Passion Play

Mark 11:1-11 (Palms)

Mark 15:1-30 (Passion)

A Sermon by the Reverend Odette Lockwood-Stewart

Today is Palm Sunday, the first day of Holy Week for Christians.  It was the day that Jesus came into Jerusalem on Passover, the most holy week for Jews.  The Palm Sunday story is of joy and anticipation, hope and expectation.  Jesus arrives to the people’s shouts of “Hosanna” -- “Save us now!”

One of the worst children’s sermons I ever heard was on Palm Sunday and was told by a pastor I know in Los Angeles.  The service had begun with the children taking part in a procession, waving palms, the adults in the congregation sang, and smiled, and obviously enjoyed the children’s arrival.  Then, for his time with the children, this pastor had the children bring their palms, and wave them again and cheer. Then he told them that it was just like when Jesus first came into the city … how people cheered and waved palms and treated Jesus like a king.  Then this pastor said, “That was on Sunday, but by Friday, the same people were mad at Jesus and shouted that he should be put to death.”

There are a lot of ways to deal with the intense progression from Palm Sunday Praise to Good Friday Crucifixion … but somehow I don’t think setting up this expectation that people who cheer for you just may turn around and kill you is on the right track,… particularly when you’re dealing with children.

The fact is, two processions entered Jerusalem on the same day:  from the East, Jesus came riding a colt from the Mount of Olives surrounded by crowds of poor people shouting “Save us now!”  From the west came Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor riding at the head of an imperial army. 

Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan describe these two processions and the question they raise in their wonderful new book, The Last Week: A Day By Day Account of Jesus’s Final Week In Jerusalem, which some of you have been reading. They write: Jesus’s procession proclaimed the kingdom of God; Pilate’s proclaimed the power of empire.  The two processions embody the central conflict of the week that led to Jesus’s crucifixion.

People shouting “Help us, now!” sought release from an order of things that was destroying lives … an order of things that protected privilege and punished the powerless … an order of things that centralized wealth and control of the land …an order that stood in opposition to the light and life-giving promise of the Way of Jesus, riding in humble defiance into the city on a colt.  

The procession of Pontius Pilate was the procession of the world order of power and might.  Matthew’s version of this same story ends with an evocative exchange.  As the people were shouting “Hosanna … Save us now” some of the representatives of the existing order said to Jesus, “Order your followers to stop.”  To which Jesus replied, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”

The cry for justice is inevitable … the movement of life toward light is unstoppable … the passion to heal what is broken, to reconcile what is estranged, to make whole that which is broken … will not be denied.

Viewed in this way, the passion of Holy Week beginning with Palm Sunday isn’t about individuals liking Jesus … and then not liking Jesus.  It’s not about people suddenly turning against Jesus … it’s not even about individual wrongdoers being in power, it is about the collision of the world’s system of power and wealth and the God’s system of the power of love.

The Way of Jesus placed a disruptive question mark over everything about “the way things are.”  Everything that was assumed had to be reexamined.  Everything that caused or reinforced divisions or domination had to be challenged.

The imperial procession from the west marched in with the assurance that might made right, and with the assumption that might possessed sufficient power to destroy any resistance.

The imperial procession didn’t like the teacher on the colt who did not bow to their power, nor sit still for their assumptions.

The imperial procession, -- perhaps above all, -- claimed to have the power to define “the way things are.”  To control all the sound bytes … to determine the “spin,” write the headlines and compose the fine print. To frame reality.

And then Jesus … teaching, healing, challenging, loving, questioning Jesus … threatened to shine a new light that would expose “the way things are” as the smoke and mirrors it was and is.

What is “the way things are?”  How do we describe, understand, current reality?  Do we accept and justify the inevitability of “the way things are” in this world? Or do we cry out “Save us, now!” and abandon the way things are for The Way?

We could justify the way things are by saying that the way things are is what God intends.

We could justify the way things are by saying that the way things are is about science, reason, politics, the real world of power and technology and economics and is not relevant to God’s kingdom, to Jesus, to the life of the Spirit.

We could justify the way things are by saying that this way things are is inevitable, and that we do not have the power to do anything about it anyway, that faith cannot move mountains.

We could justify the way things are  by hiding inside, in the future, in an Ipod, in a gated life and community, in a soul.

We could justify the way things are by claiming “evil ones” who are in power, in our past, in other pews, are to blame.

But Jesus challenges our justifications as surely as he challenges injustice or inequity entrenched in the current reality.

Crossan and Borg write that “only the empire crucified, and for only one crime: denial of imperial authority.” (p. 28)

Jesus, who rode into Jerusalem to cries of “Save us now!” or “Help us, please” had to have been absolutely clear that the Way he proclaimed, and embodied denied the authority of empire in every way that mattered.

He looked at the empire’s coins and said “Give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s … but to God the things that are God’s.”  He turned over money-changers’ tables in the temple and announced that life inside religious community could never be business as usual when people outside were treated unjustly.  Jesus took water from a Samaritan woman and lived his witness that boundaries of nationality or gender could not stand.

Jesus rode into the city on a colt surrounded by the poor – his very being announcing that there is another way … a better way … than what we resignedly think of as “the way things are.”

Make no mistake, Jesus challenged the way things were and they crucified him.  But, as we know, that’s not the whole story.

Last week we sang the folk hymn “Lord of the Dance” … with its wonderful reminder of the last word that rises up victorious … “I danced on a Friday when the sky turned black.  It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back.  They buried my body and they thought I’d gone.  But I am the dance and I still go on.”

Today is Palm Sunday, but it is also called Passion Sunday.  Our scripture reading this morning was voices of the palms and passion for the whole week.  We combine Palm and Passion Sunday because many folk do not attend worship during Holy Week, and therefore move from Palms to Resurrection without the Passion. 

I hope you will enter the Passion Play.  I hope consider entering the Biblical stories of Holy Week in new ways with Dr. Andrea Bieler at tonight’s Lenten supper program.  I hope that you will be here on Holy Thursday evening for communion and the full story of Jesus’ passion.  I hope that you will take Good Friday as religious holiday and attend worship at dawn or at noon or read and reflect.  I hope you will prepare yourself for resurrection on Easter Sunday.

Crossan and Borg describe two processions into Jerusalem and proclaim that Palm Sunday’s question is “which procession are we in?”  We all have at least one foot in the imperial procession.  We benefit … even unaware… or we acquiesce … or we justify….or we resign ourselves …  we are a part of “the way things are.”

But the carpenter from Nazareth … with loving actions, healing touches, challenging words, self-giving solidarity … shows us … invites us … calls us … to follow The Way, to join the Dance, to enter the Passion Play … to join the procession that embraces and embodies new realities … Here and now.

Yesterday more than 500 people gathered here to celebrate the life of our beloved friend and prophet, Mary Gaddis.  Hanging over the chancel was a metal sign Mary had made that had the words “I soar.”  The story of the sign is a wonderful witness to the power of renaming and renewing and reclaiming, reframing reality.  It seems that years ago when Mary’s construction project on her house in Holy City was moving along, and one particularly combative neighbor complained that the mess accompanying her work was an “eyesore.”   Mary’s transformative witness responded to the accusation “eyesore” with her own defiant affirmation … “I soar.”

“The way things are” awaits transformation, resurrection … salvation …  And people who pay attention always will shout out … “Hosanna, Hosanna … Save us now!”

Jesus rides into the city again … waiting to see what we’ll do this time!