Pre-Inauguration Reflection | Comfort from Colossians
See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority. In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.
-Colossians 2:8-15
These words of Paul have been ringing in my mind as we approach tomorrow’s inauguration. I offer them to you as a place to return when your thoughts and cares become overstimulated, oversaturated, and overwhelmed with the world’s worries.
Almost everything that you see, hear, and read right now is hoping to capture your attention and stoke your affections over an earthly transfer of power from one fallen administration to another. I don’t say that to downplay any beauty found in our national experiment or the influence that our executive branch will have over our country in the coming years, but rather to remind us that at its core, tomorrow’s pomp and circumstance is just one in a long list of “human traditions.”
As Christians, we ought to be captivated by something far greater - especially right now. But it’s much easier to find ourselves swept up in all the accusations of deceit, the fear of foreign philosophies, and every conspiracy that suspiciously stops short of indicting our own hearts that, as Jeremiah says, are “deceitful above all things.” We can think we’re the vigilant ones, on guard against the fight that’s coming to our doors. We can think fighting the good fight means putting “the other side” to open shame. But our one, true enemy was here long before us, and these preoccupations are from him. Instead of waiting for the return of Eve’s offspring to triumph over him once and for all, we let him direct our gaze to the White House, hoping someone there might return us to the former glory we’ve been missing since Eden.
In his letter to the Colossians, Paul tilts our heads away from Washington and towards a heavenly courtroom. There is no transfer of power there. There is only Jesus on his throne. It’s a wonderfully boring scene where the same person who took his seat at the right hand of God 2,000 years ago is still occupying the very same place. This quiet absence of controversy isn’t a sign of weakness, but of an uncontested victory; not a sign of inactivity, but of a steady rule; not a sign of its irrelevance to our worldly politics today, but a reminder of how deeply relevant our good news about a Once and Future King really is to a politically tumultuous culture.
The Kingship of Jesus is not a consolation prize. Political winners and losers alike will be tempted to treat it as such tomorrow, whether we feel stuck in second place with Jesus or feel relieved that we’re not. But these thoughts betray not only where our political hopes really lie, but that our politics are altogether too small. The greater political reality that we get to be swept up in today, tomorrow, and everyday is that Jesus really is - and always will be - our King. This is what ought to capture our attention and stir our affections. Reject the temptation to make little of his lordship and to settle for politics that are too small, and return instead to Paul’s good news of him who is the head of all rule and authority in the cosmos.
I can think of few sweeter truths this week than that our citizenship lies with a government that will never change hands. It changed once, but not through violence aimed at stripping power from men. Rather, Jesus came to power through the violence he absorbed for the salvation of men, disarming the spiritual rulers and authorities who are our true enemies. The government of the global church rests on the shoulders of him who carried our sin to the cross, and his resurrection is our undisputed receipt that our record of debt and the legal demands against us have been canceled. A King has come. His kingdom is here. And we are its free and legal citizens forever. What a glorious truth!
What the world will witness tomorrow on the steps of the Capitol is merely a shadow of what’s to come. By God’s grace, the United States of America will witness a peaceful transfer of political power again and again in the years to come. But make no mistake, there will be a final inauguration. Whether our country makes it to the time when Jesus returns is not for us to say. But if it does, the final change of hands will not come with one resting on a bible, but with a knee bowed to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
What’s most worth celebrating tomorrow is that Jesus is still King. And if there is anything to lament, it's that Jesus has yet to return to a world that desperately needs him and doesn’t even know it. And in the meantime, we are here, citizens sent by the one who has all authority in heaven and on earth and empowered by his Spirit to make this good news of his Kingship and his Kingdom known to all who might hear it!
Grace and peace.