We have come to the end of the church year. Next Sunday, the first Sunday of Advent, begins the new church year. The church year always culminates in Christ the King Sunday. It’s a Sunday in which we emphasize that Christ rules over all things, but acknowledge that he turns on its head all our common understanding of kingship. It's a tradition in which we imply that there is a spiritual reality in all human institutions on the one hand and emphasize on the other, the political realities inherent in this Kingdom of Christ.

Many years ago, I preached a series of sermons about strongholds, based on a book by theologian Walter Wink called "Engaging the Powers." At that time I pointed out to you something the biblical writers understood clearly: that at the center of political, economic and cultural institutions are spiritual realities, that are at odds with God's will and purpose. The letter to the Ephesians called these "principalities and powers." Institutions are not only places like University of Chicago or the Schools our children go to, the grocery store on the corner, the bank, the hospital, the Neighborhood Club, the City of Chicago or the U.S government, they are also our culturally held values and patterns of behavior. But this does not mean that they are evil. In fact, our Call to Worship, which is a hymn of the early church, affirms that God has created all things -- including institutions. "For in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers -- all things were created through him and for him." After all, institutions are a necessary part of community life.

There is an important word that we need to notice here: and that is "in him all things hold together" -- synistemi - the source of the English word "system." God meant for institutions to hold together, be systematized in God. God intended that people too, would be held together. But I don't have to tell you about our brokenness and fallenness, now, do I? No, we know that all too well. But here's something that we don't often understand: like all created things, institutions too are fallen. So, rather than be tools in God's system for redemptive, healing, liberating Kingdom activity, institutions become tools in Satan's hand for oppressive and binding activity -- you know how easy it is for that to happen, don't you? All right, then, you ask, so, what's my role in the institution? I think, it is to participate in God's activity of redeeming the institutions. And systemic fallenness needs systemic redemption. And let me add, when we don't participate in its redemption we are participating in its fallenness. If we are not a part of the solution, we are a part of the problem. In this matter, we cannot be neutral.

When was a kid in Sunday School I was told that Jesus had surprised and disappointed his people by not being the kind of Messiah that Jews had hoped for. They hoped for someone like Ariel Sharon, who would wage a nationalistic war for Israel's independence. Instead, the picture I had of Jesus was like that of a mild mannered Sunday school teacher, who had been mistakenly arrested and crucified for our sins, but miraculously rose again -- so everything is all right now. Jesus was the good boy on the block, who came to save us wimps from the bullies, and would reward us all for good behavior and right thinking about religion. The world had mistakenly expected from him a rearrangement of its politics, economics, and class structure. But I was told that he only came to save us from our sins. And the sins -- the ones we could dare to mention, I discovered, depended on which church you went to. Since I was Baptist, the sins were drinking, smoking, dancing and not taking the Bible to church. For my Catholic friends it was eating meat on Fridays and missing mass on Sunday. But sin was always spoken of as personal failing. There was a very limited understanding of the social dimension of sin, there still is -- and I never had any suggestion that the way we lived needed radical change.

Today, Jeremiah says the messiah will be a Righteous Branch. The last King's name was Zedekiah, meaning Yahweh is My Justice, but this new Ruler will be called Yahweh is Our Vindication. Notice the communitarian twist on the name -- "my" to "our" Jeremiah speaks out of the context of a nation in dire straits politically and religiously. We can't easily separate those two, you see -- the prophets keep inserting themselves into these political situations as if they are the ones God has appointed to speak truth to power! Jeremiah saw the impending disaster of Exile--the nation was on the brink of defeat and imprisonment, and Jeremiah and the prophets have been yelling for decades, "No more War!" Like how we go on chanting it endlessly.

