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The last Sunday of the Christian year is Christ the King Sunday. It looks forward to the last day when, “every knee shall bow, and tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.”

In our age of ethnic and cultural diversity, some question the claim that Jesus Christ is the exclusive symbol of the divine presence in the midst of human history. It seems arrogant for the church to call all people to find unity in Christ Jesus.

Why not seek unity in the Buddha? Why not seek unity in Lord Krishna?

Why not seek unity in the neo-pagan environmental movements, or in secular democratic capitalism, or a media driven culture of indulgence and self-medication?

There is a simple reason. These movements lack the genuine authority of Jesus.

Popular discussion about the exclusive claim of Christ to be the “Way, the Truth, and the Life” sometimes assumes an intolerance in followers of Jesus. There is a perception that people of faith are narrow-minded, controlling and intolerant of other peoples, cultures or religious traditions.

Unfortunately there are those within the church who operate out of a bigotry and a prejudice that dishonors the name of Jesus.

Mahatma Gandhi, the great liberator of India, was once asked why he so often quoted Jesus, but refused to allow himself to be described as a Christian. Ghandi replied, “Oh, I don’t reject your Christ. I love your Christ. It’s just that so many of you Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

The deeper truth of faith is that extending grace to the stranger, “the other” gives highest expression to the real priority of Jesus. The Eternal Word became flesh and dwelt among us in order to reach out to all of us. Christians are no less estranged from the life of God than anybody else. Christians claim no place of privilege in the Kingdom of God.

The exclusive claim of Jesus over all the nations, denies a claim to privilege of any nation, including a Christian nation.

Jesus is not one among religious teachers. Many great and honorable men and woman have provided insight and guidance in the human experience. At times they have been more helpful; sometimes less helpful.

Jesus is not listed among the religious teachers of the world. Rather, he is the one to whom all the religious teachers of the world point when they speak most clearly, whether they know they are pointing to Jesus or not. He is the ultimate source of divine wisdom upon which every religious tradition draws when it speaks its deepest truth, whether it knows it or not.

Jesus' authority does not rest on the claims of any Church, any theologian, or any tradition. Jesus authority is not of the world. His authority is a self-authenticating authority that rises out of the depth of his love, a genuine love the rises out of the heart of God.