Palm Sunday; Matthew’s
Passion Narrative; St. Paul’s, 4/5/2020
Jim Melnyk: “An
Uncomfortable Story”
Today the sermon acts as an introduction to the Passion Narrative rather than as a response. We are about to hear the story once again – Matthew’s take
on the Passion of our Lord. It’s not a pretty story. There’s a certain amount
of ugliness about it. It is not a comforting story. And although as Christians
we believe it has a glorious outcome, we don’t have permission to read it all
the way to the end today. The story ends with the grave. And although we will
offer our prayers for the spiritual reception of our Lord’s body and blood this
morning, the way our gospel story ends today, and the hymns we choose to sing
today, temper the glory of Christ’s spiritual presence.
My former Church History professor, Don Armentrout, used to call
this Sunday “a strange day” because “it has two names, two themes, [and] mixed
moods.”[1] It’s
been known as both Passion Sunday and Palm Sunday. But I’m thinking perhaps a
better name for this day might be Paradox
Sunday because of the extreme shifts in both tenor and tempo. This Paradox Sunday underscores the
contradictory realities of the kingdoms of this world and the Kingdom of God –
a kingdom “in which the least are the greatest, weakness is strength, and death
brings life to all.”[2]
Paradox Sunday serves as an entry way into Holy Week – a week where, as theologian
Jürgen Moltmann once proclaimed, “God weeps with us so that we may someday
laugh” with God.[3]
The paradoxical nature of the day is heightened by the two
parades we bear witness to in our liturgy. The first parade was acknowledged by
the blessing of palms and the proclamations of “hosanna” – which means “save
us.” We recalled Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem through streets crowded with those
who proclaim Jesus as the “One who comes in the name of the Lord.”But the gospel which we’re about to hear reminds us of a
second parade – one that will take place before the week is out. We call it
“the Way of the Cross.” It is a death march to a lonely hill outside the city
of Jerusalem – a place where under darkened skies Jesus will breathe his last. In
truth it is paradox – it is irony – it is scandalous – that the Messiah of God
would die in such a cruel and torturous way.
Even the opening parade is paradoxical. We call it Jesus’
“Triumphal Entry” into Jerusalem, and many Christians proclaim it as a
fulfillment of an ancient prediction; but that causes us to lose the symbolic
power of the event. Theologian Marcus Borg challenges us to see this parade in
a different light.
The so-called Triumphal Entry was actually a prophetic act
by Jesus, “based on a passage from the prophets that spoke of a humble king who
would enter Jerusalem on the colt of a donkey. He would be a king of peace,”
Borg tells us, “who would banish chariots, warhorses, and battle bows from the
land and command peace to the nations. By riding into Jerusalem on a young donkey,”
writes Borg, “Jesus enacts his message: the kingdom of God of which [Jesus]
speaks is a kingdom of peace,”[4] justice,
and compassion rather than a kingdom of violence and military might.
It seems to me that the paradoxical nature of Palm Sunday
and Holy Week is troubling for many of us. Jesus’ gospel message of justice,
grace, and love resonates with us. It’s the Good News we want to experience and
know for ourselves and for our world, not the evil of Good Friday. The ugliness
of the crucifixion chills us. And the revolutionary, anti-imperial entry of
Jesus into Jerusalem works for us as long as the demonstration doesn’t touch a
part of our lives that is sacred to us. However, it’s when the revolutionary
aspect of the gospel challenges how we live in this world that the message becomes
uncomfortable – disquieting – perhaps even something to be discounted or
ignored.
“What do I need to be saved from anyway?” we may ask. “What’s
so wrong with my life that I should need to be saved? Isn’t that just the
language of all those evangelical Christians who like to beat us over the head
with their Bibles?” Perhaps that’s one of the reasons why many of us gathered
together online this day may not make it back for the theologically and
personally challenging liturgies of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday.
Listen to the story once again with fresh ears. Listen with
fresh ears to the call for God’s kingdom – God’s community of justice, peace,
and love. Listen with fresh ears for the revolutionary challenge inherent in
that call by Jesus. Listen once again to the reality of brokenness in the human
condition. Take time to read the longer version of the Passion narrative and
see how familiar and perhaps even comfortable the challenges of Herod, Caiaphas
and Pilate might sound. Do their mutterings not sound at least a bit familiar?
Listen to the story with the knowledge that the Herods, the
High Priests, and the Pilates of this world don’t have the last say. Our
brokenness, and the brokenness of the world, doesn’t have the last say. The Coronavirus,
as overwhelming as it seems to so many right now, doesn’t have the last say. Death
– even the violent death of an innocent man – doesn’t have the last say.
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