Today we join Christians around the world in celebrating Christ the King Sunday.

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1 Not of This World The Rev. Dr. Arlene K. Nehring Eden United Church of Christ Hayward, California Christ the King Sunday November 25, 2018 John 18:33-37 (NRSV) Today we join Christians around the world in celebrating Christ the King Sunday. Unless you are a seminary graduate or you were raised in a devout Roman Catholic family, you probably don t have Christ the King Sunday marked on your calendar or know much about its origins. So I ll explain that this observance was established by Pope Pius XI in the aftermath of World War I, and was subsequently incorporated into the liturgical calendars of most Mainline Protestant denominations in the West. The Pope s intentions in establishing this holiday was to highlight the primacy of Christ s leadership and vision of a just and peaceful world over and above the tyranny and strife propagated by earthly potentates that led to the outbreak and devastation associated with World War 1. Since its establishment, Christ the King Sunday has been observed on the last Sunday in Pentecost on the Christian calendar (which is always celebrated in November on the Roman calendar) which usually falls a Sunday or two after Veterans Day on the US calendar This year, November 11, Veterans Day, landed on a Sunday, two weeks ago, which was the 100 th Anniversary of the Armistice. Two weeks ago today, Stephanie and I had were fortunate to be in Paris for this momentous occasion. We were even more fortunate to have walked into Notre Dame Cathedral just 30 minutes prior to the start of the Royal British Legion s Service of Remembrance of the Armistice, and we were allowed to sit in the nave and participate in the entire service. The two of us had been planning this trip for 26 years. We had planned for months to visit Notre Dame, and we had planned to attend church that day; but the truth be told, we owe our good fortune of participating in the British observance to a tip from a cab driver. The gentleman who transported us from Charles de Gaul International Airport to our hotel in the Latin Quarter alerted us to the fact that Avenue des Champs-Élysées and the Lourve would be closed on Sunday, November 11, and that the area around the Arc de Triomphe would be a mess due to the large numbers of visitors, foreign dignitaries, and security

2 check points and diverted traffic patterns that were expected that day. In an effort to make lemonade out lemons, Stephanie and I elected to spend Veterans Day touring Notre Dame, Sainte-Chapelle, and the Left Bank. II If you re on Facebook you can go to one of one of our pages and watch a couple of the Livestream videos I posted of the service and see a few of our vacation pictures. (Thank you for waiting to do that until after worship, even if you have an unlimited data plan.) The Royal British Legion s Service of Remembrance at Notre Dame and the French observances in general were quite poignant even more so, I suspect, than the observances held in other venues around the world. I suspect that this poignancy was due to the fact that France suffered more loss proportionally during WWI, than any other nation that was embroiled in this tragedy, and it is in some ways is still recovering from these losses. The WWI death toll for France was 1.4M which left 2.5M widowed and orphaned. Another 1.2M suffered disabling injuries during the war. Once the war was over and the troupes were discharged, 5M veterans had to be reintegrated into French society all of whom had one more physical, emotional, and spiritual wounds. As the Anglican Bishop who preached the homily two weeks ago explained, every French citizen at the time was either a widow, an orphan, a wounded veteran, or the sibling of a fallen solider. 1 WWI was not only life-altering for the nation as a whole, it was life-altering for every French family. A school boy named Nathaniel Kitzis succinctly captured his nation s profound sense of loss in the prize-wining poem which he wrote and recited at the beginning of the remembrance service. These were his words: With so much devastation and so many dead, how could anyone ever say, We won! I will never forget the moment when that child recited his climactic phrase: With so much devastation and so many dead, how could anyone ever say, We won! In that moment, in that packed Sanctuary, there was a period of silence. Picture snapping, foot shuffling, throat clearing, and neighborly whispering stopped. Then the congregation uttered a unison moan and then a sigh, and then several heads nodded in agreement: With so much devastation and so many dead, how could anyone ever say, We won! III The poignancy of that poetic moment was widely shared. Everyone in the sanctuary seemed to comprehend that these words had been written and uttered by a school boy 1 Not of This World, Rev. Dr. Arlene K. Nehring, 11/25/2018, 2 of 5.

