| "The time of Jesus's birth. "Few spectacles in all the Roman Empire match the Jewish celebration of Passover in Jerusalem, during which a million or more boisterous pilgrims from places far and near flood both that city of just 60,000 residents and all its surrounding countryside. Campfires blaze everywhere-in valleys, on hill slopes, along ridges-and the sounds of feasting and singing and dancing fill the night. By day, throngs stream into the city to visit the sacred place where earth touches heaven-God's holy Temple, a site which, only a few decades earlier, King Herod had expanded and rebuilt into one of the Empire's architectural wonders. Of course, Rome's person-in-charge, Pontius Pilate, hates Passover. For should its million-person mob ever be effectively mobilized, they could rise up and easily overwhelm the troops available to him. Now, it is into the midst of just such a volatile Passover multitude as this that there suddenly arrives an incendiary Galilean Jew, and his entrance-riding a young donkey down the western slope of the Mount of Olives toward the city gates-touches off a tumult. In terms of the symbol system of ancient Jewish street theater, this figure's arrival is not so much that of an ordinary pilgrim as it is that of a king, a deliverer, a royal Messiah-which is, of course, exactly what the rumor-mill has long been suggesting that this fellow Jesus really is. Those standing along the route instantly attribute quite specific meaning to the symbols employed in this street theater. After all, here comes one whose very name, Jesus or Yeshua, means in the local language, "He will save." Here comes Mr. "He-Will-Save," riding into the midst of this festival celebrating the liberation of an enslaved people, Israel-read, the Jews-from the bondage of a wicked king, Pharaoh-read the Emperor-in the days of a deliverer, Moses-read, Jesus. Here comes Mr. "He-Will-Save," just as the ancient prophet Zechariah had foretold concerning the last days when God would finally triumph over the forces of evil (ch. 14). Here comes Mr. "He-Will-Save," as Zechariah had accurately foretold, from atop the ridge of the Mount of Olives (14:4) to rescue Jerusalem from the clutches of the final evil empire-now understood to be Rome. Here comes Mr. "He-Will-Save," accompanied both before and behind by a crowd of choristers shouting lines from a psalm sung of old to the ancient Davidic warrior-kings (118:25-26): "Hosanna [Hôshî'áh na', which is to say, Save (us) now! Save (us) now!]! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming reign of our ancestor David!" It is early afternoon, and beneath the blazing Middle-eastern sun Jesus and his followers are winding their way down the sloping hillside toward the Kidron Valley, beyond which looms Jerusalem. Those marching with Jesus are waving leafy branches recently cut in the outlying fields, and they are also removing their cloaks and throwing them down on Jesus's path, as befits one who is about to be crowned "king" (cf. II Kings 9:13). Street theater, indeed-a scene reminiscent of an episode some 170 years earlier, when the last Jewish deliverer of Jerusalem, Simon Maccabeus, had expelled the hated Greeks and then, together with his supporters, entered Jerusalem "with praise and palm branches … and with hymns and songs." (I Maccabees 13:51) So to the casual bystander, here comes Jesus, Yeshua, Mr. "He-Will-Save," the Messiah, a military liberator-here he comes to expel the Roman enemy and free his people. But to the truly observant bystander several elements of this unfolding theater-piece seem perplexing, even paradoxical. For shouldn't a commander-in-chief be riding a spirited stallion rather than a balking burro? Oh, to be sure, good old Zechariah, that same prophet mentioned earlier, had, in a different vision (9:9), spoken of a Jewish king who would approach Jerusalem humbly and peaceably, mounted only on the colt of a donkey, there to be greeted with shouts of joy. But that other vision of Zechariah is better. For in the face of such power as Rome possesses, a non-violent Messiah simply can't be effective. And speaking of being effective, shouldn't Jesus also be accompanied before and behind by an armed militia, not by some peacenik band of dancing farmers and fisherfolk, of women and beggars, of demoniacs and the destitute-a group whose garments certainly are not providing for Jesus a carpet fit for a king but rather only an unseemly one of sweat-stained cloaks and tattered shawls? What kind of mixed signals is Jesus trying to send here? Is he the longed-for military Messiah, a genuine revolutionary? Or is he some kind of useless sovereign-some kind of "sovereign of sinners," "monarch of outcasts," "king of the sick, and the poor, and the oppressed"? Well, to the discerning bystander, the answer to that question comes sooner than might have been expected. For instead of sweeping immediately into the city to confront Pontius Pilate and his vastly outnumbered soldiers directly, Jesus and his entourage stop short of Jerusalem, in the Kidron Valley itself, outside the city gates. There Jesus brings his parade to a halt, dismounts from his donkey, and promptly abandons his attendant multitude, leaving them without a leader. For Jesus chooses to enter the gate and the city not menacingly, with a mob, but vulnerably, all by himself alone. And Jesus also chooses to proceed not to the Roman procurator's palace but instead to the sacred Temple. One can imagine how shocked and disillusioned the crowd left behind by Jesus are now feeling-those who only minutes before had been shouting, "Hosanna," while paving the road in front of him with their garments. Why has Jesus abruptly abandoned his campaign? Whatever is he thinking, entering the city alone? When Jesus arrives at the Temple courtyard- inside the city walls-preparations are well underway for the ritual sacrifice of the nearly 100,000 lambs that will begin in three days time, on Wednesday afternoon, for the sacrifices will have to be completed by Thursdaysundown, in time for the Passover meal later that night. As Jesus surveys the scene, he observes crowds of Jewish pilgrims from faraway lands streaming into the holiday market place that