When I say that Palm Sunday is challenging, I'm not talking about the complications of the liturgy or the added length of the service. What makes Palm Sunday so difficult is the huge contradiction it holds up to us, one we cannot escape if we are paying any attention at all. I’m sure you sensed it this morning. This contradiction comes into focus when we compare the two readings from Mark’s Gospel. At the beginning of worship, we heard the story of Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem, which we then re-enacted in the procession of the palms. By this symbolic, ritual action, we assumed the part of the crowd, proclaiming Jesus to be our king, our Messiah. Then, just a moment ago, we re-enacted the second story in our dramatic reading of the Passion Gospel. Again, we became the crowd – but this time we turned into an angry mob howling, "Crucify him!"
If we weren't just going through the liturgical motions, if we were really engaged with what we were doing, then we should all be feeling pretty queasy right about now. Because there is a jarring contrast between the jubilation of the welcoming crowd and its bitterness and resentment outside Pilate's headquarters. The purpose of our ritual re-enactment is to allow ourselves to see ourselves in both of these crowds, and having seen, to own up to the truth. And, the truth is, we did not just play those crowds, we are those crowds. Our own relationships with Christ reflect the same contradiction. That is the challenge, and therein lies the opportunity.
In the course of everyday life, we welcome Christ one minute and reject him the next, seemingly unconscious of the contradiction. We say that we follow him, when in fact, by our resistance to love, we drive him before us through the streets of the city to Golgotha…"the place of the skull". There is something profoundly disconcerting when a Christian emerges from worship, moments after receiving the Body and Blood of Christ, and speaks with intense and profane loathing about homosexuals. Equally disconcerting, however, was my own rapid move toward judgment in response to what I heard. Both of us banished the Christ we had just shared.
We style ourselves a “Christian nation”, yet as a political, business and consumer culture, we seem oblivious to Jesus warning that we cannot serve both God and money. Sometimes it seems that the question, “What Would Jesus Do?” feels more comfortable on a wristband than in a debate about capital punishment or the national budget.
As we face our trials and turmoil, we are right there with the crowd, welcoming Jesus into the city, crying "Hosanna"…(which means "God help us"). But when it become inconvenient or costly for us to accept the help he offers and follow his teachings and embody his life in our lives, then our cry turns to “Crucify him!”
Technically, the season of Lent ended yesterday. But the process of truth-telling and sin purging does not end - Palm Sunday just kicks it into high gear. Palm Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week, a time of growing intensity and momentum toward the cross. Lent and Palm Sunday set us up for the searing truth of Good Friday - that because of people just like us…no, forget that…because of us, God's Messiah had to die.
This truth would be immobilizing, except for one thing; by this enormous spiritual failure of humankind, the pathway out is revealed. For all that we reject him, Christ does not reject us. For all that we allowed hate to overcome us, Christ acts with love. And love will be victorious. Our Holy Week liturgies, our readings, our personal disciplines help us to identify with that part, too, and emerge more able to hold onto it through the challenges of life.
Some of you have heard this story before, but it bears retelling. It’s about something that really happened one Palm Sunday, in some other congregation. As I re-tell this story, I will ask you to close your eyes and imagine that it is happening here, today…to us. What is your response? What do you do?
We gather out-side and process into the church, waving our palms, proclaiming our allegiance to our Messiah and king. Inside, we find a man dressed as Judas Iscariot (the one who betrayed Christ), with hammer and nails, constructing a wooden cross right in the center aisle. We have to step around him and over his work in order to get to our places. Judas continues his work throughout the service – sawing and hammering during the hymns, the sermon, the prayers, the confession, the passing of the peace, even the consecration of the bread and wine. On your way back from communion, Judas offers you his hammer and nails, inviting you to help him finish the cross. Many of you do so, some weeping, some raging inside, allowing yourselves to feel the anguish of this great contradiction; that we so often betray the one who is faithful unto death. And, to our shame, these betrayals are often over the smallest things.
The priest who planned this service says this was the most disturbing liturgy he ever attended. One parishioner, a mature Christian, a good friend and a strong supporter of Tom's ministry, came to him after the service and said, "Please don't ever do that again." In Tom's words, "it cut too close." I'm telling you this story because I don't have the guts to try something like this in our Palm Sunday worship…I don't have the liturgical courage to disturb you in this way, to risk the distaste or even outrage that might result. But, even if I, I'm not sure I would willingly open myself to such a devastating encounter with my own contradictions. And, yet, if Holy Week is have any significance, if Easter is to mean anything at all, beyond a bunch of pious talk, then we must find a way to do just that.
“The opportunity to find deeper powers within ourselves comes when life seems most challenging.” We will leave here this morning, still trying to absorb the lessons of this most challenging day, only to be thrust into the intensity of Holy Week. Let's remember that what makes it holy is not some sense of proper piety or dignified solemnity. The Holy is not safely contained in our rituals…it is unleashed. It is not comfortable but discomfiting. The Holy can be (and often is) awful, disturbing and terrifying, because if we allow ourselves to experience it fully, it confronts us fully with the central contradiction of our life of faith; our deep ambivalence about God's place in our lives. The paradox of this holy season is that when we fully engage with this disturbing reality, we are then finally open enough that God can bring about our deepest healing. AMEN.