The last Sunday in our liturgical calendar is always the celebration of the feast of Christ the King, the fitting finale to reflections on the fullness of time. Saint John’s gospel text decisively clarifies the meaning of the title “king” given to Jesus (John 18:33b-37).
Are you the King of the Jews?
The arraignment of Jesus before Pilate, the Roman procurator, is His one and only encounter with a representative of political power. Pilate is understandably wary of this case brought to him by the religious leaders of the Jews. What do they really want? Is he being trapped in their own intramural quarrel? Pilate asks Jesus to hear his side, “Are you the king of the Jews?” Jesus responds with a question of his own, “Do you say this on your own or have others told you about me?” Meaning: Do you have on your own information about any illegal activities by me, or is this entire affair a machination of others using you for their own agenda?
With disdain Pilate shoots back, “I am not a Jew, am I?” He is not stooping down to the level of the interminable squabbling among the Jews and their apparent religious pettiness. But he squarely identifies the accusers, “Your own nation and the chief priests handed you over to me. What have you done?” So, Jesus must answer and state whether or not He is aspiring to be a king and therefore guilty of treason against the emperor of Rome. “My kingdom does not belong to this world.” No emperor, king or leader need to be worried about Him, because He is not intent on some power-grab in rivalry to anyone. He has already turned down once the wish of some people to make Him their king (John 6:15). And He has never resorted to the use of force to achieve anything; in fact He has stopped His followers from doing so even for His protection (John 18:11).
Then you are a king?
Pilate’s questioning neatly serves to clear the matter. Having eliminated any political purpose in the activities of Jesus, the opening is given Him to state His type of kingship. “You say I am a king”—a king in what I do, highest and supreme in my fidelity to my mission, an exemplar to all in my commitment, unchallenged in the totality of my service to the people. A king because born especially to accomplish something very vital for the good of the world: to testify and bear witness to the truth of God’s saving love for all.
For Jesus, the reign of God He came to establish is a kingdom of love and justice, of peace and joy. It is a kingdom of truth, where to be a leader one must live by the truth and testify to the truth of the supremacy of love, of God’s mercy, of the dignity of even the little ones, of man’s vocation to holiness and to eternal life. Jesus is King because He can say: I am the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6)—He personifies absolutely all this. And “everyone who belongs to the truth listen to my voice.” Everyone who really cares for the truth, who is truly concerned with people, who is uncompromising in the commitment to justice for all, who consistently works for peace, any such person listens to Jesus and recognizes in Him a King, their model.
Alálaong bagá, Jesus Christ has raised up to the highest level what kingship or leadership means. Pilate’s cynical retort: “What is truth?” identifies the virus that brings down the self-seeking dream of many who would be king, whether in the family or in society or in an organization. It is not a game or a theory or some magic formula that can get people off the mire of personal interests and infantile opportunism, but the life, the way, the truth of Jesus, the servant king, who says He has come not to be served but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45).
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