Jesus is President - Can you say it.

We like to sing and proclaim that Jesus is Lord, but our words may not mean anything. We no longer have Lords in our society, so we do not know the meaning of the word Lord.

When pledging allegiance to our political leaders, we call them president or prime minister. We pledge allegiance to the kingdom of God by saying Jesus is Lord or King. The truth is that we have pledged allegiance to two masters. We justify this divided loyalty by calling one king or lord and the other president or prime minister.

If my nation has a king and I have pledged allegiance to him, it would be quite hard to call Jesus king, because it will be obvious that I have divided loyalty. If I believe Jesus is king, it would be hard to pledge allegiance to a human king, because I cannot serve two kings. However, we just dont get this dilhemma, because we do not have human kings.

King Herod understood that a people cannot have two kings. When he heard that a king had been born, he knew he had to kill him. Israel could not have two kings. Herod knew that if a new king came to power, one of them would have to go. Herod decided to get in first.

In America, where people have no experience of kingship or lordship, “Jesus is President” might be a better paraphrase of “Jesus is Lord”. However, it would be hard to pledge that "Jesus is President" as it would exposes a divided loyalty. A pledge of "No President but Jesus" would be a subversive statement, because a republic cannot have two presidents.

Could you say, Jesus is President. Jesus is Lord is much easier, because it does not mean as much.