“A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!” That famous line at the end of Shakespeare’s Richard III gives us a hint of what a truly bad king he was. Like Joseph Stalin, Richard kept stacking up the bodies of his rivals in a murderous version of King of the Hill. But when his own life was at risk, he would gladly have given his kingdom away to anyone who could keep him alive. That’s how much he valued the kingdom.

Today we celebrate a King who was the moral opposite of Richard III, a king who valued his kingdom so much that he lovingly laid down his life in order to save it. In a world where there have been far too many rulers of the Richard III and Joseph Stalin mold, the reign of Christ is certainly cause for celebration. But I also want to give some thought to this question: what is the kingdom that Jesus loved enough to die for? Jesus is a glorious king, but what is he king of?

There is a clue for us in this morning’s gospel. Jesus said, “My kingdom is not from this world.” But still, that statement brims with confusing possibilities. It’s even more confusing in other versions of the Bible where that passage is translated, “My kingdom is not of this world.” What does that mean?

I think if you ask most people, they would say that Jesus’ kingdom is not here on earth; it’s in heaven. Jesus came to earth to die for our sins so that everyone who believes in him will go to heaven after they die. Christ is the King of Heaven. But until we get there, we’re stuck with the kings who ARE of this world. Some of them are better than others; but none of them are all that great.

Is that what Jesus was trying to explain to Pilate? Don’t worry; I’m no threat to you. We can both get along just fine. You take care of earthly matters; I’ll take care of spiritual matters; and everything will be great.

This is one of those passages where the choice of words really matters. Jesus didn’t say, “My kingdom is not in this world.” As a matter of fact, there are other places where Jesus states quite clearly that his kingdom IS in this world. “The kingdom of God is among you,” Jesus told the crowds. “Tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God,” he told the Pharisees. “Some of you will not taste death until you see the kingdom of God,” he told his disciples.

The Kingdom of God IS in this world, but it is not from this world. So the rules that apply in this world, don’t necessarily apply in the Kingdom of God. Money doesn’t buy you power in the Kingdom of God. To the contrary, Jesus said it’s hard for people with wealth to enter the Kingdom of God. Armies don’t protect the boundaries of the Kingdom of God. Jesus said, “If my Kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting.” But that’s not how it works in the Kingdom of God.

The Kingdom of God is more like a huge party… a really fun party, not one of those stuffy cocktail parties where no one is paying attention to each other because they’re all too concerned about appearances. How many times have I found myself in a conversation and I have no idea what the other person is saying because I am obsessing about myself. Are people noticing how socially inept I am? Should I have dressed a little better? I don’t think I belong at this party.

The Kingdom of God party is really fun because it’s full of people who don’t belong. None of us belong in the Kingdom of God. We’re only there because God invited us. So we don’t have to keep up our pretense. We can be ourselves and have a good time.

The Kingdom of God must have something to do with healing. Whenever Jesus went out to preach the Kingdom of God, what he ended up doing was healing lepers, and opening the eyes of the blind, and making lame people walk. And it must have something to do with freedom, because in these same preaching tours Jesus would cast out the demons that were oppressing people.

Or how’s this: the Kingdom of God is like a field that is full of wheat and it’s also full of weeds; but you can’t tell the difference. So that person over there who you think is just a worthless weed – someone who is taking up space – don’t be too quick to judge. They might end up being extremely fruitful. You can’t tell.

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Or this: the Kingdom of God is like a ruler who forgave his subject a $100,000,000 loan. The only stipulation is that the subject is in turn expected to forgive someone who owes him $100. You get a hundred million dollar gift so that you can give someone else a hundred dollars. Sounds good to me.

But not everything about the Kingdom of God is quite so appealing. What about this: Jesus said the Kingdom of God is like a vineyard where everybody gets paid the same. It doesn’t matter whether you work one hour a day or twelve. That made some people angry when Jesus told that parable.

All these bizarre stories that Jesus told about the Kingdom of God reveal how the Kingdom of God isn’t from this world. It doesn’t operate under the same rules as this world, so it doesn’t often make sense to people. And people are frightened by the things they don’t understand. Like the Romans and the religious leaders of Jesus’ day were frightened by the things he was saying about God’s reign. Frightened enough to kill Jesus, hoping that this would put an end such nonsense. Of course it didn’t. Jesus was raised from the dead and that means that the Kingdom he was describing is still very much a reality among us.

We see that bizarre, sometimes frightening, but always grace-filled Kingdom appearing among us regularly. Think about the Welcome Center. This weekly gathering looks an awful lot like the party that Jesus mentioned in the parable. It’s a party where everyone, rich and poor, is invited to sit down and share a meal together. Gathering a group of people like that in one room can be frightening… sometimes frightening in a grace-filled way; sometimes not so grace-filled. But always, among the guests who have endured about as much of this world as anyone can imagine, there are opportunities to glimpse a Kingdom that is not from this world.

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The Kingdom of God is among you. That’s something to celebrate. But it’s also something to anticipate. We still have to live in – and sometimes put up with – the kingdoms that ARE from this world. We have to deal with rulers who are not at all like Jesus and we have to play by rules that are completely different from what I have been describing. Christ the King is one of those holidays that makes us so aware of our in-between state: we’re both redeemed and waiting for redemption; we’re both saints and sinners; the Kingdom of God is here and it’s not yet here.

Let the glimpses of the Kingdom of God that you get in this world give you the hope and the courage to strain toward that day when every eye will see the true King in all his majesty… the day when the kingdoms of this world will be handed over to the one who died to redeem this world.