Isaiah 50:4-9a
Philippians 2:5-11
Luke 22:39 – 23:56

God be in my words and in my speaking; God be in our hearts and in our understanding. Amen.

When I was a kid, I was always a bit confused by Palm Sunday. It seemed, to my unsophisticated and overactive self, to be more fun than Easter, since we got to march around the church with palms, and even after the procession was over, we could spend the rest of the service poking siblings or otherwise fiddling with officially sanctioned props. Easter — at least, Church-Easter, which even as a child I understood had very little to do with bunnies, jellybeans, and chocolate eggs — Easter was much more solemn, and generally involved some kind of fancy, new, (and inevitably uncomfortable) dressy outfit.

But even for adults, liturgically, Palm Sunday is still somewhat confused. There’s the celebration of the Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, which we re-enact in our own formalized way; but the readings and the Passion story move us straight on to the bleak events of Good Friday, so that even the Eucharist (which we will celebrate in a few minutes) is more somber, evoking — more strongly than usual — the Last Supper. It’s as though the whole of the Holy Week observances are compressed into this service, and we’re left to contemplate the Crucifixion and death of Jesus for the whole long week, as though Jesus were already in his tomb, instead of simply moving — deliberately and inexorably — toward it.

So what does a preacher do with that? There’s so much, in the familiar Passion story, that it’s an almost overwhelming task to address it all. This year, though, I found myself struck by an exchange in the account of Jesus’ triumphal entry. Luke sets the scene: the nearly riotously enthusiastic crowd, mobbing Jesus and crying out joyfully, with extravagant praise for God, and subversive titles for Jesus: “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in highest heaven!” And some of the Pharisees object; “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.” But Jesus responds: “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”

What an interesting thing to say. It’s certainly a theme, a metaphor, in the Psalms and the writings of the prophets, that the inanimate created world praises God. We even have Paul, in his letter to the Christians at Philippi, writing about how God “highly exalted him…so that…every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” But for Jesus to say, essentially, that if human voices are prevented from crying praise, then creation itself would provide the chorus, sounds as though he is affirming that he is, indeed, the Messiah, the Anointed One — the blessed king who comes in the name of the Lord.

Of course, we know that; and Paul knew that. But we Christians read all of Scripture from a place beyond the Resurrection, looking back through it and subsequent events. Remember, though, that up until this point in the story, up until the moment when he entered Jerusalem, Jesus had been careful — even wary — of accepting the mantle of the Messiah, as though he knew that his understanding of his calling and the crowd’s expectations of the Messiah were at significant variance.

I have no doubt that Jesus knew how dangerous it was, how rash and risky it was, to enter Jerusalem in such a showy and theologically loaded manner. Jesus was aware, even if the disciples weren’t, that the powers and principalities in control of Roman-occupied Palestine were not safe to rile; political theater could (and did) turn deadly very, very easily, and protests (and protestors) had scant legal recourse. Coming into Jerusalem decked out in theologically significant symbols, at the head of an exuberant mob, was something that neither the Roman overlords nor the collaborating local religious and political leaders could allow to pass. But Jesus did it anyway. Neither in ignorance, nor in naïveté, but knowing and accepting the risks, Jesus laid himself open to the will of God. Jesus understood, as some of the prophets before him understood, that God’s favor wasn’t a guarantee of safety. It wasn’t that it was safe for Jesus to enter Jerusalem as the Messiah because God would never let anything really terrible happen to the Divinely Chosen one. Jesus knew, even then, that there wouldn’t be legions of angels dispatched to rescue him from the power of the authorities, and the self-protective fear and rage of the mob. He knew, like Isaiah before him, that God could grant great responsibility, and yet, still not intervene to remove consequences. As Isaiah wrote: “The Lord GOD has given me the tongue of a teacher, that I may know how to sustain the weary with a word. Morning by morning he wakens— wakens my ear to listen as those who are taught. The Lord GOD has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious, I did not turn backward.
I gave my back to those who struck me, and my cheeks to those who pulled out the beard; I did not hide my face from insult and spitting.” Even those beloved of God suffer. Jesus had no illusions, even if (perhaps) the disciples didn’t entirely understand.

So what does this have to say to us, today? We try to be good people, to take Christ as our model and guide; but do we really understand how much of a risk it is, to open oneself entirely to the uncompromising will of God? Jesus opened himself up to God, more completely than any other human being before or since; but God didn’t protect him from the consequences of his actions. Doing the right thing, whether in ancient Palestine or in modern Vermont, does not guarantee a comfortable outcome.

In his letter to the Philippians, Paul writes: “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross.” In Christ Jesus, God became human, one of us; a creature, subjected to the ills and indignities of life, just as each one of us is. And, as a human being, with free will and ample opportunities to choose differently, Jesus remained faithful to the will of God, even though it required him to be vulnerable, to be betrayed, to suffer, and to die a shameful and horrific death. Yet, Paul says — to the Philippians and to us — “Let the same mind be in you…” Understand the demands God may make, and accept them, anyway. Do the right thing; stand up for what you believe in; open yourself to the ungentle power of God. You may suffer. Doing the right thing, following Christ, being faithful to God’s will doesn’t mean that everything will work out in some safe and comfortable way. But trust that, no matter what the consequences, God is with you. In the portion of Psalm 31 we read this morning, the Psalmist says: “I am the scorn of all my adversaries, a horror to my neighbors, an object of dread to my acquaintances; those who see me in the street flee from me. I have passed out of mind like one who is dead; I have become like a broken vessel. … But I trust in you, O LORD; I say, ‘You are my God.’”
We know better than to believe that the outward circumstances of our lives reflect the quality of our relationship with God; we know better than to think that illness, or injury, or pain, earthquake, or fire, or flood, poverty, or unemployment, or loss, are evidence of a person’s particular sinfulness. We know better than to imagine that success and happiness and comfort indicate that someone is especially beloved of God. But even though we know better, those attitudes creep in, sometimes. We want, so much, to be able to control our outward circumstances; we want, so much, for there to be reasons — for suffering, for joy — that we can understand. The myth our culture promulgates — that we can and do control our reality — seems so much more appealing than the randomness of suffering, and the lack of guaranteed results for particular courses of action. God has great power; but that power is Love, and Love cannot be compelled, or coerced, or earned. Love is always a risk. The Beloved may love you back, or betray you. The very people Jesus loved cried “Hosanna!” when he came into Jerusalem, and “Crucify!” a few days later. But we know, looking back through the Resurrection — and through the subsequent world-changing history of Christianity — that Jesus was right to love, right to risk, right to follow God. His actions were vindicated, although he was not rescued. There was no last-minute reprieve, no release from the ordeal. “Father, I place my life in your hands,” he said, and then breathed his last — he did not plead, or rage, or despair; he stayed open to God, trusting in God, through it all.

It is my prayer, this Holy Week and always, that we will find in our own hearts and spirits the strength to love as God loves, to follow where Christ leads, and to open ourselves fearlessly to the Spirit’s unexpected inspiration.

In the Name of Christ, AMEN.

Sermon preached by Beth Hilgartner at St. Barnabas’, Norwich, Vt.