The Victor

 
“If the emperor and the empire wish to pursue the course of aggression and slavery that have brought agony and terror and despair to the world, if there’s nothing left for men to hope for but chains and hunger, then my king will march forward to right those wrongs.  Not tomorrow, sire.  Your Majesty may not be so fortunate as to witness the establishment of his kingdom, but it will come!” From the 1953 film The Robe

Christus Victor. Christus Rex. Christ the king.

I squirm sometimes with this language and the history it carries. Cathedrals and churches all over the world, especially the Western world, have stained glass images of a crowned and victorious Jesus. King Jesus, invoked by Constantine to head his armies and by most other European monarchs since. The Victorious Christ, invoked by empire as a figurehead, a leader, a stamp of approval from God for oppression and conquest, eventually the conquest and genocide of an entire hemisphere.

When I left the neo-Calvinism with which I had been raised, one of the reasons I did so was because I realized I could no longer believe in an all-powerful God who sat above human experience as an impassable sovereign. Who orchestrated the world, but was unmoved by its suffering.

I needed a God in solidarity; I needed a God that would walk with me through the pain and suffering of life. It was the crucified God that caught my attention and sustained my faith—and still continues to do so. A God who was revealed in the person of Jesus Christ, who lived and died as one of us. A God who died at the hands of empire—died so that every one of us who has ever suffered, ever been oppressed would know God was with us and God was on our side. This is the core of my theology. 

But, as I began to work in poor communities, I realized that I could not build a theology on a God with no power. Because, in oppressed communities, we need a God that is more powerful than the systems that oppress us. We need a God who can overcome death and the death dealing forces of systemic evil. Not as a cruel king, not as the figurehead of empires, but as the exact opposite; the Jesus of the early church, the Jesus on the side of the oppressed who “disarmed the rulers and authorities, putting them to open shame.” Here in Aberdeen, we need a God bigger than capitalism, bigger than lawmakers, bigger than the American Empire.

We need a victorious Jesus as well as a crucified Jesus. A Jesus who defied empire, not only unto death, but also unto resurrection. A Jesus in solidarity at the site of execution, but also in solidarity in resurrection and power. A Jesus who tramples on the forces of sin and hell that oppress us.

Christus Victor. Christ the victorious. Easter morning, the grave is empty. The empire has lost—the executed God could not stay dead, no matter how hard they tried. We need a victorious Savior; we need a Lord above all other lords; we need a risen Jesus. We need a Christus Victor who fights by the side of his people, his poor, who not only knows their pain, but plans to end it.