Sermon for Passion Sunday

Sermon for Palm sunday at Our Savior's Lutheran Church, Albany MN

Texts:
Matthew 21:1-11
Philippians 2:5-11
Matthew 27:11-54

+INI+

Jerusalem is not a big place, even today. In Jesus’ time it was about 1/3 mile square surrounded by walls. (City of Albany = 2.25 sq miles!) And it was PACKED with people, there for the Passover Feast.

And in the center of it all was the Great Temple. The Temple was where God had promised to dwell, a place where all people of all nations could find goodness and mercy, hope and life.

So, the city was filled with excitement and tension. The religious authorities were keeping an eye on the crowd. The Romans were watching, too.

Into this scene comes this – Parade? Demonstration? Bit of street theater? We need to read this right.

To proclaim someone as “the Son of David who comes in the name of the Lord!” means the Messiah has come. Jesus is proclaimed as the One who has shown up in the Capital City to establish the Kingdom of God’s Servant David once again, once and for all!

Hosanna in the highest heaven!” is a call of salvation – save us from our enemies!

Cutting down palm branches was done when an insurgency under Judas Maccabaeus had driven off the last pagan occupation army 170 years before.

Centuries before they had laid coats before victorious King Josiah.

Even the donkey – far from being the sign of humility we might see – was a sign of kingly office. David had ridden to his coronation on a donkey.

+++

“So, who is this,” a bystander asks? “Jesus, the Prophet from Nazareth.”

“A prophet, yes, but more then a prophet.” Not just any prophet!

Wandering, wonder-working, messiahs were a dime a dozen!

But the Messiah had a job to do – throw off the oppression of Rome and reestablish the Kingdom of David.

Roman took exception. If David’s kingdom was coming back that means the Roman kingdom was leaving and that was not going to happen.

So all these messiah candidates died and their followers went home. The powers that control this world as it is saw to that.

Yet we, 2000 years later, are going to spend this week in church reading ourselves back into the scene – standing on the street corner, as it were, as the bystander who asks, “Who is this?”

We will be in the Upper Room to see Jesus wash the feet of reluctant, enthusiastic, brave, fearful Peter.

We will see him take the ancient ritual of Seder – the Passover Meal – and open it up as meal for the world.

We will see the crowd that this day shouted, “Hosanna! Save us!” now shout, “Give us Barabbas!”

We will see Pilate loss control of the situation and cave in to public pressure.

We will see Jesus crucified as a danger to the established order of Church and State – “One man dying to save the Nation” as Caiaphas and the Council had planned.

We will see him mocked and humiliated. We will hear him cry out in the voice of great psalm of Lament – “My God! Why have you forsaken me?”

And we will hear the officer in charge of the execution detail give his judgment – this was righteous man. Just one more innocent victim of power.

+++

“Who is this?” Well, that is the question, isn’t it? And it is a question that no one can answer for another.

Mathew, Mark, Luke and John wrote their Gospels to share with us the answer they had come to. I can share the answer I have come to. But my answer can never be your answer.

This is what I believe – what I am persuaded of.

Jesus is the hope of the world – the one who has brought peace between God and creation, opening up the possibility of peace among all people of the world.

I believe, with Paul, that the name of Jesus has the power to gather all nations and tribes to him.

If you were to ask me “Who is this?” that is what I would answer.

So, I ask again – Who is this, to you? Who is this Prophet from Nazareth called Jesus?

I’d love to hear your answers. They will be different as you grow through life. That answer that made sense to me as a 8^th Grade confirmation student we not adequate as a new father in my 20’s, and those answers are not adequate now.

And it is a more urgent question then it might seem. Here is why…

When Jesus dies, Mathew tells us, the curtain in the Great Temple was turn apart from top to bottom.

This huge woven fabric was decorated with the stars of the night sky.

Only the High Priest went beyond it, once a year, into the presence of God, with the blood of the sacrifice for the people’s sins on his hands, to plead for forgiveness.

They would tie a rope round his ankle so that, if he should be struck dead by the Presence, they could safely drag his body out.

And now that temple curtain was torn apart. What do you think that means?

That we can now get to God? Well yes. But it that is all there is to it God is still safely hidden away.

Let me suggest a more wonderful and frightening possibility.

Now God’s Presence is loss in the world. The God of Goodness and Mercy chasing us down!

I invite you, this week, especially, to make yourself an easy target.