Not Caesar, But Jesus--April 14, 2020
he humbled himself
and became obedient to the point of death--
even death on a cross.
Therefore God also highly exalted him
and gave him the name
that is above every name,
so that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue should confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father." [Philippians 2:7b-11]
In a world where Caesars are always claiming to have the last word and total authority, Easter is the evidence that Jesus is Lord... and that Caesar is not.
Here's a curious thing: if you ask the average Respectable Religious person in America today what the resurrection of Jesus means, chances are you'll get answers like, "It proves that there is an afterlife," or "Easter is important because it means I can go to heaven when I die (as long as I believe the correct set of facts about Jesus to activate my heaven-ticket, of course." Or you might well hear something like, "Easter assures me of eternal life after I die, and therefore, I can do reckless things with this life, regardless of whether it endangers others, because my 'faith' is bigger than 'fear'." Slogans like that are popular these days, even if their theology leaks like a colander.
But all of that aside for a moment, if you would have asked, say, Saint Paul, what the resurrection means, his focus would have been different. He would have said (and in fact does say) that the resurrection of Jesus is how you know he is Lord of the universe--and, conversely, that all the other claimants to the title and authority of "lord" are phonies. Even if it's Caesar claiming to have complete power and the right to decree whatever he wants, it just ain't so. And, to hear Paul say it, you know it because the resurrection of Jesus reveals that God the Father has lifted Jesus up and put him above every other power. And if Jesus is Lord, then Caesar, or any of his appointed lackeys, cannot be.
For Paul that is really, really good news, because Paul knew that unlike the casual cruelty and bombastic brutality of Caesar, or the cowardly handwashing of Pilate, or the arrogant pomposity of Herod, Jesus really was a good Lord. Jesus doesn't need to insist on his own greatness or declare his own authority, because when you've truly got it, you don't need to advertise. (Like Margaret Thatcher's famous line about having refinement and class puts it, "Being powerful is like being a lady--if you have to tell someone you are, you aren't.") As Paul tells it, the resurrection speaks for itself. If you have overcome death itself, you don't have to go around telling people how powerful you are--an empty tomb says all that is necessary.
And the reason that is good news to Paul is that he knows what sort of a Lord Jesus is. Jesus can be trusted with the authority that comes with divine exaltation, because Jesus was always (and still is) kind and compassionate to the nobodies, the anybodies, and the left out. Jesus can be trusted and relied upon, because he was (and still is) faithful and reliable when others pass the buck or flake out. Jesus can be counted on to not to abuse his divinely-given resurrection authority, because, as Paul also notes, "even though he was in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God something to be exploited." In other words, the resurrection shows you that Jesus really is Lord of all--and the cross reveals that Jesus' way of being "Lord" is self-giving suffering love. He is worthy of our calling him Lord, because unlike every other would-be "lord" in the dustbin of history, Jesus actually cares more about us than about his own ego. He is worthy of our bending our knees, exactly because he doesn't demand our praise, but is simply good enough that it draws our praise and reverence from our lips and hearts and bodies. He is Lord--and because he is the real deal, he doesn't have to go around claiming it. And because he doesn't have to go around claiming it, we are simply moved to give him our allegiance freely like it is the most joyful thing in the world to do.
Two thousand years later, we are prone to forget that the resurrection is the evidence of Jesus' lordship, because we are so quick to see it only in terms of tickets to heaven rather than dethroning pretenders like Caesar and the long line of his imitators. But for the writers of the New Testament, a really important part of why Easter was good news was that it assured them that the real and true Lord of creation, the one who truly does have total authority over all things, also has the permanent wounds of being tortured by the hands of the empire, and knows what it is to surrender everything. Jesus' resurrection means that Jesus' way of living and bringing others to life has been vindicated. It means that Christ's way of loving people more fully to life really is God's way of ruling creation, and that Caesar's pompous boasting to boost his own legacy is not.
For folks like Paul who were tired of the rottenness of Caesar and Herod and Pilate and the rest, that was good news. It still is.
Lord Jesus, we name you Lord because we are convinced your resurrection confirms who you are. But we ask that you would enable us to live out our allegiance to you in more than words, but in lives that are centered on your self-giving love.
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