Sunday, April 14, 2019

"God's Revolution of Love." An Introductory Meditation on the Palm and Passion Sunday scripture texts.



"God's Revolution of Love"

An Introductory Meditation on Palm and Passion Sunday"

Luke 19:28-40; Luke 22 & 23


            A few minutes ago, we heard the story how Jesus entered into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey on that first Palm Sunday, in a dramatic act of subversive political theater. Jesus enters into Jerusalem like a king, challenging the authority of every earthly kind and even of Caesar himself.[1]
            Can you imagine what this must have been like for Jesus’ disciples? Jesus had told them what to expect. Three times he had said plainly, “We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. He will be delivered over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him, and spit on him. They will flog him and kill him. On the third day, he will rise again.” But I doubt they understood fully what they would witness later in the week.
            There are layers of subversion in today’s scripture readings. Psalm 118 is a psalm of Passover, of escape from slavery. It’s a psalm of liberation from oppression. It celebrates God’s empowerment of people who were once exploited and dehumanized. It praises the complete upending of power structures that enrich a dominant ruler or class at the expense of those who are exploited and marginalized.[2]
        The crowd comes out joyfully to meet Jesus, strewing their palm branches and spreading their cloaks on the road. They pour into the street to welcome their king, riding on a young donkey—a beast of burden.     
             On the other side of the city there was another parade.  Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of the region, was entering the city with his cavalry and foot soldiers, as he did every Passover.   There was often trouble in Jerusalem around the time of the Passover—a festival that celebrated the Jewish people’s liberation from an earlier empire, when Moses led them out of Egypt.   So, the governor brought in extra troops to reinforce the troops that were permanently stationed near the Temple, as a show of power and force.          
            The story of Palm Sunday, as Luke tells it, draws on Old Testament prophecies to show Jesus as a messianic king. Six centuries earlier, the prophet Zechariah had proclaimed a messianic vision of a king like David returning to the throne in Jerusalem, and Luke uses this imagery in describing Jesus’ procession into Jerusalem.  Zechariah says, “Lo, your king comes to you, triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.[3]  
            The people would have recognized this imagery. So, when Jesus came riding into Jerusalem, it must have felt to the peasants in the crowd as though they were on the threshold of an exciting new era. By entering Jerusalem in this way, Jesus claims to be the legitimate king.  This is a counter-demonstration that challenges the authority of imperial rule over Jerusalem.
            In Zechariah’s prophecy, the new king would banish war from the land— no more chariots, war-horses, or military weapons.  Jesus’s procession deliberately countered what was happening on the other side of the city.
            Pilate’s procession embodied the power, glory, and violence of the empire that ruled the world, the Roman Empire that exercised power through military domination, using the cutting-edge military technologies of the day.
            Jesus’s procession embodied an alternative vision-- the kingdom of God.  His victory will be won through humility and nonviolence and love. Jesus’ humble claim to a peaceful kingship was radically counter-cultural. It was politically subversive. This contrast— between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Caesar— is central to the gospel story--   to the story of Jesus and the early church.
            Jesus enters the city and proceeds to the Temple. Now, in that time, the Temple wasn’t just a religious center, but also the place where Judean society interfaced with the Roman Empire. As Robert Williamson points out, it was the job of the chief priests to collect taxes as tribute for Rome and to keep Judea functioning smoothly as a loyal Roman province.  “Through the Temple, religious elites kept the Empire operating smoothly. They provided a theological rationale for the political and economic domination of the Roman Empire, which enriched the upper classes at the expense of the poor.”[4]
            According to Luke’s Gospel, Jesus returned to the Temple on the following day to overturn the tables and cast out the money changers, protesting the Temple’s collaboration with an Empire that enriched the few and oppressed the many.
            In a few moments, we are going to hear the story of Christ's Passion, as told by Luke.  Today and this Holy Week, may we be startled and challenged into seeing God’s Reign afresh, as the subversive, empire-challenging reality that it is.
            Following Jesus on the way of the cross, we need to choose. Will we collaborate with the Empire?  Or will we choose to participate fully in God’s revolution of love, which promises abundant life for all?  If we see injustice and evil in the world around us, will we walk the way of humility and non-violence and love to resist the that injustice, trusting in God’s abundance and faithfulness?
            The good news we hear in the Holy Week story is that God emptied God's self for the sake of every beloved creature, including you and me-- because it's God's very nature to love us that radically.  We know what God's love is like by seeing it in the self-emptying servanthood and humility and self-giving on the cross! 
            So, let us go there and be with our Lord in his suffering and in his triumph.  See his great love for you...   and renew your great love for Him.
            Listen for the good news:
At this point, we heard the story of Christ’s Passion, as told by Luke the Evangelist, in chapters 22 and 23. http://bible.oremus.org/?passage=Luke+22


Rev. Fran Hayes, Pastor
Littlefield Presbyterian Church
Dearborn, Michigan
April 14, 2019



[1] David Lose, Palm / Passion Sunday A.  http://www.davidlose.net/2017/04/palmpassion-sunday-a/

[2] Lindsey Paris-Lopez, “Coronation Before Crucifixion: The Ominious, Subversive Politics of Palm Sunday.” https://www.ravenfoundation.org/coronation-before-crucifixion-the-ominous-subversive-politics-of-palm-sunday-gvbs-year-c/



[3] Zechariah 9:9

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