Wilhelm Morgner, Entry of Christ into Jerusalem
On Sunday, March 25th, we heard the story of Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem, as it's told in the Gospel of John. It's the shortest of the four accounts of Palm Sunday. In the introduction to the sermon, I sang a little bit of Bruce Springsteen's version of "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town." Alas, no audio of this event survives.
Sermon
Good morning. This week the weather felt a little more like
Christmas than Palm Sunday. As much as I hate driving in the snow or shoveling
the snow, I do like looking at it. When I see a lot of snow on the ground, I
get nostalgic. I think of snowball fights and sled riding. It’s like I’m a kid
again. I miss those times—those times when I didn’t care about the cold because
I was playing with my friends and we could only do those things during winter.
The snow also makes me nostalgic for my college years. A
big snowfall was usually celebrated with a football game, even if it was 10:00
at night. The snow on the field sort of evened out the skill levels of all the
players. The game was more about tackling other people into the snow than
trying to win. Now, the thought of getting tackled in the snow doesn’t seem
like fun. But I miss the games and being young enough to enjoy playing football
in the snow. I miss the people even more—my fraternity gave me a rich set of
relationships.
I have this one fraternity brother, his name is Joe, and he
would listen to a single song, over and over again. One summer he dated a girl
with red hair. He played and sang Neil Young’s song, “Cinnamon Girl,” until we
yelled at him to shut up.
Joe was also a huge Bruce Springsteen fan. One December he
started playing and singing Springsteen’s version of “Santa Claus Is Coming to
Town,” nonstop. If you were talking to him, and you asked him a question, any
question, especially if the question began with “why?” Joe would sing, in his
best Springsteen voice, “because: SANTA CLAUS IS COMIN’ TO TOWN!”
I mean, that could be the response to any question, any
comment, you name it. At first it was funny. And then it was a little less
funny. Then it became annoying. And after a couple more weeks, it became really annoying. But Joe didn’t stop.
Finally, it got funny again. It was just so ridiculous that we couldn’t help
ourselves—we were waiting for it. And there was no explanation for why it was
funny. You just had to know Joe. The joke worked because we knew Joe and we
loved Joe—it wasn’t funny if you didn’t know him, if you weren’t in
relationship with him.
Relationship is at the heart of this morning’s reading from
the Gospel of John, which also presents us with something ridiculous: the image
of the messiah, the King of Israel, riding on a donkey. It’s part of the story
of Jesus’ death on the cross, which made him an object for scorn and ridicule.
The idea that a savior would be crucified was ridiculous to the people who waved
palm branches and welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem.
Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem looked like a
military parade. I imagine some of you have heard this explanation before, and
it’s accurate. The parade and the palm branches on the ground were the sort of welcome
that would be given to a conquering general or a Roman governor who was coming
on a state visit. But instead of riding a great warhorse, Jesus comes on a
donkey. Instead of leading a revolt against Roman rule, Jesus meets his fate on
a cross. The people who shout “Hosanna!” on Palm Sunday also shout “Crucify!”
at the trial. And Jesus’ broken body is lifted high on a cross, to demonstrate
the power of the Roman Empire.
This story is ridiculous!
The same Jesus who could turn water into wine and raise
Lazarus from the dead couldn’t raise an army to run the Romans out of Judea.
That’s ridiculous!
The same Jesus who met the Samaritan woman at the well and
instantly knew everything about her life couldn’t avoid his own arrest and
trial. Ridiculous!
The same Jesus who could multiply a few loaves and fishes
to feed thousands somehow couldn’t get himself off of that cross. That’s ridiculous!
The crowds who greeted Jesus with shouts of “Hosanna!” and
later, “Crucify!” profoundly misunderstood Jesus and the signs—the miracles—that
he performed. The crowds sensed Jesus’ divinity, but they didn’t know what it
meant. They thought that Jesus would fulfill their earthly wishes in the same
way that Santa Claus brings presents to good little boys and girls. Even the
disciples didn’t fully understand what was going on. As the last verse of this
morning’s reading says: “His disciples did not understand these things at
first; but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had
been written of him and had been done to him.”
When I read any Bible story, I try to see where I fit into
that story. I ask the question: “in this text, who am I?” This helps me to see
where the text intersects with my life, so that I can draw a worthwhile lesson
from the story that I’ve read. I find this approach very helpful, but I always
have to remember, no matter what the story is, I’m not Jesus. I am human and I
will always fall short, so I have to
be someone else in the story. Always.
