The Kingship of Jesus

Christ in Majesty, apse mosaic of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington D.C.

In a little less than a week, as you well know, families and friends around the country will gather around a shared table and join in one of the most special meals of the year. Any grade schooler can tell you that the origins of our Day of Thanksgiving are traced back to 1621, when English pilgrims and Native Americans of the Wampanoag tribe shared a feast after the autumn harvest. The event marks, in a certain sense, the kind of spiritual birthday of what America came to represent – a land of freedom, opportunity, even abundance, and indeed for that and for all of our blessings it is proper each year to give thanks.

The Pilgrims, like so many of the immigrant people that came to the New World, were not only seeking something better – they were also leaving something worse. Many of them were especially seeking freedom from tyranny – from the unjust laws and heavy taxes of kings and queens in the European homeland. In the centuries since, much of the world has come to appreciate and even adopt for themselves the political virtues which have come to define America – representative government, democratic rule – things that I’m sure each of us value as well. While we may tire at times with the downsides of our political process, we nonetheless are grateful that we have one, that we’re not merely the subjects of earthly kings and queens.

What then do we make of today’s feast, when we call Jesus our King? Does the fact that we live in a democratic society – indeed, in a nation founded by those seeking to get away from kings – mean that the kingship of Jesus lacks meaning for us? In the Gospel, Jesus certainly doesn’t appear very kingly – this holy man from Galilee, arrested, in the presence of the Roman governor, about to be sentenced to be crucified on a cross.

The key is to hear again what Jesus says to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.” Jesus doesn’t need earthly kingship – or any of its trappings of power – for he has been given, in the words of the Book of Daniel, “an everlasting dominion”. Jesus is a King because he has been made one by his Heavenly Father, who has given him all power, honor, and glory. Obedient to his Father’s will, even to the point of death, in order to redeem us from eternal death, Jesus is, in the words of Revelation, “the firstborn of the dead and ruler of the kings of the earth.” His kingdom now is present only in a hidden form but at the end of time it will be revealed for all to see. In a sense, what we celebrate today – unlike all of the other feasts of our year – is not so much about an event that is in our past but rather one that is to come.

If we recognize that Jesus truly is the King of Kings – the only eternal King – then two things become apparent for us. First, we realize how important it is that we become a part of his kingdom. Just like an earthly king, we have to form ourselves after his example – valuing what he values, loving what he loves, rejecting what he rejected. This can be done in any and every aspect of our life: family, work, school, relationships. In these areas and others, we seek to act as he did – that is, forgiving, serving, praying, loving unconditionally. It’s much more than just asking ourselves, “What would Jesus do?” Rather we should ask, “What does Jesus wish to do through me?”

Second, we realize that in the face of final victory and everlasting glory, the fears and challenges of this world – indeed, this world itself – are ultimately all passing away. Whether it’s anxieties that we face in our personal lives, or the frightening things we see around our nation and our world, nothing can challenge the victory that Jesus has already achieved. I say this not in any way to trivialize the real difficulties that we do face. We know them all too well – we see them all around us – and we must work to overcome them, calling always upon God’s grace to assist us. But even as we strive against very real challenges to make our lives and the world around us better, nothing – nothing – should really disrupt the interior sense of joy that Christ reigns for all eternity. Remember that great line from St. Paul – "What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? ... No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us."

My friends, Jesus is not like an earthly king and we have no need to fear his kingship. His kingdom is not of this world – but that doesn’t mean we can’t begin to experience it even now, even before its final revelation. The more you and I form ourselves in the image of our king, the more we submit ourselves in joy to the knowledge that his Providence guides all things – the closer we come to bringing the full reality of that kingdom to light.

In a few moments, we’ll share a taste of that kingdom – a Thanksgiving feast, if you will, not commemorating an event of the past, but a reality of the now and the forever, a preview of the heavenly banquet. One of my favorite Christian authors, Fr. Romano Guardini, writing on the Mass, puts it well: Everything around us is uncertain, alien, edged with danger. No one knows what tomorrow will bring. Now, however, we are here, celebrating the memorial of our Lord. He knows about us, and we know about Him... Now, at the moment of sacred commemoration, He will come to us, will be with us, will fortify us. Whatever tomorrow may bring, it will be of His sending. 

May Christ our King – who feeds us with his very self – strengthen us today and always, that we may know and love and serve him in this life that we may reign with him in the next.