I suppose, prophetic communities will have to keep chanting it for the foreseeable future. We've been down this road before, and doubtless we will be on this road again. Our nation's faith in military power is monumental. Now that we have smashed Afghanistan to dust -- and still no Osama Bin Laden, you might notice, only a large number of dead, maimed, displaced Afghan people who were among the poorest in the world to begin with. I rejoice with the Afghan people that the ruthlessly oppressive Taliban has fallen in many areas of that country -- although, by all accounts the Northern Alliance is no better, for instance in its treatment of women. But that's not why we went to war. When we are done with Afghanistan, we will doubtless revisit Iraq. Colombia looms large on our southern view screens. Cuba is still one of our favorites on the Terrorist list. Lebanon needs settling and Syria will have to be dealt with.

But no one paid Jeremiah any more attention than we have paid the prophets of our time and at the end, an Enemy came up that took them away into captivity. Jeremiah saw the moral failure of the nation's leaders. And we don't have to look far to see that now, do we, though they are the most popular leaders in our nation's history. And Jeremiah was jailed for dissent.

Last time we talked about them, I said that the strongholds are like forces that are controlled by idols that we worship and that these idols do not look evil or feel repulsive, indeed, they may seem attractive and even good and moral. Japanese theologian Kosuke Koyama in his book Mount Fiji and Mount Sinai describes an image of the idol of the Japanese Emperor during the Second World War. He remembers the picture of a man impeccably dressed in military uniform and mounted on a magnificent white horse named White Snow. This is the image of the 124th Emperor, which was circulated during the war. It was a pleasing image. He was not unreal, not "wood or stone." The military leaders wanted to convey to the people that this emperor was going to lead Japan to victory. Why? The emperor was divine and Japan was the divine land. It is destined from primordial times to be victorious.

Japan's leaders had become greedy for power. Koyama says that most Japanese people were not particularly interested in going to war. So, how will the military leaders motivate and mobilize the people? They think, "well, we already have an institution in place, the Emperor, who is considered by many to be divine. If we play that up, add a proclamation, a myth, some nationalistic zeal, we've got it." So they played up this elevation of the Emperor to the status of a god and imperial religion was forced upon people. In order for that attempt to be successful, they had to take away the freedom to think and speak. So they banned Japanese scholars from speaking and writing and fed the people with unreasoned slogans, which proclaimed that Japan was the righteous nation and that the enemy was the devil. Koyama says: "Political propaganda about the cult of the divine emperor made it possible for the leaders to take away from the people their right, even their ability to protest. Families surrendered their young men to be sacrificed on beach heads, in the air and on the sea. Food, freedom and security were sacrificed on the altar of the imperial cult." Even though Tokyo had become a wilderness after repeated bombings in March that year (88,000 people died in one raid that lasted 22 minutes), even though Okinawa fell in June, the idol continued to prompt people to even take bamboo spears and defend the beachheads. These idols needed to have a nasty fall, says Koyama, unfortunately the devastation was catastrophic for huge numbers of people.

You know, Jeremiah wasn't referring to preachers when he said "Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture"-- he was referring to political leaders. They called their political leaders Shepherds ever since David the Shepherd boy had become King. So Jeremiah talks of the failures of leaders: "You have scattered my flock, you have not attended to them, so look up! I will attend to you, for your evil ways. I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all countries where you have driven them into exile," a world full of hostages and refugees, a world in captivity. As in Jeremiah's time don't we know of those who exploit positions of trust and of power for personal gain and sell the people's trust for a bribe? A failure of shepherding is a failure of leadership.

When I see how the TV public is delighted at the news that the war business is back on track, I see a failure of moral and leadership -- not only of our political leaders through the decades, but also of the church to step up to make its voice heard. Not too long ago there was a celebration in Seattle -- hundreds of its citizens burst into delirious applause as they heard the news that Lockheed had been awarded a $200 billion contract to make thousands of lethal attack bombers there. I don't for a moment believe that these people ever entertained a vision of innumerable children who will die maimed and shattered because of these weapons. The dream that was behind the glee of the rejoicing investors was a truckload of money. They overlooked the nightmare of truckloads of dead Afghans. The dream of money blinds them to the greater reality. We already know that the politicians and media have bought into this -- but you know what, the church has bought into this as well.