In this story, I hope I’m one of the disciples. They only
get the importance of what’s happened in this story after Jesus has been
crucified and raised from the dead; “when Jesus was glorified” the disciples
remembered Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem and they realized that Jesus
was fulfilling a prophecy from the Old Testament. But at least they got it. The
crowds never saw the victory over the Roman Empire that they wanted Jesus to
bring; God didn’t deliver them a military victory over the Romans.
I spent some time this week visiting with the family of a
man who had a series of strokes. The man is in his early forties. He’s been in
a coma for more than a week and his prognosis isn’t good. His parents are faced
with a grim decision; they will have to consider removing their son from life
support if he doesn’t improve soon.
While the parents are hoping and praying for a miracle, I
don’t think they believe it will come. I’m not sure it will, either. The
doctors have seen this process many times. They’ve seen other people with
similar strokes; some recover, some don’t. Those who recover typically show
more signs of improvement. There’s no good explanation for why this man had a
series of strokes, and in his early 40s, no less. No one can tell his parents—or
his children—why this happened.
Still, it’s human nature to look for a reason. We want God
to heal our loved ones, and when they don’t heal in the ways we want, we want
an answer. We want control, so we make up explanations. We tell people they
need to pray more or go to church more often. Some of the preachers on TV tell
their viewers that they need to give more money to their TV ministries so that
they’ll gain God’s favor.
We live in a world where people of great faith still die of
cancer or strokes or in car crashes. No amount of prayer changes the fact that
people die. Yet, that doesn’t stop us from bargaining with God or Jesus, in the
same way that kids write letters to Santa Claus, promising to be good. The
truth is, we want to make this about us, about what we do, because that gives
us the illusion that there’s a clear path out of our suffering.
The Palm Sunday story in the Gospel of John is very short—it’s
the shortest version of this story in the four Gospels; it’s only eight verses
long. For John, the entry into Jerusalem is almost an afterthought. It’s wedged
in between the raising of Lazarus, the plot to kill Jesus, and Jesus’
explanation of his coming death. It sets the story, but it’s not the whole
story—there’s more than the false triumph of Palm Sunday. And Jesus reminds the
disciples and the crowds that there will be suffering before the resurrection.
I think the crowds who waved palm branches and shouted “Hosanna!”
missed the point. They thought that Jesus would give them what they wanted—freedom
from Roman rule—rather than what they needed. Remember, the Gospel of John is
the Gospel of relationship; it is about God in direct relationship with
humanity through the physical presence of Jesus. I think they missed the point
because they weren’t fully in relationship with Jesus. And the crowds can be
forgiven for that; the disciples didn’t completely get it either; they only understood
the events after the resurrection.
There’s one other thing that sets John’s version of this
story apart from Matthew, Mark, and Luke. In all four accounts, Jesus rides
into Jerusalem on a young donkey; but only in John’s version does Jesus find
the donkey himself. This signifies that Jesus is in control of the story, even
as he makes his way toward his trial and crucifixion and death.[1] This is a reminder that
God is in charge, not us.
This is great, because it shifts the burden off of us and
onto Jesus. The truth is, we could never pray enough, never be faithful enough
or holy enough or righteous enough to overcome our own sinfulness. We can’t do
that which only Jesus can do; we can’t restore ourselves to a right
relationship with God the Father. Only Jesus can do that.
The challenge is for us to let go of our need to control
and explain all the events in our lives. This isn’t easy; we want to explain
away all the pain and suffering in our lives and in the world around us. But
the explanations we offer never hold up. The only answer that we can offer to
pain and suffering is relationship. That’s what Jesus offers us.
An invitation into a relationship is an invitation to
change. Think about it. If you participate fully and unconditionally in any
relationship with another person, you must open yourself up to being changed by
that relationship. You have to learn to see the world through that person’s
eyes. You have to accept and love that person as that person is. Sometimes you
have to change your own ways to do that. And that’s also true in our
relationships with Jesus.
There is so much suffering and brokenness in the world, yet
God rarely seems to take that away. But I believe that God is always in the
midst of that pain and suffering. Relationship alleviates some of the pain and
suffering. Sometimes relationship even motivates us to work to change things
that cause pain and suffering. That’s how we honor Jesus’ call to relationship—we
follow him into the midst of the pain and suffering, and then we offer
relationship and unconditional love. 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 today. We are
called to go forth and be instruments of God’s love and peace and love and reconciliation.
We are called to follow Jesus into the dark places and build relationships. 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]
Karoline Lewis. John: Fortress Biblical
Preaching Commentaries. Minneapolis: Fortress Press (2014), p. 169.
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