Christ the Lord?

"This figurehead Christ that we propose to set up is not the Jesus whom God made Lord. If we were able to set him up as Lord, that would not make him Lord. If he is Lord, then he is Lord even if not a single man, woman, or child on earth believes in him or confesses him. If he is not Lord by God's own it is so, then he would not be Lord even though every soul on earth "accepted" him as Lord. If his being Lord depends on anybody's confession, then he is not Lord at all, but only a puppet lordling created by decision and subject to human opinion.

If there is anything certain about us, it is that we would never of ourselves choose a Lord who is Lord without our consent and in opposition to our will. We would not mind so much to have a lord we ourselves could make or unmake, who owed his lordship to our election, for that would leave us our feeling of power and control. But to have a Lord I did not help to make, who is not responsible to me but to whom I am responsible - that offends my pride, cancels my right to judge and decide, and denies my ability, my competence to know and choose my way and control my destiny. It cuts me down to my proper size, and I do not like it at first. Yet I am so diminished if he is thus exalted. No lesser Christ can be the Lord of Christian faith. Only on these terms can I deal with a Christ whom God has made Lord."

~design for preaching by H. Grady Davis (1958)