Simon’s reflection for Christ the King
The image of Christ as King, like the image of Christ as Lord, is a powerful and evocative image but to get at what it might be saying to us, we may need to do a bit of archaeology, a bit of digging into the past.
That’s because kingship and lordship mean different things today in our everyday experience and they don’t consume our attention in the way that they may have done for people of former times. Kings and Queens don’t have the direct power over our lives they once had. They don’t govern or command in the same way. They are not of course without power or authority. The fascination with monarchy has not gone away and indeed many people still see it as a thing of value in our contemporary society but how we understand our allegiance to them, if indeed we accept that idea, has changed.
In the past, though, Kings and Queens were often direct rulers. The fortunes of their realms to some extent rose and fell with their own fortunes. They commanded allegiance and they commanded. Some of them were good leaders and some were bad; most were in between like any other human being would be in that situation. They were sometimes a figure of majesty and glory and could command a mystique and a romantic attachment.
In the bible kings and queens get a very mixed press. The people desire for a king so that they can “be like the other nations” in 1 Samuel. That request is granted but also interpreted as a rejection of God’s Kingship over them and Samuel gives them warnings about the downside of having an earthly king. At the same time, God works for good with the human monarchy and raises up David to be their king and later promises a messiah from David’s line.
You can see both of these themes in today’s Ezekiel reading. The earthly kings have failed. The people are oppressed and scattered but God promises to be their king and their shepherd Himself and to rescue them. He promises to raise a messiah, a king of David’s line to be their shepherd and rescue them. God will be their shepherd and King and so will the Davidic king to come. Christians believe that both statements are fulfilled in Jesus but the fulfilment is still in a sense hidden.
Christ’s kingship is in one sense hidden. For one thing, it doesn’t look like an earthly kingship. Jesus doesn’t seem powerful. He wanders around like a poor, homeless man. He dies on a cross next to condemned criminals. He doesn’t seem to come from a family of any power or influence as those terms were understood.
Yet on another level, he has a unique power and authority which is unlike any other human power. We think of the miracles, the teaching, his authority, the resurrection. All these things speak of a power far greater than any normal power. Some people of his time glimpse something of this and become his disciples. Some, however, don’t see it. They just see him as a nobody, a Galilean upstart with no pedigree or education, a rabble-rouser and a nuisance.
The kingship of Christ is hidden to us too of course and apprehended with the eyes of faith. Allegiance is invited not demanded. He is our King whether we choose Him or not but he wants us to choose Him. He’s a very democratic sort of king. He wants us to vote for him!
Despite the hiddenness or perhaps because of it, Christ’s Kingship is supremely loving. The great historian Thomas Carlyle once said: “power corrupts and absolute power, corrupts absolutely.” In the world “power” has become a dirty word because of its misuse. But with God there is no contradiction between power and love. God’s power is the power of a supreme love.
The King is also loving shepherd and victim on the cross. King Jesus tells us that if we want to look for him in our world now, we will find him when we feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, tend and visit the sick, clothe the naked, visit the prisoner, welcome the stranger. We will see the face of King Jesus in their faces.
That is part of what it means to recognise Christ as our King. It means recognising a claim to our obedience which is above every claim. It means doing what Christ calls us to do like the blessed in the parable. It may mean following even to the point of self-sacrifice taking up our crosses.
It also means being on the receiving end of his help. St Paul tells us that the power that was in Christ is in us. We should never think of ourselves as powerless. When we seek to do good, we have God’s power to actively help us.
Finally, it means that we are given a huge dignity. I used to visit a lady in a nursing home and her husband at one time. Often an African nurse would come in while the lady was asleep and we were talking and she would say: “Good morning princes!” She would go on to explain: “You are brothers of a King. You are princes!” Amen.