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Later today there will be another vivid illustration of the utter strangeness of the times through which we are living. The Prime Minister will give a statement on new regulations intended to manage the spread of coronavirus once this lockdown ends on December 2nd. Many of us will be sitting on the edges of our seats waiting to see what we will be allowed to do. Will families be allowed to gather at Christmas? Will more businesses be allowed to re-open? Will people of faith be allowed to worship?

So once again we find ourselves waiting for government permission to exercise fundamental freedoms. Usually families gather not because a government allows it but because we are made for relationship. Usually people of faith worship not because the state permits it but because they believe that God is God. It is unsurprising that the debate about the reach of the state is such a vibrant one at the moment.

But fortunately we do not live in a tyranny. We have a democratically elected government that can rule only by consent. What lies behind these measures is a willingness amongst the majority to make sacrifices for the common good.

This is something that points Christians to the feast we were keeping yesterday, Christ the King. That may seem an oddly triumphalist title in a nation where the practise of faith is such a minority pursuit. But the kingship of Christ today relies on consent. He rules over the lives of those who freely choose his path in an act of faith. One passage of the Bible demonstrates especially vividly the nature of that choice.

Jesus takes the hearer in a parable to the end of time when he sits as judge and divides people into sheep and goats. And his criterion? It is whether those being judged have seen and served him in the prisoner, the sick, the stranger. ‘In so far as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it for me,’ he says. The kingship of Christ is revealed not in splendour but in dereliction. The Christian consents to that kingship through service and compassion.

Whatever you think of the kingship of Christ, there is, I would hope, some inspiration to be drawn here. In these strangest of days we are being invited to continue giving up basic freedoms for the benefit of the most vulnerable. Living with these uncomfortable restrictions provides opportunity to serve the sick, the poor, the frail and so to acknowledge their dignity. Perhaps in the midst of the intense frustrations, this crisis will help us recover a vision of a common humanity.

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