Palm Sunday 24

Intro

Palm Sunday is the beginning of what the church calendar calls Holy Week.

It begins with Jesus entrance into Jerusalem and ends with his resurrection, one week from today.

It is a celebration that we enact and apply into our lives over and over. For the last 2000 years.

Why?

Why does it matter to us today that Jesus entered into Jerusalem on a donkey?

Why does it matter that the crowds followed Him and yelled Hosanna after Him?

It matters because in that moment we get a picture of reality, something that we can tune our hearts and our minds to.

It matters because all of us, in some form or other, is halfway

Halfway never feels like victory. Because halfway is always incomplete. We are all halfway into something. We likely have all arrived this morning either incapable or unable to call victory in much of anything.

halway feels unresolved. There is a tension. Like the fellowship of the rings in the mines of Moria after it seems like Gandalf has lost to the balrog. Or Han Solo in carbonite. This is halfway. Some of us feel halfway this morning.

Halway is usually tempting to respond to try harder. Or give up. We have a room full of us who are teetering on workaholism or teetering on giving everything up.

We don’t fully understand the weight of that which is finished, or complete, or victorious.

When we are pulled toward trying harder or giving up, we need a stronger gravity, we need something to help us in our half wayedness

There is a gravitational pull to this event.

Christ Himself is the center of all things. He is ultimately the center of you, of me, of the earth.

Colossians 1:17 ESV

And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

All things ultimately bend toward Jesus, either in salvation or judgement.

And we get a sense of that in this passage today.

Let’s begin at the end. Let’s look at the end of the passage, the center of gravity, and work our way out.

we find that the God who leads us into Jerusalem and to the cross will just as much lead us (through halfway) to resurrection

Because, as with all things, it matters where you look. Getting into Holy week, it can be easy to miss. And it’s important that we pay attention.

Christ is Victorious through Every Broken thing Because He holds all things together

Mark 11:9–10 ESV

And those who went before and those who followed were shouting, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David! Hosanna in the highest!”

Let’s look at what is happening in this passage. There is a large crowd that gathers and celebrates Jesus. They call Him all sorts of things

Hosanna

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord

Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David

Hosanna in the highest.

These are statements of complete and total victory. The people making these statements aren’t just yelling nonsense. They are making claims about who Jesus is and what His role is.

They are enacting a roman triumphal procession.

This parade would have been normal when the Roman emperor or a high ranking official would have entered into a city. They would enter through the main gates, sitting on the most regal horse, with their army and their plunder behind them.

It wasn’t a statement of possible victory. It was a statement of completed victory.

They are not making comparisons or telling stories. By enacting this, they are very specifically stating that Jesus is the messiah who has entered Jerusalem, bringing victory to the people.

It is one of the most public statements about the reality of the Messiah and what He came to do.

The role of what Christ is doing is important here. If this idea of Christ as Hosanna, is central, then we can understand everything else from it. If Christ is sustaining all things, then not only does the Triumphal entry makes sense, but everything else makes sense.

And Christ is using the statement of power for the day to show that His victory doesn’t come through the power of that day.

Jesus is on His way toward suffering and death. Ultimately though, resurrection.

And the disciples are proclaiming that through suffering and death. Through obedience to the Father, lies victory.

A funny and odd victory

But it seems like a funny, odd kind of victory.

There is a kind of funny interaction that happens in the beginning of this passage.

Jesus tells the disciples to go and find a colt (a donkey that has never been ridden) and bring it to him. He gives instructions that they are going to go into town, find a colt tied up and then if anyone asks them what they are doing, they are just supposed to say, “the Lord needs it. He will give it back.”

So they do it and they get the donkey.

Mark 11:2–6 ESV

and said to them, “Go into the village in front of you, and immediately as you enter it you will find a colt tied, on which no one has ever sat. Untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ say, ‘The Lord has need of it and will send it back here immediately.’ ” And they went away and found a colt tied at a door outside in the street, and they untied it. And some of those standing there said to them, “What are you doing, untying the colt?” And they told them what Jesus had said, and they let them go.

Why a donkey?

A donkey represented the humility of the king who would bring salvation. An emperor or a Caesar would find the best horse, one that towered above everyone else.

But Jesus finds the donkey that has not been ridden. He almost does the opposite of what has been the norm. He overturns the victorious parade saying that the true king would enter in humbly, with the people, on a donkey. Not having to lord over us. Christ acts on our behalf but this image shows that He doesn’t boast over us.

In His humility, the extent of His humanness, he enters into our world, and plays by our rules. He has all power but gives it up in going the cross, showing that victory is not found in exerting force but in humble obedience to God.

Christ sustains all things, all power is His, and yet He rode a donkey to declare that He would win.

The disciples can proclaim the victory of Christ, not because they have figured everything out, but because He has.

Victory through the cross will always look differently than the world presents.

The Triumphal entry is a counter cultural view of what true victory looks like.

Christ uses the image of power to break our understanding of power.

He shows that through the donkey and through the crowds.

And we need to be reminded of that because we often look at the donkey, and say, “how?” or we look at the cross and we wonder. We see these things that look strange to us and we wonder what could be made of them

All of creation is in agreement with this moment. Even donkeys are listening. Even stones are crying out.

But it’s easy to look and see the folly of this moment. The rabbi on a donkey, moving toward being killed through a commoners death.

We do this all the time. We look at the world around us, and ask questions about where God is and what is God doing.

We look at the world around us and ask that question

We look at our lives and the absurdity or folly of it, our circumstances or otherwise and think, God couldn’t possibly.

But when we do that, when we ask that and when that crosses our minds or even our lips, we have to go back to this moment, when we recognize that Christ doesn’t bring victory through our means, in fact He uses the simplistic things, He uses folly to accomplish His victory.

there will be times in our lives that feel like folly. That do not feel like victory, that are silent or broken. And it is easy in those times to choose figuring it out on our own vs faith.

But it is right in those moments, when we are gifted with the opportunity to not lean on our own understanding and to, in the middle of the folly, or confusion, or donkeys or palms or stones crying out, to cry victory in Christ. To proclaim that against every odd, He beat sin and death and is doing that very work in our lives this morning.

Let’s close by looking at the Apostle Paul’s cry for victory

2 Corinthians 4:16–18 ESV

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

The very things that seem to be breaking and not working are reminders that God is still renewing.

This morning look at the folly, the donkey, the brokeness, and declare that Christ has come to bring victory through broken things.

It is through donkeys and stones and missed timing that we see that Christ is bringing all things together

Remember Leonard Cohen’s lyrics in the song, Anthem

Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That's how the light gets in.

Christ brings victory through every broken thing. We will see that this morning in communion and on our way to the Cross.