Meditations For Holy Week - Palm Sunday
5 April 2020
‘Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ’. Today is the 6th Sunday in Lent, the 2nd of Christ’s Passion, and Palm Sunday.
Our first hymn is: Make Way, Make Way, for Christ the King.
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As you listen and we share in our opening prayer together, I suggest that you focus for a moment on the Palm Cross.
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Mark 11:1-11
As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two of his disciples, saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and just as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ say, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here shortly.’”
They went and found a colt outside in the street, tied at a doorway. As they untied it, some people standing there asked, “What are you doing, untying that colt?” They answered as Jesus had told them to, and the people let them go. When they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks over it, he sat on it. Many people spread their cloaks on the road, while others spread branches they had cut in the fields. Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted,
“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 heaven!”
Jesus entered Jerusalem and went into the temple courts. He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.
Our second hymn is: Ride on, ride on, in majesty.
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Everything Jesus did and said had a purpose, he wasted nothing. Here is a good example as Jesus entered Jerusalem from two small villages at the Mount of Olives, Bethphage and Bethany.
First we see that he fulfilled prophecy. In Zechariah 9 v 9 we read ‘See you King comes to you gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey’ and as the people welcome him, they shout ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’ which is a straight quote from Psalm 118 v26. We are reminded that this path was prepared for Jesus, and yet despite its agony, he was prepared to go through this for us.
Second we see that he rode in publicly. He came to Jerusalem to die, and he wanted everyone to know it. We read he often withdrew to quiet places, a lot of his parables, teaching, and miracles were performed with his disciples, or with groups of people from Capernaum, or a multitude of poor Galileans. But now when he came to die, he wanted it to be known by the world. Jerusalem was full of pilgrims from all over the world, come to share in the Feast of Passover, where they celebrated being set free from the burden placed on them by a foreign power, in that case Egypt, now they looked forward to the Messiah setting them free from another foreign power in this case Rome. Riding in as he did, everyone in Jerusalem would have known it, and be talking about him.
Third as he rode in we see his poverty. We read in the gospels that he had nowhere to lay his head, nowhere he could call his own, when he crossed the sea of Galilee it was in a borrowed boat. When he was laid to rest after his death it was in a borrowed tomb. Here we read that he had to borrow the colt to ride on, and his disciples had to throw their cloaks over its back as there was no saddle. The Son of God gave up his riches, and became poor, that we, poor as we are, may become rich through him.
He did not look for power, or control, or prestige, yet it was his right and he could have demanded it. He came as our Saviour, but rode in, and was proclaimed by the crowds, as their King. The crowds were looking for a means by which to get rid of the Romans, and this Jesus, this prophet from Nazareth, looked like the ideal candidate. I wonder what are we looking for this Easter from Jesus, a means to have power and control, perhaps a means of getting prestige, or do we humbly seek to worship him as Saviour and God. We are reminded that Jesus came on Palm Sunday as King, but as we move towards Easter we are quickly reminded that his real role was as Suffering Servant. How well do we associate with that?
We come now again to our Father in prayer…
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Our final hymn is: All glory laud and honour
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