Truth vs. truth

John 18:33-37

Typically the weekend after Thanksgiving begins a new church year and the season of Advent, a season of preparation leading up to Christmas.  Once and awhile Thanksgiving falls early, like it does this year, and then we don’t begin Advent right after Thanksgiving.  So, today we celebrate Christ the King and the end of the church year.  Technically, maybe this means we should hold off on the Christmas decorations and music just a few more days.  Maybe we should take time to celebrate that Christ is King and hold off on the Christmas preparations.

            So who should we listen to?  What should we follow?  The ways of this world or the ways of Jesus?  Our text today is typically read on Good Friday.  It is part of the longer story leading up to Jesus’ crucifixion.  I don’t think it is surprising at all that we are hearing this Good Friday text, just days after Black Friday.  Good Friday is of another world.  Black Friday is of this world.  Jesus is much more than a this world king.  He makes that clear as he answers Pilate’s questions.  His kingship extends much further than the nation of Israel.  He is not just the King of the Jews.  His reign is much larger than that.  It passes over borders dividing nations and over cultures dividing people.  His kingship is of another world.

As I read our text for today I imagined that Pilate and Jesus were playing a game.  It looks a lot like the game of Truth or Dare, which was typically played at sleepovers with friends when I was growing up.  I think Jesus and Pilate are playing their own version of the game and it is called Truth or truth.  Truth with a capital letter T versus truth with a lowercase letter t.  Good Friday is a Truth with a capital letter T.  Black Friday is a truth with a lowercase letter t.

            Christ the King came into the world to testify to the Truth.  That is Truth with a capital letter T.  Our world is filled with a lot of  truths with a lowercase letter t.  One such truth is that the Christmas season begins after Halloween or at least immediately after Thanksgiving.  The dishes haven’t been washed and the turkey hasn’t even all been taken off the bone and we begin moving on to the next holiday.  We start looking at the shopping ads.  We begin making our shopping lists and our Christmas lists.  The tree goes up inside and the outdoor lights are hung.  The Christmas card list is made.  The preparations are in full swing.

As soon as Thanksgiving is over we move on to Christmas.  The biggest shopping day of the year follows Thanksgiving.  But this year Black Friday didn’t even wait until Friday, it crept into Thursday, too.  The retail world is giving us the message to eat our turkey quickly and then hit the shopping centers.  Now, I will admit that I love to shop and thoroughly enjoy Black Friday shopping, but I was a bit disappointed to find out this year that it would be starting on Thursday evening.  This move to Black Thursday allows people that work in retail even less time with their families on Thanksgiving.  It rushes the Christmas season even more, allowing for only part of a day committed to being thankful for what we already have, before moving on to all those things we want.  And this year, because of the way the calendar falls we skip right over Christ the King.  In doing so, we fail to remember that if Christ wasn’t King then his birth on Christmas wouldn’t even really matter.

I think Jesus would say the same thing that he says to Pilate in our Gospel lesson to the retail world of Black Friday.  Jesus proclaims, “my kingdom is not from here.”  The retail world’s influence on the consumerism of Christmas is worldly.  It is not of the kingdom of God, which Jesus talked about.  Jesus testifies to the Truth, with a capital T, while the rest of the world tries to fill us with things that they believe to be truths with a lowercase t.  The commercialization of Christmas pulls us in and most of us actively participate in it.  We do so because we have been convinced that things will make us happy.  That is a lowercase truth.

            Christ the King’s message stands in opposition to that of the world.  He says, “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.”  Listen to the voice of Jesus.  Be silent.  What is the truth he is sharing with you this day?  Jesus tells each one of us that we are enough.  We are perfect just the way we are.  We are loved by God.  Nothing we can purchase on Black Friday or any other day of the year can make us any more loved.  Nothing we can do to change the color of our hair or the wrinkles on our face will make us any more loved.  Nothing we can do to lose weight or get a promotion at work will make us any more loved.  Nothing, absolutely nothing, will change the King’s love for us.  We are enough.  We are worthy just as we are, as people created in the image of God.  So, we can stop trying to be something that we aren’t.  This isn’t love that we can buy or earn.  It is love that is freely given by the king.  We are loved just as we are.  That love is the gift of a King.  A kingly gift that is given freely every day of the year.  That is the Truth, with a capital T. 

If we can believe that Truth and I sure hope we can, then we are freed to love others as we have been loved.  We don’t have to buy all the new gizmos and gadgets.  We don’t have to cook enough food to feed an army.  We don’t have to have decorations that keep up with the neighbors.  We don’t have to change our appearance.  We don’t have to do more.  We don’t have to buy more.  We don’t have to be more.  We just need to be ourselves and know that we are loved children of God.  And in doing that we will have more – more love, more peace, more joy, and more contentment this holiday season and always.  That is also the King’s Truth, with a capital T.  Amen.