Matthew 21:1-11
April 5, 2020
The irony of
reading scripture today that tells the story of a parade and a large, large
gathering of people is not lost on me. We could not be living through a time
that is more opposite than the one being described in our gospel lesson. In fact,
as I read this familiar story again this week, it was hard for me not to be
uncomfortable as I thought about all of these people lining the road, so close
together. All those germy germs being passed around. All those unseen organisms
being shared. As I read it, I really wanted to shout back through time and
declare to them,
“You need to keep at least 6 feet
apart! Social distancing, people! Social distancing!”
Since the beginning of this
pandemic, people in different venues have been proclaiming that this was the
Lentenest Lent people have ever experienced. Forget giving up chocolate or ice
cream or fasting from social media, it feels like we’ve given up everything!
But if this was the Lentenest Lent, then surely this will be the Holiest Holy
week we’ve ever experienced as well.
This is the week when Jesus will
drive money changers and profit makers out of the temple. This is the week when
Jesus will run head on into confrontation with the powers that be. This is the
week when he will be betrayed by one of his own. This is the week where his
time in the wilderness, fasting, praying, preparing, being tempted will come to
its fruition. This is the week when everything that he has been trying to teach
to the disciples will come to pass. This is the week where he will meet a
prophet’s fate and a criminal’s execution. Holy does not equate to happy. In so
many ways, this holy week will be a terrible, awful, sad, dispiriting and
heartbreaking week. And for us, with the threat of this virus still raging, and
so much of the future – I mean the future as in the next minute – completely
uncertain, I suspect that this will indeed be the holiest holy week we have ever
experienced.
And it all begins with an unlikely
parade.
That is the event that we mark this
day. That is the parade that we read about and preach and reflect on. An
unlikely parade.
I say the word unlikely, but in some
ways, it was anything but. In particular, Matthew’s telling of the story lifts
up the elements of this event that were foretold in the prophets. Jesus was
well aware of the scriptures, and he knew what he was doing. He knew what his
entry on a donkey and her colt would bring to mind, how it would look and how
it would be interpreted by the people around him. In many ways, Jesus staged
this event. When I say “staged,” I don’t mean that Jesus was being mercenary or
manipulative. I think he was trying to drive home a point, the same point that
he had been making all along. I am the one that you have been told about for so
long. I am here. I am he.
And the crowds seem to get it – at
first. They quickly created their version of a red carpet. Some lay their
cloaks down on the ground, and others cut leafy branches from the trees and
laid those down before him. And all along the route, the cries were heard from
the people who went ahead of him and the people who followed behind him,
“Hosanna to the Son of David!
Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest
heaven!”
Hosanna, a word from Aramaic meaning
“Save us.” Hosanna – save us! Save us, Son of David! Save us, O one who comes
in the name of the Lord! Save us!
You would think that all of
Jerusalem would be thrilled at the throng of folks headed into the city. But
the opposite was true. This parade, this strange and even somewhat crude
procession into Jerusalem, the holy city, was greeted not with banners flying and
accolades and shouts of welcome. This procession had the whole city of
Jerusalem in turmoil. The word that we translate into turmoil is from
the Greek seio. Our English word, seismic comes from that Greek
root.
Seismic, as in earthquake. Seismic
as in ground shaking and rolling and roiling and undulating. The whole city of
Jerusalem was shaking. The people were trembling and quaking. Earthquakes, for
those of us who have experienced them, are unlike any of the other natural
phenomena. They are loud and shaking and quaking and unnerving. They have the
potential to cause a great deal of damage and certainly a whole lot of turmoil.
So did Jesus.
The crowds who processed with him
were shouting, Hosanna, save us! But I don’t believe they fully understood what
they were asking for. Jesus was coming to save them, true. But his salvation
would shake things up, just like an earthquake. It would cause great turmoil to
those who saw him as a threat. It would turn the world upside down. Jesus would
not be the Messiah they expected. He would be the Messiah they needed. But many
of them could not or would not see it that way.
Those crowds, those fickle crowds,
who threw their cloaks and branches before him, would also be the crowds who
shouted,
“Crucify him!”
Jesus would shake up their whole
world, but not in the way they wanted or expected, and they would turn – turn
on him. Judas was not the only one to betray him.
As we walk into this holiest of holy
weeks, many of us are mourning what we are not doing this day. There is no
procession of palms with our children. There is no greeting one another with
hugs and handshakes. There is no gathering together for what lies ahead. And
next week, next Sunday, Easter Sunday, will be more of the same.
We know what its like to have our
world turned upside down, don’t we? I suspect that virus or not virus, many of
us already knew what it’s like to have our world turned upside down and fallen
apart. Life turns our worlds on their heads over and over again, but this
particular shaking is happening on a global scale. And some of us may feel as
these weeks of isolation continue, along with everything else that is missing,
that God is missing as well. It may feel as though God is absent. It may seem
that God has left us to our own sad and inadequate devices.
But the reason the week ahead is
proclaimed Holy is because God was and is most definitely in our lives. It’s
called Holy not because we say it is, but because God made it holy. Holy is not
sweetness and light. Holy is not tranquil. Holy shakes things up. Holy turns
our lives, our world on their heads. Jesus came into Jerusalem and the whole
city trembled and shook because I think they knew that with his entry, nothing
would ever be the same. And it wasn’t, it truly wasn’t. Thanks be to God.
So even though we are afraid and
anxious and wondering when and how all of this will end, we also trust – we
must trust – that God is with us. God is with us in these uncertain and anxious
days. God is leading us into this week, this holy week, and calling us to
follow and to have faith. So we will. We will follow. We will go forward,
together in spirit if not in body, and we will trust.
In this holiest of holy weeks, we will
trust that we are not cut off from our God. We will trust that God will stay
with us through the betrayal of Maundy Thursday and the darkness of Good
Friday. We will trust that Resurrection will come on the other side.
Amen and amen.
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