From Another Place

John 18:33-36

September 13, 2026 • Mount Pleasant UMC

As we were reminded in our opening video, this past Friday was the twenty-fifth anniversary of 9/11. Twenty-five years. That does not seem possible. In many ways, it seems like just yesterday and then in other ways it seems like the changes that came because of that day have always been part of the fabric of our culture. An email from a friend of mine reminded me that on that day twenty-five years ago, I was part of a group of pastors meeting for prayer as the second plane hit the twin towers. Someone broke into our meeting to tell us what was happening, so we watched the news and then contacted the mayor to see if we could have a prayer meeting on the town square. By that evening, about a hundred people had gathered and we, as a wide-ranging group of clergy who didn’t always agree on everything, led the community together in praying for our nation and for our world.

As I thought about that day, I tried to imagine that same scenario playing out today. We now live in a world that is anything but unified and where it is regularly said that prayer isn’t enough. After yet another mass shooting, one New York newspaper declared, “God Isn’t Fixing This,” and called legislators who pledged their thoughts and prayers as “cowards” who “hide behind meaningless platitudes.” When we promise “thoughts and prayers,” what are we hoping for? And is it enough? Sadly, these questions come up more often than we would like in today’s world, as violence and cruelty and wrongdoing crowd out even the best intentions of our world. What we need, we think, is some kind of real power to fix everything.

Today and next Sunday, as we focus on the last two “Broken Signposts,” we’re going to hang out here in this part of the Gospel of John that tells about Jesus’ encounter with Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea. Over these last few weeks, we’ve been reading stories in John that point us toward ways the Christian faith helps makes sense of the world. I’ve called them “signposts,” things that point to the ultimate reality, toward the God who made us and created the world. A quick review of these signposts (though I know you can read them yourself): love, justice, freedom, beauty and spirituality. Each of these, rightly ordered, helps us understand how the world should work, the way God designed the world to work, but the problem is that all of them are broken in our world. And so is today’s signpost, which is power. Ah, yes, power! We love power, as long as we are the ones who have it! As one scholar has written, “We all know power matters, but we all know it can easily go badly wrong” (Wright, Broken Signposts, pg. 160).

While we may gripe and post on social media about corruption in politics like it’s a new thing, it’s not. The longer the Roman Empire lasted, the more corrupt it became, and the governor who sentenced Jesus to death was part of that system. Pontius Pilate received his governorship because he was friends with a leading politician of the day, Aelius Sejanus. When Sejanus’ plot to overthrow the emperor was uncovered and he was executed, Pilate’s favor with Rome became suspect. Still, he continued to rule over Judea, which was always a powder keg, just like it is now, and Pilate did nothing to calm things down. The first thing he did was to march soldiers into Jerusalem with standards that depicted the emperor as a god. The Jewish leaders asked him to remove those but Pilate refused. The whole incident ended with Pilate backing down after he threatened to kill the Jewish leaders and those leaders basically saying, “Go ahead.” Even Pilate wouldn’t outright murder defenseless men. After that, Pilate wanted to build a new aqueduct to improve the water supply in Jerusalem, but he couldn’t get the money from Rome so he stole money from the Temple treasury to built it. Now, the aqueduct was needed; that wasn’t the question. It was how he went about it, and when people protested, Pilate sent soldiers in plain clothes among the people. At his signal, the soldiers attacked the people with clubs and swords. Many were killed and Rome was unhappy with Pilate. “As governor Pilate was a failure” (Barclay, The Gospel of John—Volume 2, pgs. 238-240; Card, John: The Gospel of Wisdom, pg. 190). Eventually, Pilate was called back to Rome when he committed atrocities against the Samaritans. While he was on the way, the emperor died and Pilate disappears from history. Most people believe he killed himself rather than face judgment. What was it Lord Acton once said? “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely” (qtd. in Wright 162). Pilate is “Exhibit A” for that statement. He probably would not have been remembered at all except for an early morning encounter he had with a Jewish rabbi from Galilee.

Roman officials generally had appointments early in the morning because most of the day, at least from mid-day onward, was a day of “organized leisure,” mostly spent at the public baths (cf. Card 190). Just like a pastor’s life today. So when the Jewish leaders decided Jesus had to die, they knew they had to get him to Pilate early. They had to have Pilate’s blessing because Rome had stripped them of the right to execute someone themselves; only Rome could actually condemn a man to death. So they had held their all-night trial, decided what they had actually already determined, that the only way to deal with Jesus was to silence him permanently, and when the sun rose they took him to the governor’s residence. John tells us, though, they didn’t enter Pilate’s palace. If they did, they wouldn’t be able to eat the Passover meal that night. So get this: they were worried about being ceremonially unclean and thus unable to eat a meal celebrating freedom from slavery while they had one of their own countrymen chained up, hoping to have him sentenced to death before that meal. How do the contradictions never occur to them? Nevertheless, they stay outside while Pilate runs in and out to talk to them and to interview Jesus (cf. 18:28-32). It’s almost comical when I try to picture it.

