Before I read today’s scripture from the book of Zechariah, let me give you some background info. You may know that one of the most significant events in the Bible is the deportation of the Jews from Jerusalem, to Babylon. Babylon invaded Jerusalem, forced many of the Jews out, and destroyed much of the city.
To those who were deported, this was devastating. They had to start from scratch and create new lives for themselves in a foreign land.
Many years passed in exile. In Babylon, those who were deported had children. And grandchildren. And great-grandchildren.
And for these great-grandchildren, Jerusalem was only stories and memories that had been passed down to them. All they had ever known was life in Babylon.
But then, Cyrus the Persian conquered Babylon, and told the Jews they could go back to Jerusalem and rebuild that city...
If it were you - and you had been born in Babylon, built your life in Babylon, and had known only Babylon - would you return? Would you return and rebuild your nation, starting everything over from scratch?
Enter the prophet Zechariah, who proclaimed a word of encouragement to the Jews in Babylon, encouraging them to return, and rebuild their holy city.
The voice of Zechariah cries out: "The Lord proclaims: Old men and women will again dwell in the plazas of Jerusalem… the city will be full of boys and girls playing in its plazas...I will bring my people back so they will dwell in Jerusalem." (8.4,5,8)
And then, in chapter nine, we hear Zechariah painting a picture of the reborn, rebuilt kingdom:
Zechariah 9:9-12:
Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the warhorse from Jerusalem, and the battle-bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations; his dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.
As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double.
It’s just four verses, but there’s a lot there.
“Return to your stronghold…” Return to Jerusalem. That part is clear.
But what about the part about the king humbly riding on a donkey? This sounds familiar to us, because Jesus re-enacts this scene when he enters Jerusalem many centuries later. But how would this have sounded to the Jews in Babylon, contemplating their return to Jerusalem? Would that give them the confidence they need to return? Or would it make them scratch their heads or throw up their hands in confusion?
A humble king? Riding on a donkey? Not a warhorse? Not a mighty stallion? Not riding in a chariot? But on a lowly donkey?
And his weapons, his battle-bows - the symbols of his strength - will be… broken?
What exactly is Zechariah playing at?
Well. Zechariah is describing a kingdom that is very different from any kingdom the world had ever known. It’s a kingdom all about peace, not provocation. It’s all about reconciliation, not retribution.
It’s a kingdom where weapons are broken, so that people can be made whole.
It’s a kingdom that is presented as an alternative to the kingdoms of this world. It is a vision, an ideal, toward which the people can strive, if they return, rebuild, and follow God’s teachings.
Jesus re-enacted Zechariah’s vision as he entered Jerusalem because his mission involved proclaiming the imminent arrival of God’s alternative kingdom.
And after the crucifixion and the resurrection, when the disciples set about creating a movement that would eventually become what we know as the church, they were guided by this vision of a kingdom that was an alternative to the kingdoms of this world.
And in those early days of the church, as recorded in the book of Acts, money and power were eschewed in favor of a grassroots - and sometimes underground - movement focused on justice, compassion, equality, welcome. It was a resistance movement, because it resisted violence, and it resisted the values of the empire. And most early Christians practiced nonviolence as Jesus taught, and refused to join the army, and refused to give in to many of the other ideals of the empire.
Of course, the powers of the empire didn’t like all this, which is why the early Christians were persecuted, and why many of them were killed and made into martyrs.
All that changed in the fourth century when emperor Constantine seized power in Christ's name and made Christianity the official state religion.
Instead of fighting against Christianity and all its talk of an alternative kingdom, Constantine appropriated Christianity, and even placed Christian symbols on the shields and weapons of his army. In doing so, he basically took all the ideals of Christianity and flipped them over on their head.
Now, instead of being an alternative to empire, Christianity and empire were seen as one. One and the same. Instead of being a kingdom of peace and humility, Christianity was used to justify and support the emperor’s wars of conquest.
Religion had become a tool of the state.
Some Christians continued to hold on to the vision - the vision of the prophets, the vision of Jesus. They resisted Christianity’s takeover by the government.
They argued that, in aligning itself with the empire, Christianity had turned its back on its original vision. It had cast aside the donkey, and embraced the war horse. It had taken those pruning hooks, and turned them back into swords and spears.
But over time, their voices calling people back to Christianity’s original vision were drowned out.
Fast forward to this past week, when a mega church in Dallas celebrated “Freedom Sunday” by having a worship service at which Vice President Mike Pence was guest speaker, and a choir of 100 unmasked singers sang patriotic tunes instead of hymns - an event so aligned with the values of empire that the White House enthusiastically referred to it as a “rally.”
Despite its vision of an alternative kingdom, religion is still used as a tool of the state. People in power use Christianity to reinforce their own goals and objectives, rather than fulfill the goals and objectives of the alternative kingdom of God. The Christian message is manipulated to support whatever those in power want, instead of fulfilling its mission of holding people and governments accountable, and keeping the vision of God's alternative kingdom before the people.
All the Old Testament prophets held this vision of a new, better, alternative kingdom before the people. Some of the prophets even went and proclaimed their message directly to the kings of their day, holding them accountable for failing to work toward this vision. Other prophets spoke to the religious leaders, accusing them of bestowing their blessings on corrupt kings in love with their own power, instead of calling them to act with justice, love, and humility.
When Jesus spoke of the kingdom of God, many expected it to be a kingdom that replaced the kingdom of Rome. But Jesus had something a little different in mind.
According to what Jesus taught, this alternative kingdom could exist right now, even while Caesar was still in power, as long as those who believe in it live out the ideals on which that kingdom is based. In other words, God’s kingdom is present anywhere there are people willing to live justly, love their neighbor (no matter who they may be), and humble themselves before God.
The challenges that the prophets faced and that the disciples faced are challenges that we face, too. We still live in a time when society and the government have co-opted the message of Christianity, turning it into something it is not, and then demanding allegiance to this new, distorted, corrupt version of the Christian faith.
Like Constantine, our leaders claim to act in Christ’s name, yet they have turned their backs on Christ’s ministry of healing and wholeness. They have failed to adequately address what William Barber calls the three pandemics we currently face: the pandemic of COVID19, the pandemic of systemic racism, and the pandemic of poverty.
We must resist this. We must maintain the vision of a kingdom that is an alternative to the kingdoms of this world, a kingdom built on justice and equality and love.
We must resist the continued attempts by people in power to take over Christianity, they who proclaim that our faith stands for things that are clearly contrary to what was actually taught by Jesus and the prophets.
We must resist the temptation to align Christianity with any political party, because doing so jeopardizes our ability to re-present God’s alternative vision and to hold all our leaders accountable.
Diana Butler Bass has written that "Jesus was never a supporter of a political or religious party… However, Jesus was partisan. He was partisan toward love. He was partisan for women and children, sinners of all sorts, toward the ill and the mentally challenged, slaves and poorly paid workers and soldiers, those in mean estate, and those under the boot of authoritarianism. He was partisan for outsiders and outcasts and people without banquet invitations, toward those who broke the rules for the sake of others, toward peacemakers and the persecuted and the heartbroken."
It’s not about aligning ourselves with right or left - it’s about aligning ourselves with what’s right instead of what’s wrong. It’s not about identifying ourselves as conservative or liberal - it’s about identifying ourselves as followers of Jesus.
That is the first priority and the prime allegiance of all who claim to be Christian.
