We All Secretly Believe in Kings

We all secretly believe in kings.

Which is why we continue to follow the next one, and the next

On Twitter

At the polls

In the ratings

Into battle

Until they topple, feet of clay exposed to external stressors.

We swear we’ll never believe again.

We steel ourselves and erect scaffolding around our teetering souls,

But at the slightest glint of a crown, we cave.

As if fairy tales were coded into our DNA.

As if a monarch loiters just around the next corner who is like none who came before.

Incorruptible.

All-powerful.

Merciful.

Wise.

Skilled at social media and sound-bites,

checking all the right boxes,

aware of our present, versed in our past, one foot in our future,

never harassing, never harassed.

Suffered sufficiently we can relate, but not wounded enough to make us wonder what lurks beneath.

A leader we can follow to that place we believe exists though we’ve never seen it. Still, we’re homesick for something so it must be out there.

We try to stop longing for the one – the one with the answer, the heart, the philosophy, the ring to rule all others – but we’re relentless in belief.

Look, says one, he’s here.

No, says another, I’ve found her.

He’s a capitalist, communist, socialist, anarchist. She speaks, teaches, preaches, sings, leads like one born to it. He’s smart, savvy, skilled, surreal. They blabber, and we believe again.

Their philosophy, psychology, theology, political ideology, musicology is like no other and this, at last, will show us the way.

Come see.

“What did you go out to the wilderness to see?”

It matters what we hoped to see. Sometimes we fill in the blanks where only blanks exist.

There is a king like no other, but He doesn’t glitter or linger on Twitter, He doesn’t pander or meander from truth. He doesn’t play to the crowd, perform tricks on command, or care about our comfort.

He disappoints all who await a political deliverance, a military coup, a revolution that doesn’t begin within, an ideology based on their idealized selves rather than the abandoning of self.

And He reigns alone.

He does not share His throne or suffer idols. We must abandon them along with our expectations of His rule.

He’s a king willing to let anyone down who worships their dream of Him more than the reality of God.

But the reason we cannot smother this smoldering hope is because He does live, this One True King. And as every other king falls victim to his or her own failings, we would be wise to turn our mourning into joy. For where would our future lie if we threw our crowns at the feet of lesser kings?

Every time we hear news of this one exposed or that one giving up or another letting us down, let us not say, “Woe is the world and where have we come to?” For what did we go out to the wilderness to see?

Let us instead say, “Yes, Lord. Again, you are proven right. There is none righteous, no not one. Let the world prove you true again and again. And may this toppled king turn our hearts even more to You.”

We all secretly believe in kings because He’s created us with a homing device that pings until it finds it’s base, it’s home, in Jesus Christ, and no other.

There are some whose unrighteousness suppresses this truth, but may we never be guilty of withholding it and may we ever testify to it, whether from prison cells or palace walls.

There is One True King – incorruptible, all-powerful, merciful, wise, who is love and lives love and gives love and defines love. Settle for no lesser king than King Jesus.

We all secretly believe in kings . . . here’s why https://t.co/gXPNwxSrLp #fallenidols #Jesus #KingsandQueens

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 31, 2018