Jesus Is Lord!
Revelation 1:4-18[1]
If anyone happened to pay attention to the
bulletin or the PowerPoint and noticed that today is designated “Christ the
King” Sunday, I’m not sure that would mean much. The only “royalty” we pay much
attention to these days is the British royal family. But they’re really not
much more than “cultural icons” as Wikipedia calls them. They’re known for
their wealth and celebrity. They function as figureheads with no real authority
or power to do much of anything. The best of them use their position to
advocate for good causes; the others are infamous for their family drama. If
that’s our image of what it means to be a “King,” it’s no wonder observing this
day as “Christ the King” Sunday gets passed over without much notice.
Nevertheless, the image of God reigning over
all things as “King” is one that is central to the Bible, as our Psalm lesson
for today reminds us. It is an affirmation that, regardless of who may hold
power in this world, God is the one who ultimately determines the outcomes in
the end. That, too, may be a problem for us. We see a lot of outcomes in this
world that seem to be contrary to God’s ways. It may be all too easy to assume
that God’s power isn’t what it’s cracked up to be, or perhaps God may not be
paying attention, or maybe he’s just taking a long nap. Meanwhile, the world
continues to go on as it always has. The rich get richer and might makes right.
Our lesson from the book of Revelation for
today addresses this question. In the first-century world, Christians had to
face this challenge in a similar way that we do. The ultimate power in their
day was the Roman Empire, and any time anyone questioned that power, they were
met with brutal violence. The presence of vast and powerful Roman armies
throughout the world of that day constantly reminded people where “true” power was.
And Roman Governors like Pontius Pilate didn’t hesitate to unleash the soldiers
on unarmed crowds of men, women, and children to keep a firm grip on their
power. The problem for believers in that day was that they confessed their
faith that “Jesus is Lord” in their worship! And yet, all around them were
images that contradicted that faith.
I believe the book of Revelation was written
to remind those Christians that at the heart of their faith was a very
different vision of what life is about. It’s a vision of the one who sits on
the throne, who bends everything that happens, both evil and good, toward his
purposes. To convey this image, our lesson speaks of God as “the Alpha and the
Omega,” the one “who is and who always was and who is still to come,” and “the
Almighty” (Rev. 1:8). This description of God is full of implications, but
essentially, it’s a reminder that God is the one who sits on the throne of the
universe, and it is his rule that will ultimately define all things and
everyone in the end. It’s a reminder that “Our God is an awesome God; he reigns
from heaven above; with wisdom, power, and love; our God is an awesome God.”[2] That remains true regardless of what we see or who claims to hold power here
and now.
The Book of Revelation also speaks of the one
who stands at God’s right hand: “Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the
firstborn of the dead” (Rev. 1:5). Again, there’s a whole theology about Jesus
packed into that phrase, and it takes the rest of Revelation to explain. One of
the most important images of Jesus in the Book of Revelation is that he is the
lamb who was slain and who has triumphed through his death. As in our day, so
also in that day, “triumphing through death” didn’t make much sense. And it
still doesn’t. Sacrificing one’s life the way Jesus did would seem to be
weakness, not power. But the Scripture contradicts that point of view by
proclaiming that, because of his death and resurrection, Jesus is “the ruler of
the kings of the earth” (Rev. 1:5). All the kings of the earth! Because of his
death and resurrection, he alone has the right to rule over all the so-called
“powers” of this world. And he rules over the “kingdom of this world,” and the
promise is that “he shall reign forever and ever” (Rev. 11:15) as we know from
the familiar oratorio “The Messiah”!
At the heart of the Christian faith is a
vision of a reality that directly opposes the visions of power in our present
world. God reigns over all things by the power of his love. And Jesus
demonstrates that power by working in each of our lives to transform this world
into “the kingdom of our Lord” (Rev. 11:15). At the heart of our faith is the
conviction that this ultimate reality, God’s reign in and through our lives
through Jesus our Lord, is the true reality that defines all of life. This
reality, the reign of Jesus Christ as Lord, exposes the falsehood of all the
boastful claims of the rich and powerful in our day. And the promise is that
one day the reign of Jesus Christ as Lord will overthrow all the false powers
in our world and bring true peace, justice, and freedom to everyone!
I guess the question we have to answer is
whether this vision is more convincing than what pretends to be true in our
world. Things haven’t changed much since the First Century. But the real
question we have to address here is where we place our faith. As a recent
lesson from the Psalms reminds us, if we place our faith in “mortals,” no
matter how powerful they may seem, we find that in them “there is no help” (Ps.
146:3). The Scriptures call us to place our faith in the God who is working
right now to establish his kingdom and his justice, peace, and freedom for all
peoples everywhere. The Scriptures call us to place our faith in Jesus Christ
as our Lord, the one who by his death and resurrection exposed the lie of those
who abuse their power in this world. The Scriptures call us to place our faith
in our Savior who lives and reigns for all time and unto all eternity. And the
Scriptures tell us that one day all creation will worship him as Lord of all.
I think we need that kind of “bigger picture” perspective
for our faith in these days.[3] It’s all too easy for us, especially when we go through hard times, to think
nobody’s paying any attention, nobody really knows or cares. If God did, why
would this happen? But as a good friend reminded me once when I was going
through a hard time, nothing that we have to go through in this life escapes
God’s notice. God always pays careful attention to each one of our lives, because
that’s the nature of who God is. That’s the nature of his love for us. When all
we see reinforces the appearance that power in this world comes from force, or
intimidation, or wealth, it can be discouraging to those of us trying to live
out our Christian faith, hope, and love.
But the Bible gives us a different image of
power: it’s the image of the all-powerful God who created all things in the
beginning. It’s the image of the God who entered this world in the person of
Jesus to redeem us all with the power of love on the cross. It’s the image of
the power of new life defeating the power of death on Easter Sunday. It’s the
image of Jesus reigning as Lord even now over all the “powers” in our world.
It’s the image of that reign fulfilled one day “on earth as it is in heaven.” What
that means for us is that one day all the wrongs of this world will be set
right, and all that we have to suffer in this world will be turned to good.
That’s the nature of Jesus’ reign as Lord. And the promise is that Jesus shall
reign as Lord like this “forever and ever”! Amen!
[1] © 2024 Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by
Rev. Alan Brehm PhD on 11/24/2024 for Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman NE.
[2] Rich Mullins, “Our God is an Awesome God,” 1988, BMG Songs, Inc.
[3] Cf. Richard Bauckham, Theology of the
Book of Revelation, 31, where he says that the “vision of God’s sovereignty
in heaven” is what “makes it possible for John to enlarge his readers’
perspective on their own situation by setting it within the broader context of
God’s universal purpose of overcoming all opposition to his rule and
establishing his kingdom in the world.” This reign of God is “the true reality
which must in the end also prevail on earth.”
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