You can tell from the content of the conversation that power is foremost in Pilate’s mind. Look at the question he asks Jesus to begin with: “Are you the king of the Jews?” (18:33). You see, the Jewish leaders have made no direct accusation against Jesus; all they have said is that he is a criminal that they wish to have executed (cf. 18:30-31). So Pilate, based on what he has heard about Jesus, is trying to find out if Jesus is actually guilty of a capital crime. Is Jesus trying to take power like his friend Sejanus had? Are you the king of the Jews? It’s almost like Pilate is saying, “I mean, I know you’re not actually the king of the Jews, but do you think you are?” Are you trying to grab power?

Power is a tricky thing, and increasingly in our world, it’s a dirty word (cf. Wright 160). When a leader does something we don’t particularly like, whether in business, government or even in church, we’ll say, “Oh, it’s all about power. They’re just trying to grab power.” Watch the comments on social media in debates from local schools to international relations and if people don’t get what they want, they often accuse the other side of grabbing power or overstepping their power. Of course, even “accusing people of trying to grab at power can itself constitute a power grab” (Wright 161). Power is a tricky thing.

We need power—in all senses of that word. I had friends last month in northwest Indiana who went ten days or more without electricity after the storm that blew through that part of our state and life was pretty miserable without power. We also need laws and infrastructure and organization to our society and to have those things there have to be people in power, making decisions for all of us. The challenge is how much power to give. Go back to Lord Acton’s statement; too much power and we end up in dangerous and desperate territory. Leadership becomes tyranny, direction becomes bullying, and the will of the people becomes anarchy. I appreciate the way N. T. Wright describes the dilemma: “Things go well when there’s a strong, clear lead ‘from the top,’ as we say—until the person ‘at the top’ forgets that the locomotive leading the train has to remain attached to the cars. Some leaders, all too aware of this, stop leading and simply try to ‘manage,’ but that’s disastrous as well. If the driver isn’t holding the steering wheel, either the truck will careen wildly, uncontrolled, across the road, or everybody else in the truck will try to grab it. Neither way ends well” (163). Our problem with power, and the reason this signpost is broken, is that we think we are the source of power. Pilate believed that, or at least he thought his power came from Rome. Nothing could be further from the truth. “Power…comes from God and is given to human beings” (Wright 165). And until we get that right, we will continue to struggle with power.

Jesus, of course, as the Son of God, points the way, even when it looks to all worldly eyes that he is completely powerless. Chained, in custody, in front of the one man in the province who can and will decide his fate, Jesus is still in control. In fact, a bit later in the story, Jesus will basically rub his power in Pilate’s face. When Pilate gets frustrated with Jesus’ non-answers to his questions, he says to Jesus, “Don’t you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?” And I don’t know how The Chosen will depict this scene, but I picture Jesus smiling and maybe chuckling a little bit when he says, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above” (19:10-11). Power comes from God and is given to human beings. Look at the way Jesus reacts to Pilate. Are you king of the Jews? Pilate asks. Jesus says, “Did you come up with that on your own? Or did someone else say that about me?” (cf. 18:34). Not an answer. So Pilate tries again: “What is it you have done?” Basically: why are you here? Why have your own people turned you over to me? And Jesus drives the point home: “My kingdom is not of this world…my kingdom is from another place” (18:36).

To Pilate’s ears, this is as good as an admission. Kingdom? Then he must think he is a king! “Kingdom” is about authority, power, ruling. Kings are in charge; they don’t even have to ask anyone for permission. They might be advised by others but they have all the power in their hands. And Jesus has just admitted that he sees himself as a king. But what if there are two different kinds of power (cf. Wright 161, 176)? What if there is a kind of power Pilate understands and one he doesn’t? The one kind of power, Pilate’s kind, makes its way through conflict and fighting. Caesar advanced the reach of his empire through “ruthless efficiency” (Wright 177). That’s the kind of kingdom Jesus’ followers expected, and so it makes complete sense that in the Garden of Gethsemane, when the soldiers come to arrest Jesus, Peter grabs a sword and tries to kill the high priest’s servant. He only succeeds in cutting off his earlobe, but violence, fighting, swords—that’s what made sense to Peter. And so Jesus tells Pilate that his followers, including Peter, could respond that way. They could follow and even establish the sort of kingdom Pilate understands: “If [my kingdom were of this world], my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders” (18:36). But Jesus’ kingdom is not, in fact, of this world. There’s another kind of power.

