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.”
-John 18:36

“Are you King of the Jews?”, Pilate asked.

This was the moment. When Jesus could finally announce who he was, and what he stood for. His platform.

And Jesus said, “Yes! I’m King of the Jews! See what you’re up against, Pilate? I’ve come to lead my people to a new promised land. And you’re not invited.”

Wait. He didn’t say that.

As far as I can tell, Jesus was not a partisan politician. I don’t know that he was partisan at all. To be partisan is to choose a “part”, a platform, and then defend it (sometimes overzealously so).

Jesus was not bipartisan either. He did not practice “both-sidism,” saying, “the pharisees, the Jews, and the Romans all have some good points. Let’s sit down and come to a compromise in the middle.” No, he was very clear about his views.

They were not of this earth. He actually says, “My Kingdom is not of this world.”

I’ve struggled with this for years, because, well, clearly my side has figured it out. We’re right, and they are wrong. I’m pretty grounded in my ideals.

Am I missing something? Something that transcends (without denying) the deep divisions in our society? An ideal that is all-embracing?

Humans have been trying to find that as long as there have been humans.

You might say “Christianity” is the answer. But what does that word even mean anymore?

Archimedes said, “Give me a place to stand, and a lever long enough, and I will move the world.” We call this place an “Archimedean point”,

It’s a mythical place of objective truth. Something undeniable.

People have looked to religion, reason, science, order, even suffering to try to describe some over-arching principle. Each of these can help, but they all have down sides.

The closest, clearest I can find is true love.

In the Gospel of John, Jesus is filled with “grace and truth” (John 1:14) and those words are joined at the hip.

Jesus knew true love. The rest of us are still catching up. Or rejecting it, to the world’s detriment. When Jesus speaks of the Kingdom of God, I think this is what he’s talking about.

It’s bigger than we can even wrap our brains around. Even when we try to make true love our Archimedean point, we frequently fall short. We misuse love, we leverage it to our favor, or we flat-out reject it.

But sometimes we tap into something so pure, it transcends every division humans can dream up.

Jesus’ mission was to insert a little of that “Kingdom Love” into a world struggling to find it.

Can “true love” help us move past this polarized moment? I honestly don’t know. I’ve been searching for it my whole life and fallen short. Perhaps the “birthpangs” Jesus talks about require the kind of painful wrestling we’re all mired in.

I do know that Jesus was willing to die to reveal a kind of love that is wrapped in mystery, like the resurrection. Yet this mystery is hidden in plain sight all around us, begging us to pursue it.

This requires more than partisanship or even bi-partisan support. It requires viewing humanity as a hyper-complex, limited organism, struggling against itself to become more than it is.

Behind every social issue, even every partisan platform, there is true love waiting to be revealed. No, not all platforms are equal, but I want my words and actions to reflect that truth, both in my heart, and in my world.

Easier said than done,

but I’m trying, Lord.

This link will take you to a song I wrote, called “Not a weapon”.

Have a great week,

Mitch