What Wondrous Love Is
This (4/9/17)
Wilhelm Morgner, Entry of Christ into Jerusalem
Palm Sunday presents an interesting
choice for all preachers. I can choose the liturgy of the Palms or the liturgy
of the Passion. This year, I chose both. Now I suppose I could have chosen the
Palm Sunday text—it’s shorter, so it would probably make for a shorter sermon,
too. It’s also a lot more fun. It’s got shouts of Hosanna! Who doesn’t like
that? The passion story has shouts of, “crucify!” That’s not fun at all. But
the truth is, you can’t have the palms without the passion.
Matthew
27:11-54
NARRATOR
Now
Jesus stood before the governor; and the governor asked him,
PILATE
Are
you the King of the Jews?
JESUS
You
say so.
NARRATOR
But
when Jesus was accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer.
PILATE
Do
you not hear how many accusations they make against you?
NARRATOR
But
he gave him no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was
greatly amazed. Now at the festival the governor was accustomed to release a
prisoner for the crowd, anyone whom they wanted. At that time, they had a notorious
prisoner, called Jesus Barabbas. So after they had gathered, Pilate said to
them,
PILATE
Whom
do you want me to release for you, Jesus Barabbas or Jesus who is called the
Messiah?
NARRATOR
Pilate
realized that it was out of jealousy that the religious authorities had handed Jesus
over. While Pilate was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him,
PILATE’s WIFE
Have
nothing to do with that innocent man, Jesus, for today I have suffered a great
deal because of a dream about him.
NARRATOR
Now
the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask Pilate to release
Barabbas and to have Jesus killed. Again, Pilate asked the crowd,
PILATE
Which
of the two do you want me to release for you?
CROWD
Barabbas.
PILATE
Then
what should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah?
CROWD
Let
him be crucified!
PILATE
Why,
what evil has he done?
CROWD
Let
him be crucified!
NARRATOR
So
when Pilate saw that he could do nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning,
he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying,
PILATE
I
am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.
CROWD
His
blood be on us and on our children!
NARRATOR
So
Pilate released Barabbas for them; and after flogging Jesus, Pilate handed Jesus
over to be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the
governor’s headquarters, and they gathered the whole cohort around him. They
stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and after twisting some thorns into
a crown, they put it on his head. They put a reed in his right hand and knelt
before him and mocked him, saying,
SOLDIERS
Hail,
King of the Jews!
NARRATOR
The
soldiers spat on him, and took the reed and struck him on the head. After
mocking him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then
they led him away to crucify him. As they went out, they came upon a man from
Cyrene named Simon; the soldiers compelled Simon to carry Jesus’ cross. And
when they came to a place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull), they
offered him wine to drink, mixed with gall; but when he tasted it, he would not
drink it. And when they had crucified him, they divided his clothes among themselves
by casting lots; then they sat down there and kept watch over him. Over his
head they put the charge against him, which read,
SOLDIERS
This
is Jesus, the King of the Jews.
NARRATOR
Then
two bandits were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left.
Those who passed by derided him, shaking their heads and saying,
CROWD
You
who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! If you
are the Son of God, come down from the cross.
NARRATOR
In
the same way the chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were
mocking Jesus,
PRIESTS, SCRIBES & ELDERS
He
saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come
down from the cross now, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God
deliver him now, if he wants to; for he said, ‘I am God’s Son.’
NARRATOR
The
bandits who were crucified with him also taunted him in the same way. From noon
on, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And about three
o’clock Jesus cried with a loud voice,
JESUS
My
God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
NARRATOR
When
some of the bystanders heard it, they said,
CROWD
This
man is calling for Elijah.
NARRATOR
At
once one of them ran and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine, put it on a
stick, and gave it to him to drink. But the others said,
CROWD
Wait,
let us see whether Elijah will come to save him.
NARRATOR
Then
Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last. At that moment the
curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and
the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints
who had fallen asleep were raised. After his resurrection they came out of the
tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. Now when the centurion
and those with him, who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and
what took place, they were terrified and said,
CENTURION
Truly
this man was God’s Son!
Sermon
Good morning! And what a beautiful morning it is! It feels
like Spring is truly here. Of course, with the beginning of Spring also comes
the return of Major League Baseball. That always brings about the Pirates’ home
opener, which often brings with it—snow. Yay. But the snow is gone, the warm
weather is returning and the sun is shining, so let us all rejoice!
It seems to me that the frequent changes in the weather are
a sort of parallel to the emotional arc of the stories of Palm Sunday, the
Passion, and Easter. First, we hear the crowds shout, “Hosanna!” We feel the joy of
Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. It’s like the joy of Spring; the joy of
opening day. Everything still seems possible—the Pirates haven’t lost a single
game! Yet. But we know how this story ends.
In the story of the passion, we see Jesus betrayed and
arrested, and then put on trial. We hear the soldiers mocking Jesus and we see
him dressed in an elegant robe, clothed like a king, but held as a prisoner. We
hear the crowds shout, “Let him be crucified!” And then they ask Pilate to free
Barabbas instead. We also see Simon of Cyrene bearing the cross and many people
wailing for Jesus. When they get to Golgotha, Jesus is again mocked by
soldiers. Later we see Jesus on the cross, in the company of two bandits. We
hear Jesus cry out to God the Father, then he dies, and we hear a centurion
confess Jesus’ innocence.
