I Testify to the Truth – John 18:33-37

A text – John 18:33-37   

³³ Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” ³⁴ Jesus answered, “Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?” ³⁵ Pilate replied, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?” ³⁶ Jesus answered, “My kingdom does not belong to this world. If my kingdom belonged to this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” ³⁷ 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.”

A reflection:

This coming Sunday is known in many Protestant circles as Christ the King Sunday. One of the usual readings for that Sunday is this scene between Pontius Pilate and Jesus, when the Jewish chief priests have handed Jesus over to Pilate for trial. Pilate is trying to get the measure of Jesus. He has heard someone say that Jesus is king of the Jews. But Pilate knows that Herod is the nation’s king. Is Jesus a petty king of a small tribe somewhere in Judea? Is Pilate actually dealing with a king? A prophet? A lunatic? So he asks. And Jesus’s answer apparently annoys him. He gets nowhere, so he asks what Jesus has done to be handed over. Jesus doesn’t answer him. He continues about kingship. He locates his kingdom “not from here.” And then he declares his destiny, his identity to Pilate: “I came to this world to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”

Jesus, the Son of God, testifies to the truth. We are followers of this Jesus. Wouldn’t we love it if Jesus testified to the truth (and noted the lies) on our command? We are daily bombarded by both truth and lies, and we are bewildered. Human beings don’t always tell the truth, and they may use one truth to lay groundwork for lies. We might cry out to Jesus to testify to the truth, show the liars for who they really are. If we cry out for Jesus’s truth, and if we get really still, if we turn off all the noise, and if we listen for Jesus’s testimony to the truth, what will Jesus tell us? He will say, “I love you. That is God’s everlasting truth. I will be with you even past death and into the next world. I am the Alpha and the Omega, and you are mine.” Jesus spent his ministry showing us the love of God, showing who and what God cares about, and showing the going-even-past-death nature of that love. The kingship of Jesus is the embodiment of the greatest commandment: Love God and love neighbor.

A prayer:

Lord God, Thank you for loving us. Thank you for the gift of the scriptures that tell Jesus’s stories and his testimony to the truth. Help us always to remember that Christ is the King, and that his rule is love for God and neighbor, something we always have the power to imitate.  Amen.