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” Jesus says instead that his purpose is “to testify to the truth” and that “Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to [his] voice”. Although it doesn’t seem obvious, somehow, the kingdom of God is not to be found in exercising power but in entering the truth.

This takes us back to chapter 8 in John’s Gospel, where Jesus talks about his mission to make known the truth and about the world’s failure to understand. To a group who rejected his teaching he said:

You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him... But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. Whoever is from God hears the words of God. The reason you do not hear them is that you are not from God.

No wonder that Pilate, in reply to Jesus in today’s gospel, says, dismissively, “what is truth?” 

Jesus teaches us that the kingdoms of this world are characterised by people defining themselves in opposition to other people, setting themselves over against other groups, and seeking to maintain that division by violence. They depend on regarding your so-called “enemy” as somehow fundamentally different from you: someone who is disposable. It is your enemy, not you, who is the cause of your trouble, the source of the violence you suffer. He must be eliminated! And your enemy may well think the same about you.

According to Jesus, this is founded on a lie, on the rejection of the truth. And that truth is first of all the good news about God. “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” This is the truth to which Jesus bears witness. The purpose of creation, of human existence, is love, and the good news about God is love which will not compromise with half measures, love that longs to share the life of God with all people. All people. We are all in this together, all equally in need of knowing that love and receiving that life. 

So there can be no over against other people, no division or violence, in the Kingdom of God. God is light and in him is no darkness at all. Those who see the light, who hear the truth, and respond to it, enter that Kingdom. They leave behind the old way of being human, which was founded on a lie, and enter God’s truth. 

And it is that truth to which Jesus bears witness in this scene, most acutely, most personally. Because Jesus is the innocent victim who stands for all human victims, all people who have ever been seen as “the enemy”. Jesus is the enemy! He must be - look at how all the people are rioting and demanding his death. And so Pilate sees him as disposable, different, not the same as him, and hands Jesus over to death. In his unjust judgement Pilate rejects the truth and enacts what the kingdoms of this world are like. And in his acceptance of suffering and death out of love for the world, Jesus enacts the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of the truth.

Pilate rejects the truth of the person before him, and so fails to see the truth of God. But those who receive the truth which Jesus speaks become children of God. They become witnesses who testify to the truth. They enter his kingdom and live according to the new way of love, leaving behind the old way of division, of defining ourselves over against others.

That of course is not always easy, particularly when people disagree about things which they think are very important. The past week has seen the Church of England in crisis over the rejection by General Synod of legislation that would have enabled women to become bishops. For the most part the speeches in Synod itself were thoughtful and respectful, resisting the temptation to caricature opposing views, wanting to find consensus and a shared way forward. 

But that can’t be said of much of the reaction that has followed. There has been a huge emotion dump as this process that has taken so much energy and care over 12 years has collapsed. That emotional energy has got to go somewhere, and it is understandable that some people are hurting and angry, while others are relieved. But there has been much unhelpful and unedifying commentary, knee-jerk reactions, pinning of blame, name calling, and caricaturing of others. 

That will not help find a way forward for our church. But more seriously, if we fail to recognise one another in the truth of our identity as beloved children of God, then we are in danger of slipping back into the old way of being human, the way of the kingdoms of this world.

As the Church of England seeks to find a way forward it is important that we do so with a profound attention and respect for the truth of the other person. The truth that the person who disagrees with me is nevertheless caught up with me in God’s embrace, and that we are called together to bear witness to the truth of God’s patient, transforming love. There is no-one who is “the enemy”. 

That doesn’t offer any instant answer or easy solution. But the church is not called to reflect the values of the world, with its oppositional politics and imposed conformity. The church is not called to be “relevant” or “credible” in terms that the world might want to impose. God’s kingdom is not of this kind. Our task is to bear witness to the truth. Because although God’s kingdom is not from this world, it is for the world. It is the kingdom of Jesus Christ, who, because God so loved the world, was sent into the world, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. And that truth is something to which we can all bear witness.