Isaiah 50: 7,8; Mark: 11: 1-11

Dark side of the reign

The body of King Richard III of England was reburied at Leicester Cathedral last week.  It brought out all the pomp the British are so good at: soldiers, royal representatives and the Archbishop of Canterbury, the head of the Anglican Church.  The fact that he was King and that he is still honored as a King more than five hundred years later hides the fact that his reign was more darkness than light.  Yet he was only 32 years old when he died in the battle of Bosworth Field, the last battle of the Wars of the Roses at the tail end of the Middle Ages.  But how he got to the throne is a tale of great darkness.  This fascinated Shakespeare who wrote one of this earliest plays, Richard III, about him.  In it Richard’s spinal deformity (which was probably not as bad as Shakespeare assumed) becomes a symbol of darkness, which is highly discriminatory of course. Richard was supposed to be the Lord Protector of the Realm, supervising his twelve year old nephew Richard V. Instead he had the marriage of the child’s deceased father, Richard IV and the Richard’s brother, annulled, so that the reign of the boy would be illegitimate.  Shakespeare writes about Richard III’s resentment when his brother Richard IV becomes king in the famous lines: ”Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York; And all the clouds that lour’d upon our house In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.” Shakespeare really brought out the darkness of the reign of King Richard, perhaps more so than the young man deserved.

Today we remember Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem.  It is that brief moment when we can speak of the earthly reign of Jesus, even though it was only to fulfill the prophecy.  He is celebrated and heralded and John writes that above the cross is written INRI, an acronym in Latin, Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum wich was also written in Greek and Hebrew, meaning:”Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews.” But of course Jesus was not a King of people and of land as Richard was.  He is a King of hearts and souls.  But that’s not what the people wanted: they wanted an earthly Messiah Who would liberate them.  Also there is no darkness to Jesus reign unlike Richard’s, it is a reign of light and love. Unless we take into account that by his death for salvation he would invite all that was evil and oppressive to come His way.

Earthly reigns can be benevolent, friends, but there is always an element of darkness.  It comes with the power at one’s disposal.  We have talked about the career of Lee Kuan Yew, the prime minister of Singapore for thirty years who passed away last week.  He was able to make different religious and ethnic groups live together, but ruled pretty much like a dictator. Even he said:” I had to do a lot of nasty things.” We talked about the scheming of Francis Underwood, a modern-day Richard III, who in the Netflix series House of Cards achieves great power and reveals much darkness. We talked about the police in Ferguson and other cities. We need them for our safety and for the order of our society, but police officers are often biased and we have seen the dark side of officers and the force come out time and time again. We talked about the German Wings pilot who for a brief moment had reign over airplane and for now it looks that his darkness overtook him, resulting in indescribable tragedy.

So, friends, you may think: ”Interesting, but how is this relevant for me? I am king or queen of nothing.”  But you, that is not true, friends.  Our power and influence may be limited as is the power and influence of most of the globe’s seven billion people.   But at one point or another we reign over something: it may be over children when they are young, or over parents when they are old, it may be over an office.  In my case it’s my back yard.  I want to keep it lush but I have to watch out the snakes don’t come in.  Some things I do to the yard are good for the future of the earth around us, like big trees producing oxygen, but other things may be bad, like using more water than is absolutely necessary.  Then there are my words. Officially I reign over them.  There is a chance that as a minister I say something on Sunday that may make a difference to you, but one wrong or mispronounced word could result in something unforgiveable or hurtful. I am very aware of that.  It may not even be what I say, but what people hear.

Friends, there will be times in our lives, perhaps for brief moments, when we ‘lord’ it over others or over something.  We have the reign over our checkbooks to begin with.  What you and I can do is be aware of how our power and influence impact people and the world we live in.  How much are we aware of the darkness that can creep up on our actions?  Are we aware of how the little power and influence we have can pervert us or bring out the worst in us? Are we aware how much good we can do as individuals and how if we decide not to do the good we can do, we contribute to the darkness? May the Christ, the King of our souls, give us wisdom.