{"id":1724,"date":"2015-11-22T13:26:25","date_gmt":"2015-11-22T18:26:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=1724"},"modified":"2015-11-22T13:26:25","modified_gmt":"2015-11-22T18:26:25","slug":"our-lord-jesus-christ-king-of-the-universe-year-b-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/our-lord-jesus-christ-king-of-the-universe-year-b-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Lord Jesus Christ King of the Universe, Year B – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

Our Lord Jesus Christ King of the Universe, Year B<\/a>
\nDaniel 7:13-14
\nPsalm 93:1-2, 5
\nRevelation 1:5-8
\nJohn 18:33b-37
\nNovember 22, 2015<\/p>\n

We call Jesus \u201cking\u201d but what does this really mean for us?<\/p>\n

The Jews had long been waiting for a new messiah.\u00a0 The messiah they were looking for was heir to the throne of David.\u00a0 They saw this to mean the messiah would restore the kingdom of Israel on Earth and make them a great nation once again.<\/p>\n

Pontius Pilate asked Jesus, \u201cAre you the king of the Jews?<\/em>\u201d\u00a0 Pilate only asked the question because those who opposed Jesus had come to Pilate saying Jesus was making himself out to be a king and that was a threat to Caesar\u2019s power.<\/p>\n

Jesus responded by saying, \u201cMy kingdom does not belong to this world\u2026.my kingdom is not here.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

Jesus is indeed a king but not in the way Pilate is concerned with.\u00a0 Pilate\u2019s interest lies only in political kingship.\u00a0 Jesus has no interest in being a political king.\u00a0 Jesus\u2019 focus is on faith and the theological meaning of kingship.<\/p>\n

We see Jesus\u2019 kingship come in its fullness in the heavenly kingdom but we come to know of the heavenly kingdom while we are still in this world.\u00a0 Jesus comes to tell us of the heavenly kingdom.\u00a0 Jesus comes to bring us truth.\u00a0 We call Jesus \u201cking\u201d and that means following the truth he brings.<\/p>\n

In recognizing Jesus as king in Heaven, we turn to images of what that kingdom will be like.\u00a0 That leads us to the Book of the Prophet Daniel and the Book of Revelation.<\/p>\n

These two books contain multiple images of what the heavenly kingdom will be like.\u00a0 Daniel presents the image of the Son of Man coming as the one who received \u201cdominion\u201d<\/em> and \u201ckingship<\/em>\u201d from the Ancient One.\u00a0 Jesus gets his authority from God.<\/p>\n

Daniel also speaks of how \u201chis kingship shall not be destroyed<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 No earthly kingdom lasts forever and so we see this pointing to the heavenly kingdom.<\/p>\n

Revelation reminds us of how Jesus shed his blood for us.\u00a0 Many kings expect people (soldiers) to shed their blood for the king but Jesus turns that around and sheds his blood for us.\u00a0 Jesus comes not to be served but to serve.<\/p>\n

Revelation goes onto speak of the Lord as \u201cthe alpha and the omega<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 Alpha is the first character of the Greek alphabet and Omega is the last so this points to God as the beginning and the end.\u00a0 Jesus has always existed and will always exist as our king here on Earth and in Heaven.\u00a0 Jesus is king everywhere.\u00a0 Jesus is \u201cking of the universe.\u201d<\/p>\n

What does calling Jesus \u201cking\u201d mean for us?<\/p>\n

First, going back to what Jesus said, \u201cFor this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth<\/strong><\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 Jesus gives us the truth that only God can offer.<\/p>\n

If we believe in Jesus, we need to get rid of the idea that seems to be growing in the world today, that there is no one truth.\u00a0 There is and we don\u2019t get to decide what it is.\u00a0 The truth<\/em> comes from God.\u00a0 We can accept or reject it but our rejection doesn\u2019t change the truth.<\/p>\n

What else does it mean to call Jesus \u201cking\u201d?<\/p>\n

To call Jesus \u201cking\u201d is to accept him as our leader.\u00a0 As I already said, many earthly kings expected the people to serve them, to be willing to shed blood for the king.<\/p>\n

Jesus turns that around and sheds his blood for us, to call us to serve.\u00a0 When we lead, we must not lead for our own gain in wealth or power.\u00a0 When we lead, we must<\/em> serve the needs of others.<\/p>\n

When a parent leads their family, it must be for the good of the whole <\/em>family and not just for the parent to get what they want.<\/p>\n

When we are a supervisor at work, we must work to help others become better.<\/p>\n

When a politician leads, it must be for the good of the people.<\/p>\n

When any of us leads, it must not be to get our own way.\u00a0 Our goal must always remember the words in the Our Father, thy kingdom come, thy will be done<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our Lord Jesus Christ King of the Universe, Year B Daniel 7:13-14 Psalm 93:1-2, 5 Revelation 1:5-8 John 18:33b-37 November 22, 2015 We call Jesus \u201cking\u201d but what does this really mean for us? The Jews had long been waiting for a new messiah.\u00a0 The messiah they were looking for was heir to the throne …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘Our Lord Jesus Christ King of the Universe, Year B – Homily’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[82],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-rO","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1724"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1724"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1724\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1725,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1724\/revisions\/1725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}