Pastor Hugh's Monthly Meditation
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Is Christ Our King? Really?
The painting portrayed here is by the late-19th century Russian artist, Nikolai Ge (1831-1894). It is entitled, “What is Truth? (Christ and Pilate).”
Click on image to see a bigger picture of Nikolai Ge's, “What is Truth? (Christ and Pilate).”
Ge was part of the Artists’ Cooperative Society that was formed in 1870 to express a growing discontent with the constraints imposed by the traditionally conservative Imperial Academy of Arts. As a way of breaking from tradition, the “Thirteen Contestants,” to which Ge belonged, formed a travelling art show that allowed their work to be shown to a wider audience. This innovation earned them the name Peredvizhniki, or the Wanderers.
In addition to their progressive outreach to their audience, the Peredvizhniki were also progressive in their artistic style. And this change can be seen most clearly in their portrayal of Jesus.
In our March 2006 meditation we featured Ivan Kramskoi’s “The Temptation of Christ.” Kramskoi, too, was one of the founding “Wanderers.” Rather than portray the traditionally powerful Son of God, Kramskoi’s tempted Jesus was exhausted and ashen from his ordeal. Like Kramskoi, Ge portrays Jesus before Pilate as physically and psychologically depleted and powerless. This portrayal offended many and under pressure from the Church it was removed from the travelling exhibition.
Sunday, November 26, is celebrated in our Church as “Christ the King Sunday.” The Gospel reading is from John 18 and portrays the arrested Jesus’ encounter with Pilate. During their encounter, Pilate asks Jesus, “Are you the King of the Jews?” When Jesus responds that his kingdom is not of this world, we read:
If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the [religious authorities]. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” Pilate asked him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that 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.” (John 18:36-37 NRSV)
Here our lesson ends. The next question asked by Pilate to Jesus, and depicted in Ge’s painting, is “What is Truth?” To which Jesus responds with silence.
What does it mean to claim Jesus as King? Historians will tell you that it was this assertion that eventually served as the charge Rome used to justify Jesus’ execution. In his day, proclaiming Jesus as king would have been considered an act of sedition, punishable by death. There was only one source of authority—Caesar. All other claimants would have been either intimidated into silence or eliminated in order to maintain proper civil order. Yet in our society, the Church’s claim that Christ is our King hardly seems to elicit any reaction, let alone a perilously negative one.
If Jesus was a king, what kind of king was he? Ge’s painting captures well the contrast between the powerful, well-dressed, and demanding Pilate and the haggard, weak and mute Jesus. Pilate stands in the light, Jesus in the shadows. One represents the established political order and maintains control through the manipulation of power, especially the power to kill. The other, Jesus, represents . . . well . . . the political nobodies, the powerless, the marginalized. And he proves his authority by becoming weak and marginalized and “obedient to the point of death — even death on a cross.” (Phil. 2:8)
When we proclaim Christ as our Sovereign, not just with vacuous words, but from our deepest convictions, from our hearts, we confess an allegiance that rejects a culture that glorifies death and violence or justifies its use as an acceptable means to our personal ends. We reject a world that measures the value of a human life in terms of material or political success. When Jesus truly is our sovereign Lord, we not only become the objects of his love, but we become subject to his law — to love others as he loved us. If Christ is really our King, then his rule over us is over our whole life and not over a compartmentalized portion of it, say that hour or so we attend church on a Sunday. If Christ is our King, then all that we have and all who we are belong to him, and come under his rule, to be used for his purpose.
In our culture, we reject the idea of kingship, and for good reason. Not only does the idea of kingship promote the heresy of patriarchy (that is, the rule of men over women), the very notion that a human person should have absolute power over our lives goes against the deepest values of our faith and culture. Kings, history tells us, tend toward despotism. Power in their hands has always been corrupted and corrupting. But this is not so when we bow our knees to the rule of Christ. Our Sovereign proved his authority by becoming humanity's . . . servant. As his subjects, we are called to become the same.
And the reward, the gift that is ours through obedient faith? A life that is nothing less than eternal.
Hugh R. B. Haffenreffer
Pastor
November 2006
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