About nations and kingdoms

This weekend, citizens of the United States of America will commemorate and celebrate the 250th anniversary of our Declaration of Independence from the British Empire. I am deeply grateful for the significant founding virtues of American democracy, human rights and religious freedom. The U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights are truly inspiring to read and the envy of many people around the world.

At the same time, as followers of Jesus, we are rightly and profoundly disoriented and grieving as we watch:

• The arrests and detentions of our immigrant neighbors, coworkers and fellow congregants. From my church alone, four members have been arrested and deported or detained, separating fathers from young families.
• A war against Iran that has turned into a regional conflict, demolishing infrastructure and killing civilians.
• Our leaders claim that these violent actions are being done in the name of a Christian nation.

Holy Week this year brought questions of kingdom into vivid reality for me. On the Saturday before Palm Sunday, more than 8 million Americans gathered in more than 3,000 cities for No Kings demonstrations. Many Christians are joining these protests. The United States is a democracy, and citizens rightfully engage in non-violent protest when our nation’s leaders behave like kings or emperors. In our constitutional democracy, there is no king, and there shall be no king.

And the next day, on Palm Sunday, we told or acted out the story in worship: Jesus riding into the seat of the empire, on a donkey, being hailed as King. In our scriptures following Easter, Jesus continued to speak about the Kingdom of God.

For followers of Jesus, there is a kingdom, and only one kingdom, that matters. Our allegiance is to the Kingdom of God, in which Jesus is Lord.

The early Christian language of “kingdom” and “Lord” arose in the face of empire and oppressive kings, and it reflects patriarchy. So, to be clear, when Christians say that “Jesus is Lord,” we are not claiming male superiority or affirming domination systems. Quite the opposite. We are saying: No earthly kings. There is one Word who was with God from the beginning; one Lord who was the victim of state violence, and refused the sword.

Trying to avoid gendered domination language, we might consider the language of authorship: Jesus is the author of our faith (Hebrews 12:2). And God is writing a very long story. We are called to develop our characters in our corners of the plot. But we are not writing the chapters, nor the book.

To be followers of the risen Christ means declaring that the Kingdom of God — the upside-down, non-patriarchal, liberating Kingdom — is the only Kingdom that is real. When we look at the world and its empires through the eyes of this Kingdom, the emperor has no clothes.

An outpost of the Roman Empire crucified Jesus in his human body, but his life and upside-down Kingdom continues.

And here is the Good News: we are invited to dwell in that Kingdom of love and liberation — you and me, here and now.

In the midst of a suffering world of principalities and powers, we are witnesses of another way. Jesus says: You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem – the outpost of the empire – and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8).

To be a witness means more than one thing. The disciples were witnesses to Jesus because they saw him and because they became signs of his Kingdom. As Jesus’ disciples living in 2026, we too are witnesses to the Kingdom of God, meaning we live as visible glimmers of this Kingdom of God.

As we celebrate the birth of this nation, to be followers of Jesus is to be a community of liberated and liberating people, whose only weapon is love.

— Rebecca Stoltzfus, president