Christ Our Servant King

Next week, we will be in Advent, where we wait and prepare ourselves for the coming of Jesus, our King. But, just who is this Jesus, the King?

Daniel Clendenin tells us that the birth of Jesus signaled that God would "bring down rulers from their thrones" (Luke 1:52). In Mark's gospel the very first words that Jesus spoke announced that "the kingdom of God is at hand" (1:15). John's gospel takes us to the death of Jesus, and the political theme is the same. Jesus was dragged to the Roman governor's palace for three reasons, all political: "We found this fellow subverting the nation, opposing payment of taxes to Caesar, and saying that He Himself is Christ, a King" (Luke 23:1–2).

Jesus announced that He is King and that the rulers of the world are not. We know that as humans we are prone to sin and under those circumstances our own human leadership would be filled with endless political strife and rebellions, which, in fact, is what we see in today’s world. The Israelites yearned for God to provide kings to lead and protect them, and maybe just make things easier for them, but those leaders, always ended up falling short of the goal of bringing peace and justice to their world.

The visions that Daniel has in this week’s reading trace the rise and fall of some of the greatest political kingdoms known throughout history: Babylon, Persia, Greece and finally Rome. But Daniel foretells of a king whose kingdom is not ethnically, spatially, or temporally limited. God’s kingdom is an everlasting dominion, not destined to pass away. Daniel goes on to say in verse 14 that peoples of all nations and of every language are welcome to worship the one true ruler of all the kings of the earth.

Christ, our King taught the disciples how to pray in the Lord’s prayer when he said. "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." People who live and pray this way have a very different agenda than Caesar's. They enter a kingdom, pledge their allegiance to a ruler, and submit to the reign of Christ the King.

Jesus is a prophet, priest, and king. When he walked this earth, he didn’t look like a powerful ruler, yet he modeled a much more meaningful and effective kind of leadership as a servant king – one who welcomes, loves, and cares for all people. May we, at St. John’s continuing to walk in faith, love, and service side by side all those we meet in our community, persevere in modeling our lives after Christ our Servant King.

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