Jeremiah shouts, "The days are coming when I will raise up a leader who will deal in justice and righteousness," not just reprove personal moral failings, but the systemic moral failure by which the human race is sold so that some people can get rich on an endless war economy. Jeremiah says that God is to provide radical justice for the world, and this is the name by which God will be called: Yahweh is our Justice. God is our Vindication. Allah is known also as Merciful and Compassionate.

But you object: But this is a political vision, you say? Of course it is. The leader that Jeremiah is talking about must function in the political realm. Why is this a problem? The gospel does have social and geo-political dimensions. To quote the hymn from the early church, in Colossians, "All things hold together (systemically) in Christ." But you see, the problem is that our politics are too narrow. Our politics are politics with only precinct vision, and are nationalistic and tribalistic -- to use a word famous African American preacher Rev. Jeremiah Wright used about two weeks ago, in a TV sermon to describe our national attitude following September 11 and going on to this war. But that is too narrow a vision for our God. Paul, writing to Colossae, presents to us a World Vision gospel. No American flag wavers there, nor NATO banners, and Paul doesn't see a Messiah confined to churches either. We are told instead that he is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all creation, for him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether it is matter or energy, body or mind, its all one. The thrones -- not only David's, but all the thrones of power, in the Oval Office or the Kremlin, whether a throne at the Vatican or one at the national cathedral. Not only that, all things -- people who died, or are hurt, families that lost loved ones or are dislocated, whether it was on September 11 in New York or after October 7 in Afghanistan -- they all hold together in Christ. Christ is above all authorities; he is before all things, says Paul says, and in him everything hangs together -- the molecules in your bloodstream, the moon hanging in the sky, families gathering together on Thanksgiving Day, --all of them are held together in Christ. That's the kind of king he is: A high doctrine indeed.

Don't put any rings around Jesus' kingship, Paul seems to say, and confine him to workshops on conflict resolution. Pilate didn't make any mistake about that, the mockers at the Cross didn't make any mistake. They knew what they had on their hands and on their cross--"Let him save himself if he is the Christ of God, the Messiah, the Chosen One, the king of the Jews." Pilate's world, and the world of all politicians, is so threatened when Jesus' kingship comes near. Pilate took no chances, false shepherds never do. Their option is always for violence, their immediate gain, and their shortsighted benefit. And billions stashed away now in the useless and inhuman manufacture of weapons of death, will keep our economy in humming.

Now comes Jesus with a model for our complete liberation. Not just to save us from our personal moral failings -- but to break down systems that bind, to redeem the institutions that are fallen. Was Jeremiah talking about Jesus, when he said, that God will raise up for David, a Righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. I don't know about you, it certainly sounds like that to me.

In fact, I think, Jesus comes 'named by God', to have a pre-eminent place, a pre-eminent voice in all things. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile all things to himself, whether in earth or heaven, whether in lower Manhattan or in high Afghanistan, Wall Street or the Khyber Pass.

There's nothing left out of that Bible definition of Jesus' holding all things together. There is nothing outside Jesus purview, oversight, and authority. Jesus is king over all things. In that other wonderful story about Jesus' kingship, when Jesus drew near to Jerusalem, he sent disciples and said "Go get that colt, the new one." Not the Cadillac, but the colt. The Roman Empire came high on horseback, as the U.S. comes high on Cruise missiles and new Lockheed fighter bombers from Seattle. The vision of the prophets is that this king would come in humility, not with imperial power, but on a borrowed burro.

Someone wrote the following verse about Christ Our King.

Christ is our king: the first child of a peasant woman, a story teller among the common people: welcoming urchins that gather around him, laying his hands on unclean lepers, making disciples out of fishermen tax collectors, dining with traitors and other dregs of society, washing the feet of his followers, tramping around the country on foot, allowing a prostitute to publicly wipe his feet with her hair.

His only crown -- a wreath of thorns. His only throne -- two crossed planks of wood.

Come, let us celebrate a remarkable thing; Jesus of Nazareth is King!