This isn’t a fun story. But the truth is, you can’t have
one story without the other. You can’t have the shouts of loud “Hosannas”
without the crowds chanting, “Let him be crucified!” While we want to remain in
the triumph and the earthly glory, we must also watch the broken and suffering
Christ on the cross.
It’s worth pointing out that the scene of Jesus entering
Jerusalem on a donkey would have been similar to a military parade. The people
who witnessed Jesus riding into the city and the first generations of people to
hear this story, all of them would be familiar with the scene. Jesus rode into
Jerusalem the same way an emperor or a great military hero would have entered a
city. But Jesus rode in on a donkey. He hadn’t conquered any territories or won
any battles—not at that point. The victory comes later in the story and it’s
not the victory that the adoring crowds expect Jesus to bring. Perhaps they
should have asked why Jesus rode in on a donkey. Perhaps they were so sure that
Jesus would drive the Romans out and change their present reality that they never
thought to ask.
The glory, laud, and honor of Palm Sunday heighten the
drama of Jesus’ many betrayals—first by Judas, then Peter, and also by the crowds
that shouted, “Let him be crucified,” and then asked for the release of
Barabbas instead of Jesus. It takes only a few days for all these different
people to turn on Jesus.
These two stories can’t be separated from one another; the
glory of Palm Sunday is linked to the betrayals and the crucifixion. Jesus has
to be rejected before he can be executed, and he can’t be resurrected if he
isn’t crucified. But I’m getting ahead of the story; we need to stay in the
passion narrative for a little while longer, even if it’s not comfortable.
The story is uncomfortable because we don’t want to see
Jesus suffer and die. We want the glory of Palm Sunday and we want Easter
morning, but we’re not there yet. These two stories are pretty straightforward.
I don’t have to decode a bunch of hidden meanings, so that begs the question,
where are we in this story?
Are we in the crowds on Palm Sunday? That seems like a good
thing. We all love Jesus, so of course we want to shout loud Hosannas! But
maybe we only want to shout in church. I mean, if we did it out there, people
might think we were crazy. When’s the last time you shouted “Hosanna!” in
McDonald’s or Starbucks or Shop-n-Save? Are you so alive with the power of the
Holy Spirit that you shout “Hosanna!” with every fiber of your being? Or are
you just trying to live in the glorious past of this church as it was thirty or
forty years ago?
I would suspect that none of us is ready to jump up and say
that we’re Pilate or the soldiers, or even Peter. But the truth is, we all deny
Christ from time to time. Jesus is the only one to walk through this life
without sin. For that matter, none of us wants to admit that we were in the
crowds that shouted, “Let him be crucified!” Of course, there had to be a few
people in that crowd who had shouted “Hosanna!” on Palm Sunday. The truth is
more complicated than that: we are all of these people from time to time.
Sometimes we are Simon of Cyrene, compelled to bear the
burden. Sometimes we do wave palm branches and shout loud Hosannas! Other times
we draw a sword and try to prevent the authorities from arresting Jesus. And
then sometimes we deny that we know who Jesus is. We don’t live up to or into
the call to be disciples. Or we try to live in a moment that has already
passed.
We can’t stay in Palm Sunday forever and we can’t prevent
the Romans from arresting and crucifying Jesus. There was no stopping the
crucifixion:
Jesus laid down his
life. It wasn’t taken from him; he let it go. Along the way, he also released
his friends who were too tired or frightened to continue the journey with him.
He let go of rights we consider inalienable–to his life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness. To what did he hold fast? He held fast to his commitment
to live what he preached. He held fast to following the Father’s will, at all
costs. He held fast to the mission to which he had been appointed, “not to be
served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45) He
held fast to the Word of God, and let go of the words of anxiety and warning
with which well-meaning friends tried to redirect his course.[1]
Jesus didn’t stand still
and bask in the glory of Palm Sunday, he moved forward in faith and obedience.
He accepted the burden that was laid upon him. He showed the most wondrous love
and took away our sin.
The job of savior has already been taken; our burden is
much lighter than that. We cannot match the perfect, wondrous love that Christ
has shown to each of us. Yet we are called to be disciples; to follow Christ in
humility, obedience, service, and love. We have to set aside our own comfort
and freedom to do this. This is difficult, but it is our calling, all the same. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Benediction
Now, beloved, as you depart from this place, remember that
we are called to be the Church, the body of Christ in the world, the world
today. As the Church, we are called to participate in the work of re-creation,
through relationship. Go forth and be instruments of God’s love and peace and
reconciliation. Do not return evil for evil to any person, but know that we are
all loved by God, and that we are called to reflect that love to everyone we
meet. Go forth and be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. In the
name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, Let all God’s children say, Amen!
[1]
Sheldon Sorge, “Hanging on and Letting Go,” retrieved from: http://www.pghpresbytery.org/news/sheldon_shares/2016/ss_031716.htm
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