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Palm/Passion Sunday; March 28, 2010
Park Avenue Presbyterian Church; Des Moines, Iowa
Texts: Palm: Psalm 118: 1-2, 19-29; Luke 19: 28-40 [41-44]
Passion: Isaiah 50: 4-9a Psalm 31: 9-16 Philippians 2: 5-11 Luke 22:14 – 23:56 or Luke 23: 1-49
“What’s Not to Like about Palm Sunday”
--} I like Jesus. I like parades. I like joyous celebrations. I like the 4th of July, apple pie, and fireworks. But I don’t always like Palm Sunday.
I don’t like Palm Sunday—because we often get our proverbial Palm Sunday “cart” before our Palm Sunday “donkey.” Like we do at Advent for Christmas, Christians get eager to celebrate Jesus’ “victory,” so we import our certainty of the resurrection into the parade—ahead of time! Some churches even treat Palm Sunday as if Easter has already happened; believing the parade is simply about welcoming Jesus’ victory over sin and death. So eager are they, they simply dismiss the parts of the gospel story where the crowd that lauds and hails Jesus’ coming into Jerusalem turns out to be the same crowd shouting, “crucify him!” before it’s over.
I don’t like Palm Sunday because sometimes eager Christians can cover up the fact that at the end of the parade there’s a cross—forgetting that the entry into Jerusalem is the prelude to Jesus dying and the theological importance of such a death. In our rush, we quickly re-write the details of the gospels in our head, lauding Jesus as “King of Kings” and “Lord of Lords,” as if there were no other; failing to recognize that first-century believers knew the Roman prefects insisted on the same titles for themselves! That the faithful claim such an “equal” or even “greater” title for Jesus only serves to put the “faith” in danger.
I don’t like Palm Sunday—because the Bible isn’t the only history book, and sometimes we read it as if it were. We use it to confirm the stories we like, but writing off the rest. We imagine a large parade for Jesus coming into town, mainly to support how WE see Jesus; but historically speaking, first-century Jerusalem might best be described as a powder keg, with someone always threatening to light the fuse. Rome, the preeminent world power rules Palestine, and is well known for its bringing peace through the power of the sword. It was Herod the Great who helped the Israelites rebuild Solomon’s Temple that had been destroyed by the Babylonians. Herod had become a Jewish convert, but he rebuilds the Temple to gain the peoples favor, making it easier to govern them—to dominate. But by the time of Jesus’ processional entry, history’s pages had turned. Herod the Great was dead, the regional Roman prefect was Pilate, and the Romans were notoriously nervous about Judaism’s celebration of the Passover—which brought thousands of pilgrims to Jerusalem to celebrate the Israelite’s escape from Egypt, when without an army, the Israelites defeated Egypt’s military might and drowned it in the sea.
So by the first “Palm Sunday” (whichever day it was) the Romans had developed a unique way of dealing with Judaism’s religious observances. “Keeping the peace by the power of the sword,” Rome moved scores of troops up to Jerusalem in a huge show of force. This added thousands of soldiers on top of the thousands of pilgrims streaming into the city. Think about the images of the last presidential inauguration! The big Roman capital in Palestine was actually Ceasarea Maritima, an elaborate city built by Herod the Great on the Mediterranean coast with huge palaces and all the great Roman comforts. By many accounts, it was actually a “downgrade” to have to go up to Jerusalem, where things were not as nice and the quarters far more cramped and the company not so desirable. The Romans were already grumpy, they didn’t ever take kindly to any actual or perceived “threats” to their worldly power; and so if the parade Jesus leads into Jerusalem is more than a few dozen rag-tag unarmed followers, the Romans are likely to have waltzed over and squashed the procession before it ever got to the city walls! And there would have been no crucifixion for the world’s stage.
I think that may partly be why Luke tells us in his version of events that the Pharisees wanted Jesus to “shush” his followers—because they didn’t need to be attracting the ire of the nervous Roman authorities. It’s why some scholars today—including Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan—suggest that while the Roman parade is making its way up the eastern side of Jerusalem from the Mediterranean, with chariots, cavalry, infantry, in a powerful show of worldly force; that Jesus and a very small band of followers is coming down the Mount of Olives on the western side of the city being led by a donkey with little fanfare. Everyone in town, or nearly everyone would have been captivated by the Romans and their expected arrival. No one knew Jesus was even coming; and even if they had, he was only one of thousands of pilgrims coming to celebrate in Jerusalem.
I don’t like Palm Sunday, because in the face of all this history, it almost makes Jesus’ entry out to be something it never could have been!
