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We have just re-enacted, in an orderly Anglican way, the Triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. The basic story of Palm Sunday is familiar to us from our annual liturgy of the palms, but the real meaning of it has been hidden from us. When I looked at the prayerbooks of the Episcopal Church, I was astonished to discover that all of them, going back to the 1789 prayerbook, omit the story of the triumphal entry, and instead, ask us to read the story of Jesus’ crucifixion on Palm Sunday. At the time of the Reformation in the 16th century, the Church of England decided that on the “Sunday before Easter” we would read only the Passion Gospel, as we call it. This means that not even the oldest Episcopalians among us, nor their grandparents, have ever heard a Palm Sunday sermon on the triumphal entry. It was only with the 1979 prayerbook that a Liturgy of the Palms was added, and the name of the Sunday before Easter was officially called “Palm Sunday”. Last fall, about 30 of us were reading and discussing the book God and Empire by John Dominic Crosson. We learned two crucial things from that book: first, we learned what the real context was for the palm procession. Second, we learned why the crowds who greeted Jesus with joy on Sunday, shouted for him to be crucified on Friday. As we talked, we realized that our Holy Week services did not help us understand what happened on Good Friday, because we jumped over the events that happened on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of that week, directly to the arrest of Jesus. This year, for the first time, we begin today reading what happened, in the order in which they happened, during Jesus’ last week. This is the reason we have prepared those Retreat Kits for you: we want everyone in the parish to read and meditate, each day, on the events of that day in Jesus’ life. This year, we are going to follow Jesus step by step. Let us turn our attention now to the Triumphal Entry, and to the context in which it happened. At the time of Jesus, there were probably about 40,000 inhabitants of Jerusalem. Three times a year, Jewish pilgrims came from far and near to celebrant the three great festivals. Scholars estimate that for Passover, this may have been as many as 200,000 visitors streaming into Jerusalem. Because there was so much resentment of Roman rule, the gathering of such a large crowd in Jerusalem was always a matter of concern for the Roman governor, so he came to Jerusalem also with a large contingent of soldiers. It is important to know that the Roman governor had the center of his administration not in Jerusalem, but in the new Roman city of Caesarea Maritima, built by King Herod on the coast, about 100 miles northwest of Jerusalem. That location gave the Roman governor immediate access to ships coming from, and going to Rome; and as a newly built city, probably it had few Jewish inhabitants. Therefore in the midst of the Jews coming into Jerusalem during that week before Passover, came a whole procession from the west, of Roman legionaries, some on foot and some on horses, fully armed with helmets, shields and weapons. At the head of the procession was Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Idumea, Samaria, and Judea, riding in a splendid chariot surrounded by his personal guards, and by others carrying banners and golden eagles on poles. The message of that procession proclaimed that the Empire of Rome was supreme, and that the Emperor Tiberius was the Son of God. It was staged precisely as a Triumphal Entry: it was both a claim to authority, and a warning against resistance. No doubt pilgrims traveling the same road, were pushed aside, and had to wait in the dust while the column of soldiers marched by. Whether that other entry into Jerusalem from the east, occurred on the same day, we have no way of knowing. But since the Romans came three times a year with their legionaries, Jesus and all the Jews would have known they were coming and perhaps when they were coming. I tell you all this because there is every reason to believe that Jesus carefully planned his entry into Jerusalem: it was not a spontaneous event. Jesus was approaching Jerusalem from Jericho on the main road that went up the Mount of Olives to a town called Bethphage. There he stopped, and instructed two disciples to go on to the next village of Bethany, to collect a donkey and a colt. Remember that Jesus was well-known in Bethany, and notice as well that there was an exchange of passwords. Jesus told the disciples that if the owners of the animals challenged them, they were to say, the Lord needs them. Equally important are the references to Psalm 118, which is one of the 6 psalms traditionally chanted at Passover. This psalm is the praise of a king for the victory God has given him over his enemies. It tells how the king returns to Jerusalem, singing praise to God, coming through the gates of the city, coming up to the Temple, accompanied by people who bring branches up to the altar! Since