by Rev. Canon David B. Tabo-oy
Then they threw their cloaks over the animal and helped Jesus get on. v36As he rode on, people spread their cloaks on the road.
v37When he came near Jerusalem, at the place where the road went down the Mount of Olives, the large crowd of his disciples began to thank God and praise him in loud voices for all the great things that they had seen: v38″God bless the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory to God!” v39Then some of the Pharisees in the crowd spoke to Jesus. “Teacher,” they said, “command your disciples to be quiet!”
v40Jesus answered, “I tell you that if they keep quiet, the stones themselves will start shouting.”
Read: Luke 19:28-40
This Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week. It is also called Palm Sunday commemorating the triumphal entry of Jesus in Jerusalem. This day starts the passion of Christ, a remembrance of his last seven days on earth as recorded by the gospels. The journey that begins today is not a long one in terms of distance. Calvary, the place of crucifixion, stands just outside Jerusalem. But every moment of this week will widen the gap between acceptance and rejection. Each succeeding day will leave Jesus with fewer supporters and make their voices less audible amid the growing clamor of the opposition. By week’s end, the leaders who see Jesus as a threat to their power and who want to be rid of him will have their way, and Jesus’ allies will be frightened into silence. But that is not the end of that journey. More than triumphant than his entry to Jerusalem is the glorious victory accomplished seven days later.
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We must always remember that Jesus’ kingdom comes through suffering and the cross. And this is what people don’t like. People want a man of action. The people want a man who leads an army into Jerusalem and defeats the Romans, chasing them all the way back to Rome. When the people realize that their King is not the king they were expecting, they turn on him. He was just another disappointment. Just another unfulfilled promise. This is what Holy Week was about to the people who lived it firsthand. It was unbridled expectation met with staggering defeat and disappointment.
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But the events of this week established a New Kingdom. The events of this week shatter bondage, liberates captives, gives sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, heals the afflicted, and gives good news to the poor. It is this week that a King executes himself for the crimes of his murderous subjects. It is this week that Jerusalem will get a descendant of David, who is wiser than Solomon, to rule from David’s throne. It is this week that Jerusalem will get a new High Priest. And it is this week that all of us will be set free from the oppression of the Enemy, who hates God’s people.
It is a new covenant, established by blood, offered in humility by a High Priest and King who liberates the captives and establishes peace.
“Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming of our father David’s kingdom! Hosanna highest heaven!”
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Seven days changed the world. These seven days have been the topic of a million of publications, countless debates, and thousands of films. These seven days have inspired the greatest painters, the most skilled architects, and the most gifted musicians. To try and calculate the cultural impact of these seven days is impossible. But harder still would be an attempt to account for the lives of men and women who have been transformed by them. And yet these seven days as they played out in Jerusalem were of little significance to anyone but a few people involved. What happened on those seven days? During the next seven Sundays of Lent and Easter we will look at these seven days in depth but for now let’s summarize:
1. On Sunday the first of the seven days, Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey to the shouts of Hosanna, fulfilling an old prophecy in Zechariah 9:9.
2. On Monday he walked into the Jerusalem Temple overturning tables where money exchange occurred, Roman drachmas were being exchanged for Jewish shekels. Roman coins were not allowed. The image of Caesar was a violation of the second commandment. But the Temple authorities were using the Commandment as means to cheat the people and making the Temple a place of profit rather than a place of prayer.
3. On Tuesday Jesus taught in parables, warned the people against the Pharisees, and predicted the destruction of the Temple.
4. On Wednesday, the fourth day, we know nothing. The Gospel writers are silent. Perhaps it was a day of rest for him and his weary and worried disciples.
5. On Thursday, in an upper room, Jesus celebrated the Passover meal with his disciples. But he gave it a new meaning. No longer would his followers remember the Exodus from Egypt in the breaking of bread. They would remember his broken body and shed blood. Later that evening in the Garden of Gethsemane he agonized in prayer at what lay ahead for him.
6. On Friday, the fifth day, following betrayal, arrest, imprisonment, desertion, false trials, denial, condemnation, beatings and sentencing, Jesus carried his own cross to “The Place of the Skull,” where he was crucified with two other prisoners.
7. On Saturday, Jesus lay dead in a tomb bought by a rich man named Joseph.
8. On Sunday, his Passion was over, the stone had been rolled away. Jesus was alive. He appeared to Mary, to Peter, to two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and to the 11 disciples gathered in a locked room. His resurrection was established as a fact.
Back then these seven days were called Passover, as it is still called today by the Jews. Christians around the world know these seven days as Holy Week, the Passion of the Christ. (“His Triumphal Entry”, www.sermons.com)
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The drama of Palm Sunday involves Christians in a journey they have to take, uncomfortable though it may be. Christians have to arrive at the cross in order to get beyond it. Christians have to see themselves among the bystanders in order to understand their participation with them. Christians have to see how God transforms the cross from an instrument of death into a symbol of eternal life.
Palm Sunday is the day when Christ proclaimed his victory over the hostile forces opposed to him. He faced these forces armed only with power of self-giving love, but that was enough. Let this Palm Sunday onward be an opportunity for us to be good disciples by following that spirit of triumphal entry. Let our hearts be the city of Jerusalem welcoming Jesus every moment of our lives with the welcoming streamers: “HOSANNA! BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD. HOSANNA IN THE HIGHEST!
Let us pray.
Almighty and everlasting God, who, of thy tender love
towards mankind, hast sent thy Son our Savior Jesus Christ
to take upon him our flesh, and to suffer death upon the
cross, that all mankind should follow the example of his
great humility: Mercifully grant that we may both follow the
example of his patience, and also be made partakers of his
resurrection; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who
liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God,
for ever and ever. Amen.