I don’t like Palm Sunday, because most of the time, the way we read the gospel stories it obscures what may be God’s greatest act and what I believe the gospel writers were really trying to tell us or show us—that in the face of worldly domination, violence, and oppression, Jesus dies. It’s not a huge victory lap for the Son of God because of his resurrection, but the very death of God’s beloved Son.
I don’t like Palm Sunday because I don’t believe it’s a victory march; Jesus goes into Jerusalem and doesn’t come out alive. In order to demonstrate the power of the Kingdom of God, Jesus goes into Jerusalem to take on all the power of Rome, all the power of Judaism’s religious authorities, maybe even all the world’s power. And in the face of that power, Jesus’ followers are scattered, the “Jesus movement”—if we can call it that—is effectively squashed. And all the powers of the world look very much like they’ve won—unless….
I don’t like Palm Sunday; but the truth is, I don’t have to. And you don’t have to “unlike Palm Sunday” or agree with me about Palm Sunday at all. But what we should notice together, is that the gospels tell us that Jesus decisively enters Jerusalem as seriously as God entered the world in Jesus. That Jesus goes into Jerusalem in the face of worldly domination, violence, and oppression—to demonstrate the values of the Kingdom of God. He doesn’t take up arms or threatening gestures, he doesn’t “dominate” or demand adherence to his way as the right way, but visibly “shows” the whole world—it’s powers, it’s dominators, it’s religious fanatics—that the ways of the Kingdom of God are unconquerable.
In the face of worldly domination, violence, and oppression, Jesus does the unthinkable—for those looking for a victory—he dies. The world kills him, and he doesn’t even lift a finger against it. That’s God’s response. To demonstrate not the power of the world, but to demonstrate the love and power and freedom of the Kingdom of God—a different way, a new call, the kind of life that yields life. The great victory of Jesus is to deny the powers of the world by demonstrating the very different power of God.
Worldly power is forceful power—violent power—peace by way of the sword. And Luke reminds us of what happens to Jerusalem in the years following Jesus’ death. Almost certainly reflecting the Roman siege and destruction of Jerusalem, including the Temple, Luke’s Jesus wept over these foreboding words:
“your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.”Violence may have its way in the world, but it cannot conquer the Kingdom of God and its ways. But stand the world’s ways against God’s ways, like Jesus does in Jerusalem, and we’re often surprised by what happens—or doesn’t!
Palm Sunday is the announcement, really, of what’s coming—but not just that Jesus is riding triumphantly into town! What we “expect” may not be what actually happened. It’s true, Jesus rides into town, one way or another, for a showdown. But it’s to “show” people the demonstration of the Kingdom’s ways. In the face of domination, violence, and oppression—by the world’s standards, Jesus’ loses. But that’s not the end of the story! Not just because Jesus is raised, but because of what we see and know of him in the gospel stories.
In the Holy Land I met Elias Chacour, Bishop of Galilee in the Melkite branch of the Catholic Church. He wrote an inscription for me in one of his books that I’d purchased: God does not kill. It’s a hard point. Bishop Chacour has faced a dominant, violent, oppressive government nearly every day of his life—much like Jesus did. It’s always tempting to believe that by way of power, we can stop violence; “Peace through strength”—or something like that. It just doesn’t square with a God who doesn’t view violence and killing the same way human beings do. God does not kill. Which is why, I think, Jesus doesn’t lift a finger to save himself in the face of human violence. It’s not a matter of choosing some human beings over other human beings, but of human beings being called to live out God’s vision.
God’s vision—the ways of the Kingdom of God—are often antithetical to the ways of the world. Where earthly rule often gives in to violence, domination, and oppression, God’s kingdom is unconquerable by such things. How might our world be different if we gave witness to this path of Jesus? If we recognized God’s vision and allowed it to intercept our own? Where we live by the threat of violence and worldly power—what if we could choose Jesus’ way instead?
Sometimes, rather than joining the parade on Palm Sunday, I just want to be an observer. I see who Jesus is in the gospel stories. I too, know and see the world’s powers of domination, violence, and oppression at work. So I want to see and know what happens to Jesus—not because I believe it happened one way or another, but so I can see the values of the Kingdom of God at work and apply them to my own life. If the Palm Sunday parade is to mean anything, it means learning to give witness to the ways Jesus exhibits the Kingdom of God. It means for me to emulate him—by proclaiming loudly not only his kingship and lordship for my life, but proclaiming even more loudly the values of the Kingdom of God that Jesus demonstrated in those days for the sake of the whole world!
--+ AMEN.
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