3 whose soprano voice illustrated that he was too young for military conscription, and far too young to remember the start of WWI or any war in this world for that matter. The young poet was not, however, too young to understand the horrors of war, or the world s desperate need for peace and justice. The poignancy of this child poet s words are not lost on those of us in this room either. History has taught us and the polarized political rhetoric that we hear repeated in the media today further reminds us that war is easy to wage and that peace particularly peace with justice is very hard to forge, and even harder to maintain. These are the reasons that Pope Pious XI established today s celebration known as Christ the King Sunday. These are the reasons that this celebration has been adopted by Mainline Protestant churches around the world. It was because we Christians need the reminder that there is a higher power to whom we are ultimately accountable. We need a reminder that earthly potentates should not be granted our ultimate allegiance. Moreover, we need a reminder to look to Jesus for a clear sense of God s vision for the world, and to hold ourselves and our leaders accountable to the example and teachings of Christ if we ever hope to live into that reality. IV Though the horrors of WWI (the War to End All Wars) brought the need to completely review and reboot the world s vision, values, and practices, this process was not new to the Christian Church. It was grounded in the foundations of our tradition, and is illustrated in today s gospel reading. In John chapter 18, we encounter three First Century world leaders: Caiaphas, Pilate, and Jesus. Each expressed radically different visions, values, and practices. A brief summary of each follows: Caiaphas was the High Priest. He was the leader of the Jerusalem Temple and the leader of the Sanhedrin, an Ancient Israelite approximation of a Supreme Court. According to the author of John s gospel, Caiaphas turned Jesus over to Pilate, because Jesus was a threat to the power he held over the dominant culture s religious views. Caiaphas figured that the Temple and the Sanhedrin would be better off without Jesus reminding everyone of the Ancient prophets teachings, but neither the priests nor the judges had the civil authority to conduct executions. That authority lay with the state, so they handed Jesus over to Pilate, the Roman Governor. Pilate was appointed by Caesar to oversee Israel, which had become a colony state in his international realm. Pilate saw Jesus as more of a religious heretic than a political leader, and he realized that Caiaphas was trying to get him to do his dirty work. So Pilate passed off the decision-making assignment regarding Jesus fate to the mob that had gathered in his court. Ultimately, the mob ruled against Jesus, and called for his crucifixion. Not of This World, Rev. Dr. Arlene K. Nehring, 11/25/2018, 3 of 5.

4 Before Jesus was marched off to Golgotha, he was given an opportunity (in John s gospel) to clarify his role and relationship to the religious and imperial authorities. This is when Jesus announces that his kingdom is not of this world. In making this statement, Jesus refused to be characterized as the leader of the dominant religion or the colonial government. Instead, Jesus is presented by John as the true messiah as the moral leader of a Jewish reform movement, not a Temple priest or a political rebel. He was a spiritual leader who revived the teachings of the ancient prophets, who embodied the spirit of the law, and who promoted allegiance to God above all earthly rulers. Jesus was the ultimate authority on earth and in heaven. He was, to echo Isaiah the King of King and Lord of Lords for this counter-culture cohort who are described in John s gospel. The author of John s gospel and the Johannine community understood themselves to be accountable to Christ and to be citizens of his kingdom a kingdom not of this world. He was the leader that they and the world needed then. He was the leader that we continue to need, now more than ever. IV Now, more than ever, we need Jesus not only to save our souls but to save us from ourselves and from the morally weak, short-sighted, self-interested earthly leaders who put their ego needs, their greed, and their desire for power above all else. Now, more than ever, we need Jesus, and the Israelite Prophets, Mohamed, Gandhi and other peace and justice loving prophets whose visions are not of this world, who teach morals and practice ethics that promote justice, peace, the common good, and the stewardship of creation. Now, more than ever, we need leaders and we need to set our sights on leaders whose visions, values, and practices can serve as a plumbline for the alignment of our loyalties and resources if our world is to have any real hope of justice and peace. V Let s think about our own lives for a moment and ask ourselves: what decisions have defined us? To whom have we granted our allegiance? What values have we embraced? Do our espoused values align with our actions? If not, what personal changes do we need to make? Like the author of John s gospel, each of us must decide whom we will grant our allegiance to. Each must define the vision and values we will strive for and express. Each of us must decide whether to align our loyalties with some earthly power, or claim allegiance to a higher power and to citizenship in a realm that is not of this world. My prayer for each and every one of us today is that we may recognize that we do have Not of This World, Rev. Dr. Arlene K. Nehring, 11/25/2018, 4 of 5.

5 choices about our world views. We do have choices about what we say and do. We do have choices about who we campaign for and vote for, and we do have choices about whether we will hold our elected officials accountable for their behavior or not. Do we align ourselves with leaders whose visions, values, and practices are consistent with Jesus and like-mind religious prophets who pursued the common good, who welcomed immigrants and refugees, and who stewarded the earth s resources for the wellbeing of all, or not. My goal is to continue to study and learn from the example and teachings Christ, to use his life and witness as a plumb-line for assessing who I will align with, and to strive to follow his example. I trust that this is your goal too. Amen. Not of This World, Rev. Dr. Arlene K. Nehring, 11/25/2018, 5 of 5.