the priests have set up in the porticoed courtyard surrounding the Temple proper. To accommodate the pilgrims' needs, this courtyard has been filled with many money-changing tables and with an enormous barn housing thousands of animals. So here in the vast courtyard on this Sunday afternoon pilgrims are busily exchanging their native currencies for the kind of coins that the priests will accept when the people make their offerings to the Temple and purchase their Passover lambs. The excited clamor of crowds, the clanking of coins, the bleating of frightened animals-these are the sounds charging the air. Dismay comes over Jesus, as he measures the commercialism of this scene against the dire warning sounded by God in the book of the prophet Jeremiah (7:11), where it says: "Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your sight?" Then, heavy in heart, Jesus next directs his gaze beyond the tables and the barn to the low fence that separates the commercial courtyard from the Temple proper. Jews who are seeking to offer sacrifice pass through a small gate in that balustrade and then go through the grand gate that leads inside the Temple proper, first to the Court of Women and then, up a set of stairs and through another gate, to the Court of Israel, where male pilgrims may turn over their purchased animals to the priests for sacrifice. Jesus approaches the balustrade and notices some stones set into it, stones that bear this inscription: "No person of another nation is to enter within this barrier and enclosure around the temple. Whoever is caught will have themselves to blame for their death which follows." In other words: "Gentiles stay out, or be punished by death!" More dismay fills Jesus, as he contrasts this inscription proclaiming the exclusion of non-Jews from the Temple with the gloriously inclusive words of God proclaimed in the book of the prophet Isaiah (56:7c), where it says: "My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations." Having taken much time to survey and reflect upon these temple scenes, Jesus finds that it has now turned late. Sunset is approaching. So filled with sadness and with anger over what has been seen in this place, where earth is meant to touch heaven, Jesus withdraws from the Temple precincts. Once again outside the city wall, he finds that the multitude who accompanied and hailed him upon his arrival have largely dispersed. At least his inner circle of disciples has been awaiting his return, albeit impatiently. So rejoining these, Jesus accompanies them on the 45-minute walk to the nearby village of Bethany, where they have made arrangements to spend the night. The poet and Presbyterian preacher Thomas Troeger captures powerfully this end-of-the day scene in three verses of his Palm Sunday hymn, "A Cheering, Chanting, Dizzy Crowd," which we will sing at the close of today's service. Listen, please: "When day dimmed down to deep'ning dark the crowd began to fade 'til only trampled leaves and bark were left from the parade. "Lest we be fooled because our hearts have surged with passing praise, remind us, God, as this week starts where Christ has fixed his gaze. "Instead of palms a winding sheet will have to be unrolled, a carpet much more fit to greet the king a cross will hold." For you see, Jesus will return tomorrow to cleanse this Temple, and that action of his will set irrevocably in motion the conflict with the established authorities that will lead, come Friday, not to the overthrow of Rome but to the execution of Jesus. Now, the Palm Sunday story of Jesus's approach to the city of Jerusalem has excited me ever since I was a child. Parades, palms, waving, singing, shouting, even a donkey-it's the closest a church ever gets to being a circus! But the older I become, the more bitter the taste of this day seems. For with every re-telling, this story from my childhood takes on ever more somber shades of meaning-overcast as it is by its pall of glooming ironies and foreboding misconceptions. For by the time "day dimmed down to deep'ning dark" the misconceived shouts of "Hosanna!" have laid the groundwork for misdirected cries of "Crucify!" Today's branches and bark have pointed ahead with irony to Friday's thorns and tree?trunk. And the garment-strewn road down the Mount of Olives has augured the soldiers' casting for garments on Calvary. That day of Jesus's procession was a moment of fragile possibility. If only people had seen Jesus for what he truly was, a sovereign who came to offer not the start of the strife and conflict for which many living under the Roman yolk had been dreaming, but a sovereign who came to offer the gift of love and inclusion to all whom the powerful had marginalized. And each Palm Sunday since then has offered the world another moment of fragile possibility, as each succeeding generation receives yet another opportunity to reject the philosophy that might makes right and to embrace Jesus's way of resisting evil non-violently, to accept Jesus's way even if it leads to a cross. So where will we who have greeted Jesus today with Hosannas-where will we be found at the end of this week, on Good Friday? Is it possible that we, like most of that ancient crowd, will have reaffirmed the premise that might makes right, and will have rejected Jesus's way of the cross? Or will we, like just a very few of Jesus's disciples, all of them women-among them Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the younger and Joses, and Salome (Mark 15:40)-will we like these prove steadfast to the very end and be found, come Friday, standing watch at the cross? Dear companions of mine in today's "cheering, chanting, dizzy crowd," let us use this Holy Week to draw nearer to the way of Christ, to reject the way of power and prestige, and to accept the way of the cross-Jesus's way of humble, non-violent service. And so that we can together receive the gift of God's grace that can help us hold firm to such an acceptance, I invite you to join me here on Thursday evening at 7:00 p.m. for the observance of Christ's last supper with his followers, and then again on Friday between noon and 2:15 p.m. to stand watch together at Christ's cross. Let us pray: Amen |
Return to Sermon Archive