When we read of Jesus saying, “My kingdom is not of this world,” we typically hear him saying, “My kingdom is all about dying and going to heaven.” But that’s not what he says and that’s not what the original text says. Listen again to what he actually tells Pilate: “My kingdom is not of this world…my kingdom is from another place” (18:36). And then put that aside the prayer we pray often, at least every time we take communion: “Thy kingdom come…on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10, KJV). Let me say it again: power comes from God and is given to human beings. Jesus’ kingdom is from heaven but it is for this world. It is the true kind of power, the only kind that lasts. It is a signpost to the reality of God, and when we get this right, everything changes because having worldly power over anything no longer matters. It’s not what will last.

Think about the scene before us: Pilate has all the worldly power he can have. He literally has the power of life and death over Jesus. He’s surrounded by the trappings of worldly power: he’s in a palace, he has soldiers at his command, he can release a prisoner like Barabbas with a word, and he lives in luxury and extravagance every single day. And yet, in just a few short years, Pilate will be gone and so will his power. It will not last. It’s tenuous at best even on this critical morning. And then there’s Jesus, standing before him, wearing what is probably his only tunic, under arrest and most likely bound by his wrists. Very soon, he will be beaten, have a crown of thorns cruelly pushed onto his head and nailed to a cross. Why is he not nervous? Why does he act as if he’s actually in control at this moment (McKnight, John, pg. 296)? Because he has power. He has actual power. From this point, he will be taken and murdered, an example of what he has told the disciples, probably just hours before: “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (15:13). But he’s giving his life; not one is taking it from him (cf. John 10:18). Pilate’s power advances through violence. Jesus’ kingdom advances by love, the first of our signposts and the root of them all. Standing before Pilate, Jesus is love in the flesh, doing what only love can do. With a nod to Huey Lewis, this whole story is really about the power of love. And Pilate completely misses it.

But so have the disciples, even though Jesus has been pointing it out for three years and even on this night. When they had gathered for their final meal together, Jesus had knelt down and washed their feet. No one asked him to. No one expected him to. I kind of wonder who they thought would do that, since there were no servants in the room. But Jesus did it. He served and told them that was the example he wanted them to follow. In fact, he said they would be blessed if they would follow his example (13:1-17). And then he called them his “children” (13:33). And actually the word he uses there refers to little children, infants. In other words, he refers to them with a word that describes perhaps the least powerful being on the planet (cf. Card 157; Wright 178). An infant is completely dependent on his or her parents for everything—for food, for comfort, for care and for cleaning up after making a mess. Everything. The infant has no power, at least not the way Pilate would define it. But if you’ve held an infant, you know what kind of power they have. An infant born into your household instantly takes over your heart and loves you without condition. When you look at that little face, there isn’t anything you wouldn’t do or give for that child. And even as children grow, they bring a different kind of power into the world. Even the hardest of hearts are often melted by the presence of a little child. Babies love without condition. They have no power but they can change the world. I think, maybe, that’s why Jesus calls the disciples “children,” because that’s what he expects them to do: give up their ambitions for worldly power and instead change the world through the power of suffering love.

Robertson McQuilkin was president of a prominent Christian college and seminary, Columbia Bible College and Seminary, and had served in that role for 22 years. He was happy in his work and planned to be in that position for eight more years until retirement. But suddenly, everything changed when his wife of forty-two years, Muriel, was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease. All of the conventional wisdom told McQuilkin to stay at his post, perhaps hire someone to help take care of Muriel, and to continue to “serve God” by shaping young minds in the college and seminary. McQuilkin, however, chose a different path. He announced that at the end of that year he would step down as president, retire and go home to take care of Muriel. It made no sense to most people, because the power was in the presidency. But McQuilkin told anyone who asked that he was simply honoring his vow forty-two years before to take care of Muriel “in sickness and in health.” It was not a duty; rather, it was a matter of integrity and, in his words, a “great privilege.” And he stayed by her side until she died thirteen years later, even on days when she did not know who he was. There is no greater power in this world than the power found in suffering love, and that kind of power will, in fact, change the world. [REMOVE THE SIGNPOST COVER]

As I said, we’re going to return to Pilate’s conversation with Jesus next week, but we know how the story goes from here. Jesus does give his life for his friends—the disciples and all who have followed him through history, all the way down to you and me. He defeats the evil power of this world through the power of love. When Jesus died, the powers of this world thought they had won; after all, death is the ultimate weapon, the ultimate threat from Pilate’s kind of power. But that threat was removed when Jesus rose from the dead on Sunday morning. God’s power brings not death but life. The end of the story is not death but resurrection because God’s power renews creation itself (cf. Wright 183). And one day he will make the world the way it was meant to be because his power is life-giving, world-changing, others-serving and from-another-place. It’s not from this world but it is for this world. So who is really in control in this world? Not the ones who think they are—not by a long shot—because in the end there will be only one kind of power left standing. Let’s pray.