Palm
Sunday 4-14-19
Grace to you and peace from God our father and from our
Lord and savior Jesus our king, Amen.
This is it. We made it. Holy Week: This week is what the
forty days of Lent have been leading up to, the most important week of the
church calendar. We are about to enter a week where bread and wine become
Jesus’s body and blood, and where an instrument of torture and death becomes
the means by which we are rescued from death.
This week begins with a parade. Jesus comes down the road
into Jerusalem, like kings of old, riding a colt and surrounded by his
disciples laying their cloaks before him like a royal procession. They are
filled with “Lauds” for all the deeds of power that they had seen Jesus do –
for the healings, the feeding of over five thousand people, the casting out
demons, calming a storm and raising a widow’s son – feats so astounding that
Jesus’ followers can’t help being Loud for the Lord: “Blessed is the king who
comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest
heaven!”
Now, the last time we heard those same
words was back in December, over 4 months ago - when the sky was filled with a
multitude of the heavenly host, appearing to shepherds late at night. These
poor shepherds witnessed the first proclamation of the good news of
great joy for all the people, the birth of a savior, a messiah,
the Lord. That night, the sky was filled with the
shouts of angels: ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace
among those whom God favors!” As we learned during one of our “Eat, Pray,
Learn” nights, this kind of Good News was reserved only for royalty such as Emperors
and Caesars. The Emperor was worshiped as a son of the gods. And so for the
angels to make this claim about Jesus – a baby born in poverty and not a palace
– was news to turn everything they knew about the world upside-down.
Fast forward to today, Palm Sunday, and this time people,
not angels are joyfully shouting Jesus’ praises. But not everyone. The Pharisees, too, have seen
these deeds of power that Jesus has done, and they are concerned. And they were absolutely RIGHT. They know exactly what
this means: treason.
Remember that the Jewish people at this time were under
the oppressive thumb of Rome, who ruled with an iron hand and tolerated no
rivals. The Roman Empire claimed everything for themselves – your time, energy,
property, money.
After Jesus’ grand entrance into Jerusalem, the scribes
and the chief priests decide the best way to get rid of Jesus would be to get
him into trouble with the Romans. They use this question about taxes to trick
Jesus, because this is one of those questions where there is no “right” answer.
If Jesus says yes, pay taxes, then he would be validating Roman oppression and
violence against his own people, and his followers would probably desert him. But if he said NOT to pay taxes, then he will
be in big trouble.
 |
| image of the Empire |
Fortunately, Jesus was on to them. He does what he does
best, confounding the religious elite and showing them up yet again. Jesus
actually used the trick to trick them.
The coin he had them bring has the emperor’s face imprinted on it, much like our
coins have the pictures of presidents. Because this coin had the face of the
emperor on it (like this fake coin I have), and the Emperor was worshiped by
the Romans as a god… therefore, coins were considered by the Jewish people to
be idols. Iffy at best for the use of everyday commerce, but definitely not
allowed in the Temple of the Lord…. So those trying to trick Jesus should not
have had these coins on them in the first place. That they produced a coin for
Jesus so easily clearly reveals THEIR hypocrisy. They got a far different
answer than they bargained for. The joke is on THEM.
 |
| Images of God (photo credit M. Russo) |
Give to Caesar that which is stamped with his name and
image – all the trappings of empire and power. And give to God that which bears God’s
image. Take a look around, because that is US. For the weeks of Lent, we have
been singing as our offering plates – with our president’s image bearing money
comes forward – we have been singing: “Oh my heart, imprint your image, blessed
Jesus king of grace… let the clear inscription be: Jesus Crucified for me.” The true offering isn’t what’s in the
plates. It’s what’s out there in the pews.
When you were born, you
were created in God’s image. And when you were baptized, you were named and
claimed, “child of God.” God doesn’t just want part of you. God wants everything that
you are and everything that God has created you to be.
When the scribes and the chief priests figured out this
is what Jesus was saying, they were shocked into silence. They
became silent as stones.
After all, Jesus says, “If these were silent, the stones
would shout out.” Thanks to Jesus, we
might need to rethink that old phrase, “dumber than a box of rocks.” Stones,
boulders, rocks, and pebbles are all on standby to pick up where the everyone
leave off.
The stones probably knew, as we all know, that the time
was very near that the praises for Jesus would go silent, and
the crowds instead would cry out for his death. They probably
knew that his disciples would be silent from heavy sleep as
Jesus prayed alone in the Garden of Gethsemane, before they all ran away,
leaving the faithful women at the foot of the cross, weeping and wailing in
grief.
The stones might see what Jesus’s disciples cannot – that
this king does not go into Jerusalem to set up a peace that is
like that of Rome, a peace brought by might and sword and taxes. This King
doesn’t enter the holy city to set himself up as
RULER, but to give himself up as
SACRIFICE. As Paul wrote, the one who in the form of God and had equality with
God empties himself and becomes obedient – even so far as death on a cross.
And this is what Holy Week is all about. Up is down and
down is up. Stones would shout when we are silent. Men run away in fear, and
women take their place at Jesus’ side. This king that we welcome, we then
abandon and reject. We embrace peace that is not actually peace. "Our hearts of
flesh become like hearts like stone, silent in the face of evil days and evil
deeds." (Bonhoeffer)
Still. There is clearly a place in the story, in
this most holy of week, for stones.
Stones can still be called upon to praise Jesus for
showing us what the glory of God looks like in the flesh. You can write things
on stones, like “Jesus crucified for me.” A stone sealed the tomb where Jesus
lay after his death, but stones of tombs can be rolled away to
make room for the power of resurrection and new life. The stone that the
builders reject can become the cornerstone, the
very source of our faith. Hearts of stone - like ours - can be gathered
together into spiritual house around that cornerstone,
gathered and loved by their creator.
Jesus describes himself as the cornerstone to same
Pharisees who would continue to reject him. And Peter, our favorite “loud mouth”
disciple, the same who denied Jesus three times, his very names means “Rock” or
stone. And this rock – Peter - would later write about
Jesus as a living rock, a living stone, rejected by mortals yet chosen and
precious in God’s sight. He says that we are God’s own people, living stones,
stones that are at the same time dead and alive.
In Holy week, down is up and up is down. Flesh and blood
bear the image of God. Hearts of stone come back to life. We who have hearts of
stone cry “hosanna” and “crucify.” We who would not show mercy, have received
it. Despite our willingness to turn away from God, God will never turn away
from us, and will go all the way to death and back in order to prove it.
No comments:
Post a Comment