Christ the King: Oaths of Allegiance

Sermon by the Revd Dr Brutus Green
Readings: Ezekiel 34.11-16,20-24, Psalm 95.1-7, Ephesians 1.15-23, Matthew 25.31-46

If you’re in the Church, the Armed Forces, the police or parliament; judges, magistrates and notaries, scouts or guides, if you become a British citizen, you will swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen.

I have sworn it at least five times.

Parliamentarians have occasionally limply protested: Several have crossed their fingers, Dennis Skinner reputedly added under his breath ‘and all who sail in her’,  cunningly suggesting his fidelity was in fact to HMS Queen Elizabeth II, presumably out of a steadfast devotion to sailors.

But Britain operates on a system. The Queen is the symbol of the system, so however you’re paid the queen’s shilling, you’re bought into her. Your passport allows you to travel in her name, and given that she owns 10% of the country, you can’t get very far here without stepping on her land – whether it’s Hamley’s or the Apple Store, Regent Street is all hers. 

So even if the monarchy is not your thing; if you squirm at the omnipresence of the established inequality that is the cornerstone of this nation, aristocratic privilege, from the very top down, you can’t very well get away from it. To be British is to be a subject of the crown. In our state, no one promises to uphold democracy. No one promises to uphold human rights. No one to defend liberty. But to bear true allegiance to the Queen and her successors is everything.

Now, if you ask most people who is the head of the Church of England, they will tell you immediately:
(thinking of Henry VIII): the Queen! But no – monarchs are merely supreme governors. Like Andrew Bailey is the governor of the bank of England. Governors are always less interesting, though Dr Bailey’s PhD thesis, prior to his career in banking was: ‘The impact of the Napoleonic Wars on the development of the cotton industry in Lancashire.’ A racy title for someone who was to go into banking. But no, once again, the go-to Sunday School answer proves right, the head of the Church of England is Jesus. And in this festival of Christ the King, we are admitting our twin fealty to Ma’am and the Lord.

But before we complain of divided loyalties, let us first consider the nature of Christ’s kingship. The key text here is in Philippians. Very likely this is Paul quoting perhaps the earliest of Christian creeds, when he instructs us:

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, 
who, though he was in the form of God,
   did not regard equality with God
   as something to be exploited, 
but emptied himself,
   taking the form of a slave,
   being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form, 
   he humbled himself
   and became obedient to the point of death—
   even death on a cross. 

Christ’s kingship is revealed on the cross, as Pilate writes in Greek, Latin and Hebrew, Jesus Christ King of the Jews, though his crown is of thorns.

It is ironic. When Israel decides it wants to be like the other nations and have a king in the Old Testament, God warns them that a king will take their sons for his armies, their daughters to be servants, their produce and their labour. God is not a fan of kings. But the people insist. Christ’s kingship, on the other hand, is something else. it is not exploitation, or governance. Christ’s first decision as king is to empty himself, to make himself a slave.

And irony involves parody. Christ the king makes other kings look bad. All your wealth, your power, your entitlement, your privilege. That’s actually how not to be a king. And if you emperor, you khalif, you prince, you raja, are the opposite of the true king, then you deserve pity or contempt, and not honour.

But Christ’s kingship is not merely negative. He has redefined what it means to be anointed, to be Messiah: it is to serve; to suffer for the people. 

The early creed in Philippians continues:

Therefore God also highly exalted him
   and gave him the name
   that is above every name, 
so that at the name of Jesus
   every knee should bend,
   in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 
and every tongue should confess
   that Jesus Christ is Lord,
   to the glory of God the Father. 

Now, here is the danger. If we remain in the mindset of earthly kingship we read this as a happy reversal. Yes, Jesus had a bad week. Well actually just a bad couple of days. Palm Sunday was great and we’d all like to have dinner with a dozen of our close friends. But if we look at the resurrection as an overturning of the crucifixion we miss the point. If we think every knee will be forced to bend; to confess under the almighty power of the returned king; we have not heard the Gospel.

It’s not just the crucifixion. Jesus’ entire life is a critique of power. It begins by divesting itself of power: in poverty, as a refugee, complicated parentage, born among animals. In its content his life is given to healing the powerless, teaching against received wisdom and authority, serving, and challenging power. Execution is a natural end for one who wishes to expose the injustice of politics.

The point of the resurrection is not to turn defeat into victory. Jesus doesn’t come back to judge and destroy Pilate, the pharisees and priests. Even to make them realise how wrong they were, and bend the knee. The resurrection is the sign of hope that promises God’s restoration of everything that eschews power for love. 

Jesus’ kingship remains one that serves instead of ruling; that loves and does not harm; that gives and does not exploit. The judgement of the Gospel is that such who follow this kingship who share that mindset of Christ, will know truth, justice and love. And in doing so will grasp eternity, which knows only these, and nothing of fear, violence and self-concern.

There have been those who have read Christ’s kingship as the great retribution. ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay says the Lord.’ But when we look to the whole work of Christ, To the first martyr who calls for forgiveness of his persecutors: Of the beatitudes and Romans: ‘Bless those who persecute you. Why would the character of God be opposed to that of Christ and the Christian ethic?

We do well if we remember that today’s Gospel is a parable: they aren’t real sheep and goats, so why should we insist that the fire and eternal punishment is prepared by the God who has revealed himself as love? Who has emptied himself of power in order to show humanity how to live.

No but to follow our king is to feed, to give shelter, to comfort, to clothe, to visit. But not only to follow but to know him in those we serve, and so to touch the cloak of something eternal. While those who care for wealth, power and prestige will see those go up in flames with our transitory world.

The British monarchy, for what it’s worth, is no stranger to this kenosis, this emptying. We have not had an empress of India for some time, and by miles and inches the monarchy has rescinded its place in the world. And the faith of service of our Queen is at least beyond reproach. But to follow our King requires a shift of values. To seek generosity not wealth; care of others, not security; humility not prestige; love and not power.

You’d get a better lunch with the Queen. But it is an eternal banquet with our King. Amen.