St. Matthew tells us that Jesus is riding on the donkey to fulfill the prophecy of Zechariah, that “your king is coming to you mounted on a donkey”, it is fair to assume that Jesus planned his procession as an enactment of the prophecy and the psalm. In verse 21 of Psalm 118, the Hebrew word for salvation is nearly the same word as Jeshua (Jesus), and likewise the cry “Hosanna” comes from the same root word. The crowds around Jesus shouted the words of the Psalm: “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” (verse 26), and they carried branches, as described in verse 27 of the psalm. So Jesus was presenting a direct and deliberate challenge in his triumphal entry, but what was he intending to accomplish? I believe the challenge was both to the Roman empire, and to the Temple authorities: the chief priests, scribes and the Pharisees. I think the challenge was intended to shake up all the Jews who had come for Passover, by presenting them with an alternative vision of God’s presence. To the Romans, and to the Jewish collaborators with Rome, Jesus was saying, all your military might and your strong-arm control of your empire will fail sooner or later. What endures is the presence of God with his people. To the Temple authorities, Jesus was saying, you have put your faith and your hope in this Temple and your sacrifices, rather than in God; you are failed shepherds, who have led the people astray. And to all the pilgrims, Jesus was saying, remember the prophecies: the anointed descendant of David will not come to you in glory, but in humility ~~ riding a donkey, without soldiers or weapons, because this king will come to create peace. The second half of Zechariah’s prophecy says, “He (the King) will cut off the chariot . . . the war horse . . . and the battle bow . . . and he shall command peace to the nations” (Zech 9:10) What was Jesus intending to accomplish? Certainly he was intending to present a choice to all the Jews gathered to celebrate Passover. In classic prophetic style, he hoped to turn their hearts to God’s way, more by his actions than by his words. Even though it seems the ordinary people were with him, I wonder if he expected his challenge to succeed? He knew that people in positions of power, are generally reluctant to give it up. The fact that his disciples remember three separate times when he predicted his suffering and death, says to me that he expected he was riding to his death. Why didn’t he make an effort to avoid death? The traditional answer to these questions, is that Jesus was taking the punishment for our sins. He was without sin, so he did not deserve to die, but he was substituting himself for us. Although this statement of how Jesus saves, is enshrined in our hymns and prayers, there are several problems with it. First, Jesus never spoke about God requiring punishment for sin; in fact, when Jesus spoke about sin, his emphasis was on the forgiveness of sins. Second, Jesus did not share the preoccupation of the Pharisees with ritual purity, keeping holy things separate from ordinary secular things. In fact, we know of many instances when he simply ignored the rules of purity, yet the whole sacrificial system of the Temple was tied up with purity. If the ordinary sacrifices for sins offered at the Temple were of no importance, why would Jesus offer himself as a sacrifice? And most important of all, Jesus lived in a completely different kind of relationship with the Father, which was not based on obedience to the law, but rather was based on the love which he received from Abba, and the love he gave to Abba. If one were to try to describe the God of Jesus, it would have to be in terms of that good shepherd searching for the one lost sheep, and like that father running out to welcome the prodigal son. Jesus was urgently, by word and deed, telling people not to put their trust in the use of power, whether it be military or political or economic power. He was telling them not to trust in social status, or family connections, or even religious institutions. He was inviting them to seek God’s presence in himself and in his simple ministry of forgiving sins, healing illness, and revealing the presence of Spirit. No wonder the ordinary people loved him. No wonder the leaders were threatened by him. Therefore, I invite you to accompany Jesus this week, remembering each day the things he said and did which offended some people, and delighted others. Make this a week in which you search for your own answers, while you meditate on what he did, and how others responded to his actions. To help you in this process, our Worship committee has prepared the Retreat Kits you see in front of the altar. After you have come to the altar rail for communion or a blessing, I invite you to take one of the kits with you as you return to your seat. There are a few with very large print: they have red yarn tied on the handle: please don’t take one of these unless you normally need large print. In the name of Jesus, the Son of Man,
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