i myself will be the shepherd

As curiosity and affection and appreciation for a laugh motivated Arthur Weasley to study the quirks of Muggle life, so do they motivate me, a Spiritual man, to study the beliefs and behaviors that govern the lives of Worldlings.

One funny belief, commonly held in the World, is that when choosing political leaders, one should vote for the Party rather than voting for the Person. Alternatively expressed, if leaders seeking office might seem deficient in admirable qualities, this deficiency is unimportant because the office-seekers are mostly just rubber stamp votes for their chosen faction.

Ideally, to take this position means that the elector finds the candidate’s faction attractive, even if the candidate herself is repugnant to him. However, in the Year of Our Lord 2024, it seems more common that the professor of Party Not Person loves neither the candidate nor the party, but is driven above all by hatred and fear of the opposing party. “Both candidates are tools. Both parties are trash. But I hate this party more, and the enemy of my enemy’s rubber stamp is also my enemy’s rubber stamp but the one I will vote for, I guess.”

What a pitiable state! It is understandable, though, because since civilization’s dawn, the persons elevated to political leadership have been unimpressive as a rule.

The predominant characteristic of the worldly king, bemoaned by nearly every one of their subjects ever, has been greed. Worldly leaders love money and the comforts and pleasures it can buy, so when they get their hands on political power, they will, like clockwork, use it to enlarge their incomes. The money will come from people who are often standing at the precipice of destitution.

Another universal complaint is the tendency of these leaders to use their power to establish dynasties for their children and to reward their friends and family members with privileges and extortion-funded sinecures.

Dishonesty is a crucial trait in the identity of the worldly politician. Hardheartedness is normal; sadism is not uncommon. Cowardice, stupidity, attention-seeking: all things for which the politician is infamous.

The stereotypical leader-parasites have historically had solid control of most governments, so their citizens, if they’ve been lucky, have seen their societies graced by stagnation or gentle decline. For the unlucky citizens, the normal government’s legacy is one of outright robbery or of ruin on the warpath.

Two centuries of unprecedented technological advancements and imperial-financial plunder have provided thick makeup for First World politicians to conceal their mediocrity, but as the empires have been bungled away and the makeup production has been outsourced to Asia, their flaws have become more conspicuous than ever. A few news-addicted conspiracy-theorist fanboys muster cheers for them, but billions more smolder at the thought of these officials, smolder at elections to pick more of the same, smolder at the swampy system where these politicians have thrived.

The bottom line is that it has obviously been rough out there for a citizen awaiting a decent leader, so while it is wrongheaded, it is not at all surprising that the people who have not fallen into apathy should start to ignore the leaders themselves as much as they can and instead place all remaining hope in the more abstract basket of a political party.

It is wrongheaded because a person of poor character might be able to give generic stump speeches, might be able to make promises, might be able to talk, but they will almost certainly not have the ability to think of innovative solutions or the strategies to implement them, and they will not have the motivation or the courage to act unless their feet are held to the fire. Even if you love the (mostly modest) dreams laid out in party platforms, the ugly-charactered person will not be able to realize them.

A non-useless leader must be intelligent and wise so that she can decide upon the right destination and figure out how to get there. She must be honest so that she can point out below-the-surface cancers in government rather than allow them to continue festering in darkness. She must be courageous so that she can execute her plans instead of cowering in fear about the powerful people whom she might upset by her action. The person of character, even if we don’t fully agree with their reasoning on one or another specific topic, brings some hope for newness, whereas the traditional politician brings nothing, brings a drain on the treasury that could be spent better on a few park benches or a set of bus tires.

Our Gospel, our political future, is the Kingdom of God. There have been many kingdoms on Earth, and there is ultimately only one difference between all of those kingdoms and this one: the person in charge. The other kingdoms have had thousands of different world-infected kings, whereas this kingdom will be ruled by the Lord Jesus. The person of Jesus is the only significant difference, and this difference will mean absolutely everything.

Jesus as King means we will have a political leader who forswears all wealth and maintains a lifestyle devoid of luxury. Jesus as King means we will have a political leader who is unmarried and has no children to shower privileges on. Jesus as King means we will have a political leader who is Truth and who completely abstains from lying. Jesus as King means we will have a political leader who has a sea of love for all people, who is willing to lay down his life even for his enemies. The Kingdom of God is the wisdom and righteousness of this man’s judgment, forever.

“But, like, didn’t Jesus float up into Heaven? Haven’t you been waiting for him to come back and be King for two-thousand years?”

Yes, he did float up into Heaven. Christians have been waiting since then for him to float back down. But he sent from Heaven a Helper who has only very recently clarified things for us, who has made known to us the secret of how the Reign of God will begin.

The key to this secret and to so many others is the relationship of the Father and the Son.

Jesus said that he and the Father are One, that whoever had seen him had seen the Father. He said:

Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.

Then, he whose every prayer was answered, whose words have the authority of the Father, prayed that all who believe might be drawn into this Oneness.

I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.

The Lord Jesus has not left us orphans. He has always been here on Earth with us, as he promised. He dwells in us and he does his works in us, just as His Father dwells in him and does his works in him. We see the Lord Jesus in the Apostle Paul, who was completely aware of the new reality of his post-baptismal life and left to the Church the perfect words to describe it:

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

This is the power of God’s Spirit: that Father and Son and Spirit can dwell within flesh, become all within flesh, and can live and work in the world, through flesh, for the salvation of those whom God has chosen. Jesus the King will work through believers who have been crucified and in whom Christ lives. The Spirit of God will purify those who are called, will transform them, will etch on them the Lord Jesus’ face, and they, and He, will take control of all political authority and create a New Earth.

Be glad, people of the world, that in the person of Jesus, the drab political tradition we’ve known will be destroyed. The Party Not Person position will lose its meaning, for there will be only One Party and One Person and they will be the same.

Be glad for the approaching days when the Spirit raises up those will leave everything, sacrifice everything, and receive a new name.

Be glad for the approaching days when the members of the Body of Christ called to this work, dead in love, dead with Christ, steamroll your political statūs quo.

Be glad for the rapidly approaching days when the Lord Jesus in whom the Father lives makes corruption a memory, the days when we will walk in green pastures.