The Solemnity of Christ the King, November 24, 2024

John 18, 33–37

Pilate said to Jesus, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus answered, “Do you say this on your own or have others told you about me?” Pilate answered, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests handed you over to me. What have you done?” Jesus answered, “My kingdom does not belong to this world. If my kingdom did belong to this world, my attendants would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not here.” So Pilate said to him, “Then you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say I am a king. For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”

It is fitting that this feast marks the end of the Church year for, at the end of time, Christ the King will descend from heaven on the clouds to judge the living and the dead. 

“Are you the King of the Jews?”  The Roman procurator, Pontius Pilate, asks this question of the Lord Jesus.  The Lord never applied any such title to himself.  The title never occurs in the Law or the Prophets, nor did any Israelite king claim it.  It is a concoction of the high priests and quite odd-sounding to Jewish ears.  Of course, the high priests came up with it in order to set Pilate against Jesus, for otherwise they had no civil case against him.  “Do you say this on your own or have others told you about me?”  Jesus says this in order to point out to Pilate that he did not hear him call himself by that title — it was one affixed to him by the high priests.  “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests handed you over to me.”  Pilate’s reply does not seem to fit with what Jesus asked: “Do you say this on your own?” If we look carefully at the first part of the Lord’s question we can see that Jesus is asking Pilate if he is confessing that he is the King of the Jews.  Indeed, the Greek text can better be translated as: “You are saying this of yourself or others are telling you about me.”  This would explain Pilate’s strong reaction: “I am not a Jew, am I?”  Pilate follows this with, “Your own nation and the chief priests handed you over to me”, implying that the Lord’s own nation believes this of him, but he, Pilate, not belonging to this nation, certainly does not.  “What have you done?”  Pilate does not count the claim that Jesus calls himself the King of the Jews as a crime and so he passes over it and proceeds to ask him what  is the crime he has  committed.

“My kingdom does not belong to this world.”  Literally, “My kingdom is not of this world.”  The lectionary version means that the Lord’s kingdom does not have physical boundaries in this world.  The literal version implies that this is not just a kingdom in a spiritual place, but a kingdom that is wholly spiritual.  Now, Jesus uses the false claim as an opening to speak to Pilate about the Kingdom of God.  The Lord pauses here, giving Pilate a chance to form a question.  A kingdom not of this world should have intrigued this superstitious Roman, but it does not.  The Lord offers another way to understand what he is talking about: “If my kingdom did belong to this world, my attendants would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews.”  The Lord draws the lesson from this example: “But as it is, my kingdom is not here.”  But Pilate is not interested in kingdoms not of this world, only that Jesus says he is a king: “Then you are a king?”  

“You say I am a king.”  As though to say: “I am not a king in the sense that you are using this word.  I myself do not use the word because it would mislead you into thinking I am someone I am not.”  It was for this reason that the Lord never called himself the “messiah”: it had political implications foreign to his mission.  “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”  Jesus explains to Pilate that this is what the word “king” means to him, one who is at the service of others, revealing the mysteries of Almighty God.  He also explains who his subjects are: those who listen to his voice.  This is a King and a Kingdom like none other.

Jesus is a King who does not rule territory and the people who live there, but a King who rules hearts.