Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“Jesus answered, ‘My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.’”
NL Daily Devotion for Sunday, March 15, 2026
by Rev. Dr. Miles Hopgood, Clergy Stuff
Main Idea: Jesus disappoints us by declaring that his kingdom is not from this world. But it is a kingdom in the world and for the world, and that is truly good news.
As the child of attorneys, I was enamored with courtroom scenes. From dramas like “Twelve Angry Men” and “The Rainmaker” to comedies like “My Cousin Vinnie” and “Legally Blonde,” they let me imagine how exciting it was to be an attorney, even as my parents constantly reminded me that real courtrooms weren’t like that. Though eventually my desire to be an attorney faded (like Luther, I decided to quit dreams of being a lawyer to go into ministry instead), I have always had a soft spot for a good trial-turned-showdown.
Had my first exposure to the genre been a dramatization of the confrontation between Jesus and Pilate, however, I doubt my interest would have been nearly so engaged. This is supposed to be the big dramatic climax of the narrative, and yet when Jesus is put on the stand, he hits us with, “My kingdom is not of this world.” What sort of zinger is that? Clearly, Jesus did not get the memo that you are supposed to turn the dial up to eleven when this moment comes. We want a version of Colonel Jessop’s “You want me on that wall, you need me on that wall,” and yet all we get feels like Jesus pleading the fifth. Pilate tries to get things back on track by trying to catch Jesus with a bit of wordplay—“So you are a king!”—but Jesus won’t follow the script. He simply came in to the world to testify to the truth.
It is important that we feel the disappointment with what Jesus has to say here, or clarify why we don’t. For if we are not let down to hear that Jesus’s kingdom is not of this world, we are probably on the wrong side of things. Those who are on the margins, excluded and oppressed, crushed under the wheel of empire and capital—they are who desperately want Jesus to make a kingdom of this world. If we are not disappointed to learn that Jesus isn’t bringing about a new earthly kingdom, we are probably more on the side of the oppressor than we would are comfortable admitting or confronting.
OK, so we are disappointed, or at least think we should be. What do we do with that disappointment? Is there good news in these words? Absolutely there is, and especially for those suffering from oppression. We begin by realizing that Jesus’s insistence that his kingdom is not of this world must be set alongside the Incarnation, that is, God’s decision to enter into the world in Jesus Christ not to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Jesus’s kingdom is not from this world, but it in this world and for this world. It will not be built as the kingdoms of this world are, with bombs, laws, or any other form of state sanctioned violence. It is being built in and among us in a way that no other kingdom can be—through self-giving, resurrected love. Jesus is not rejecting us or creation with these words. He is promising something better than we could have hoped for, for us and for all the world.
