The Rev. Philip Kissick
Holy Trinity Kew
Palm Sunday 9 April 2006
Mark 11:1-11
This morning we begin the journey of Holy Week with Jesus’
triumphal procession. We dramatise the story in our liturgies by
having processions with palm branches. It sets the scene for
the drama of Holy Week; it offers hints of the challenge to
traditional understandings of Messiahship that Jesus offers; it
shows Jesus in control of what is about to happen.
But in its drama it raises some interesting questions. What sort of
Messiah is this Jesus? Is he one who will sweep all before him
and take control? How exactly does he make it all happen. At
the beginning of the story it seems very much like he is the one
who sweeps all before him and takes control - which is
precisely what the disciples and the crowds want. And yet, at
the end of the story, not that is the story of Palm Sunday but
the story of Holy Week, the reverse seems to be true. Jesus has
died on a cross and all his power, even his life, has been taken
from him. More than this, his entry on a donkey speaks not of
power but of weakness so that as Jesus enters Jerusalem the
message that this story sends are mixed.
We are caught in the web of people’s expectations, the fear
of the authorities, growing tensions between the different
players in the drama and the actual intention of Jesus in his
understanding of God’ mission. And all this is played out in the
wider political landscape of a captive people where the
leaders compromise for survival and radicals within the
community call for resistance.
The people look for someone who will lift them out of their
troubles and free them. The authorities fear that Jesus will
destabilise an already volatile environment. The radicals are
looking for a sign that he can mobilise the masses - otherwise
he is useless, or worse, a lackey of the Romans; of no use in the
struggle for freedom. At this point the Romans are
unconcerned. This is a matter of Jewish religion and nothing to
do with them so long as it doesn’t threaten public order and
the authority of Rome. Roman authority only comes into play
later, and only then when their hand is forced. In that situation
they act out of political expediency.
Into this context Jesus instructs his disciples to get a particular
donkey, which if anyone asks they are simply to say that the
Master has need of them. He then rides this donkey to the
acclamation of the crowds to the Temple Mount at which he
looks and then simply leaves.
Jesus is in control, he sets the pace and finds what he needs to
do what is required. No one else is forcing his hand. It is not the
forces of society which push him into a corner, he travels to
where he must go according to his own agenda.
In understanding the drama of Holy Week this sense of control
by Jesus is crucial. It makes it clear that what is about to
happen happens because it is within God’s plan, not because
people have taken control. One of the difficulties as we speak
of this is how we then understand what we call free will. In
terms of the story of Jesus himself the struggle of Gethsemane
highlights this. Being free to choose is not the same as being
able to do exactly what we like. We are only really free when
we choose to do those things which most truly reflect what we
believe about ourselves and the world. When we choose
otherwise we become discontented. Freedom is about
making the choices that most truly reflect the best we can be.
So Jesus choice and God’s will become one. And at this point
that choice and will are to set the pace and agenda of the
week that is about to unfold.
At this point the people welcome him with open arms. Why,
given what happens later? It seems strange that people will
at the beginning of a week welcome someone with open
arms and at the end of that same week call for his death. But
the key lies in what they expect and what they see in Jesus.
Jesus is a charismatic preacher whom they expect to bring a
quick change and improvement to their lives - to take away
the struggle. He has healed people and given them new
hope, he has made the authorities who make ordinary
peoples’ lives difficult look like fools. Perhaps in the same way
he can quickly turn their lives and world upside down and
make everything for which they dream come true.
But in the end they desert him because his way of change
involves suffering and does not take it away. At his time of trial
he doesn’t challenge these authorities. He submits to them. No
army is raised to overturn the oppressor. Life is pretty much as it
was before. For what they want Jesus seems useless so they
may as well free Barabbas who promises nothing but who they
at least understand.
But embedded in the Palm Sunday story are images which
point away from the people’s perception - the donkey which
the humble and not the mighty ride and the almost anticlimax of Jesus sim ply going away again. He has arrived. There
is plenty of time. He will not be hurried. And shortly the final
drama will commence. And in that drama the world will be
changed. In ultimate terms the humble will triumph because in
death the powerful will do all they can to Jesus. But in his
resurrection he will declare that their power is nothing against
the power of God who wills life and hope.
The problem is that to get to this point requires patience, it
requires the people to stop, to draw breath, and to wait
through the suffering for what lies beyond. The people,
however, are too impatient. They want it now, so at the end of
the week they throw Jesus aside for he is not delivering it now.
Yet Jesus still delivers that for which they ultimately long freedom to be the people of whom they dream, the people
of God.
We are now at the moment where we draw breath and
before Holy Week ask ourselves what we want from God. Our
struggles removed, or the strength to endure to a victory
which is eternal. Have we the patience not to cast Jesus aside
because the solution is a long time coming, to look at
Jerusalem and wait with him through the drama and suffering
of Holy Week and Good Friday. As we do this Easter Day
becomes the celebration of our freedom and a time of
rejoicing in seeing our greatest hopes, and even those hopes
of which we did not even dream, realized. May God grant us
the strength to stop, to wait and to listen.