Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday Isaiah 50:4-9a Mark 15:1-47

Good morning, on this day known in Protestant churches as “The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday”.  Our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters call it simply Passion Sunday.  Strange to be having two Gospel readings, which take us from Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, all the way to Golgotha, but that is what this Sunday does.

We understand why it is Palm Sunday, but when we think of Passion and then, perhaps, of passionate, it is usually love stories come to mind.  But The word “passion” comes from the Late Latin word “passionem”, which means “enduring and suffering".  For us, on this day, though Jesus’ Passion is also part of a love story, our Savior’s suffering, begins.  This is the beginning of Holy Week.

Of course, when we old folks were children, today was joyful.  It was only Palm Sunday back then, and it meant another one of those wonderful Sundays when we were given something we could take home with us. The closest we came to understanding what the palms meant could be found in the third verse of the hymn, “Tell Me the Story of Jesus”.  Remember that one?  It goes like this:

Into the city I’d follow the children’s band,Waving a branch of a palm tree high in my hand;One of His heralds, yes, I would singLoudest hosannas, “Jesus is King!”

For us who can remember way back, Passion Sunday was last week, the 5th Sunday of Lent, and this Sunday was only about the palms, about Jesus triumphal entry into Jerusalem.  Around 1962, the change in our church services came about.  People were less and less likely to show up in church each night during Holy Week, less likely to spend time in church on Good Friday, and so it was important to include what we used to think of as our Good Friday readings into our Sunday celebration.  

So, lest we forget the solemnity of this upcoming week, today our Gospel readings leave Palm Sunday and continue into a much darker theme.  We are carried rapidly past the entry into Jerusalem, and then it is the brutality endured by our Lord that takes center stage.

But let’s begin first with the joy of Palm Sunday.  For a moment, let us allow our imaginations to lead us back in time, to when this was just Palm Sunday, and even farther back, as Jesus tells His friends to go and fetch the donkey.  They must have wondered what He was up to now.  A donkey?  What can He be planning? 

Jesus chooses to ride into town on a young colt, the foal of a donkey.  Imagine a large and friendly dog, about three feet tall at the shoulder. That’s comparable to what He rode in on.  And if this isn’t an odd enough image, think how His entry compares to the Roman processions with which the people of His time were well acquainted.  Certainly, Jesus was well acquainted with these processions, and most likely had them in the back of His mind as He entered Jerusalem.

Rome really loved a procession. Rome excelled at using a military parade as a demonstration of its dominance, to keep its subjugated peasants in awe. And Jesus knew that Pilate, the Roman Governor, made a point of riding from his capital city on the Mediterranean coast every Passover, to make sure these crowds of peasants in Jerusalem stayed in line.  While Jesus’ little street parade, with the donkey and the palm fronds, appears to be a spontaneous action on His part, others point out that it can be seen as an anti-imperial protest.  He’s mocking the empty pomp of the empire, questioning the brutality with which Rome ruled the peasant class and kept Judea impoverished.

Jesus rides in and reclaims Jerusalem.  In His last recorded public act before everything changes, an act of both love and humble defiance, Jesus is still pointing out the way people take advantage of other people, how the strong oppress the poor, how ridiculous the pomp and ceremony of the world really is.  He doesn’t speak about it this time; He simply portrays it in His entrance into the city.  But in the end, His parade was not about what humans could do. This was about what God would do.  Did we care about all this when we were children, or was it just about the joyful singing and the palms?  As adults, do we care today?

And now, our morning service moves on, to a different Gospel reading, to the horrible story of Jesus betrayal and death.  A Cross is a terrible place to die.  To ponder Jesus’ death for us upon the Cross, is a frightening and terrible Mystery.  On this day, today, friends betray Him.  There is no healing in the garden of Gethsemane – just nameless, mindless violence.  We want to turn away from violence and horror, from war and cruelty, from lynchings, from killings of minorities, of women, of LGBTQ+ people, but today, for a moment, we are meant to realize Jesus suffered such violence, and that He did it for us, in our stead.

Our Lord, the Fully Human One, the Holy One, the Incarnate One, the Son knew. He knew what was coming, what would happen.  They pierced His hands and His feet.  They cast lots for His clothing.  And - in all of it there was never even one moment where He couldn’t have ended it – leaving us to be what we had become – unconscious, and so much less than what we were intended to be.  And yet…He did not regard equality with God something to be grasped at.  Rather he emptied himself ... and humbled himself becoming obedient...even to death on a Cross.

The women and few friends who stood nearby as Jesus died; they did not understand.  The crowds that had jeered did not understand.  As for us, mostly we still don’t get it.  We are too proud, too human to understand.

We bless the palms – the symbol of our lives in our hands.  We raise them up so that God might see; but then we are meant to pray that we may also have the courage to lay them down – lay down our lives given over to our Lord.  We like the palms, the joy, the parade, but humility remembers that nothing - nothing of import ever begins with us – it begins with God, and with that horrific death, suffered for us, on the cross. 

Crucify Him!  In todays’ Gospel there is no echo of “It is accomplished”; no “you will be with me”.  There is only the darkness; only tragedy; only sadness.  The Veil is rent and only a Centurion bears witness to the Truth.  Truly, this man was the Son of God.  This is the Passion of our Lord.

Let us pray:

Show me that scene in the garden, of bitter pain; Show me the cross where my Savior for me was slain; Sad ones or bright ones, so that they be stories of Jesus—tell them to me. And help me to listen with true humility that my heart may understand.  In Jesus Name. Amen.