Palm/Passion Sunday – 04042020A
This is always such a TOUGH DAY. I totally get it! Some people STAY AWAY INTENTIONALLY!
Those “same people” would never worship with us on GOOD FRIDAY, either!
It is too GORY. Too HEAVY. Too REAL.
Too SAD. Too DARK. Not at all LIGHT-HEARTED!
We want NICE.
We want ANTISEPTIC, STERILE, and CLEAN. (Especially today!)
People loved “PALM SUNDAY!” They were RIDING HIGH!
Lots of HIGH FIVES and KUDOS all the way around!
It was a “feel good” kind of day!
Jesus and his ENTOURAGE finally had made it to the “BIG TIME!” And, on to the “BIG STAGE, at that!” Greeted like ROCK STARS, they were!
Surrounded by FAME and WELL WISHES. IDOLIZED!
Everybody likes to jump on “that BANDWAGON” as long as it is headed toward the “PROMISED LAND.”
WHY, if you can MAKE IT in JERUSALEM…you can MAKE IT ANYWHERE!
Nothing spells SUCCESS like being GREETED by the MULTITUDES of YOUR people on PALM SUNDAY!
CLOTHES and LEAFY BRANCHES strewn everywhere! Music, Merriment, Dancing in the streets, EXCITEMENT being everywhere and filling the air. It was ELECTRIFYING! It was MORE than amazing. People laughing, singing and having a good time! Talk about “good vibes and feel good moments!” This was it! There was only “ONE WAY” and that was UP, baby!
Yep, they were “riding high,” alright. But that was THEN. “Passion Sunday” is a DIFFERENT STORY!
That was Jesus, the twelve, and a very specific group of well-wishers.
It was Passover Time and “THE CITY” and the “surrounding cities and villages” were overflowing with “teeming groups of pilgrims.”
The PILGRIMS would have come from “far and wide,” from Galilee and all the surrounding country sides. These would have been HIS PEOPLE…the poor people from the “boonies, the backwoods, the hills, the bumpkins.
You know, the agrarian people and the common everyday fishermen…making their way to THE BIG CITY from their small little fishing villages and from the tiny, small plots of land they had eked out their lives on.
These would have been the masses that Jesus would have spoken to, healed, fed and taught. And now they found themselves in the rather reserved and sophisticated city of the JERUSALEM ELITE.
They were galaxies a part these two worlds.
Dirty, filthy, smelly peasants and aristocracy side by side, neither having very much in common with the other. That is save for the fact they were all Jews, the children of Abraham.
But later there were other crowds that would appear. These crowds would have been staged, arranged and almost hand selected. These would not have been the bumpkins at all.
This other group would have consisted of the Roman collaborators. “THEY” who were making money off the Roman occupation.
This group was called the “Judean Authorities” …these were the knowledgeable, the informed, the elites of Jerusalem.
The Roman occupiers allowed them to be “Authorities” on the ONE CONDITION that they kept the PEACE among their own people and collected TAXES for their hated occupiers. They were paid well and given much respect by the Romans.
The High Priest, the chief priests, the scribes and the Jewish Elders of the Sanhedrin were among the collaborators. It was indeed an elite group of men.
“To win the day, their way,” they were known for doing WHATEVER WAS NECESSARY to achieve THEIR goals.
Cheating, corruption, stealth, bribery, utilizing false witnesses, inciting the crowds, public shaming, mocking and hurling false accusations was all par for the course.
YOU DID – WHAT YOU HAD TO DO! And you NEVER look back. These would have been “THE CROWDS” who gathered on GOOD FRIDAY.
These would be the MEN who had ACCESS to PONTIUS PILATE and who could arrange a TRIAL at a moment’s notice.
THESE were the Jerusalem ELITE…the rich, the powerful and the MEN of HONOR.
And Jesus of Nazareth, from Galilee, had picked the wrong fight, with the WRONG GROUP OF MEN.
Because “these men” held ALL THE POWER with the POWER that was ROME to back them up!
Hosanna, indeed. Amen.