Palm Sunday

Mike Bowler

Readings Psalm 118: 1-2, 19-29 Mark 11:1-11

We have heard this morning from Mark’s gospel the story known as the Triumphal Entry. A story that we are probably very familiar with. The story of Jesus’s arrival into Jerusalem, riding a donkey, to the praise of shouting crowds, cloaks laid on the ground and waving of palm branches.

Let us go a little behind the scenes of what was happening on that Palm Sunday in AD 30. Lets look at it from a few points of view.

From a Roman’s view point, this was in about the 16th year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius. The place is in Judea, a small territory on the east coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Judea had been conquered and come under control of the Roman Empire about 90 years previously. It had always been a rather troublesome area because the Jewish people who lived there thought they were a nation and been chosen by a supreme God called Jehovah. They had for a long time been expecting a Messiah would come and who would throw out the Roman rulers and oppressors. The place was always rumbling with political unrest. A couple or so years earlier, a wandering preacher and miracle worker had come to into the public eye. His name was Jesus, a good and hard working man by all accounts, a carpenter, salt of the earth. He had recently performed a rather spectacular miracle before about 5000 people, feeding them with 5 small loaves and two small fishes. John was to write much later in his gospel “ After the people saw the sign Jesus performed, they began to say, “Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world.” 15 Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself” (John 6:14-16). Clearly Jesus never wanted to be become a King, but the people were determined to make him one.

And now, today, they were having their way. There were thousands of them, all converging on Jerusalem, their holy city, to celebrate their Passover festival, and Jesus was there. A mile or two outside Jerusalem, he had commandeered a donkey, and was riding on it towards the gates of the city. The crowds had cut down branches from the palm trees which were on each side of the road, and had spread them on the road as a kind of carpet of victory, like the Roman emperors had when they returned to Rome after a victorious war. The people had spontaneously broken out into cheers and songs and were shouting ` “Hosanna![a]”
“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” (Mark11:9)
 
There could be no doubt about it: to the thousands of Jewish people, Jesus was going to enter Jerusalem to take over his kingdom, and that was very worrying from the Roman point of view. Of course there were Roman soldiers around, but only a handful who would never be able control these thousands of excited and wound up Jews.  This situation was going to turn into a big problem.
 
Now let's look at that first Palm Sunday from the Jewish point of view. There is no doubt that life under Roman rule could be oppressive and brutal, especially out in the provinces. But Rome was too experienced at ruling an empire to provoke their subject peoples unnecessarily. It was too expensive in men and materials. Wherever possible, Rome came to a working relationship with the local leaders and the Jewish high priests, and most of the supreme council of the Jews, were happy to oblige. With Roman protection and approval, they were able to keep their very lucrative positions. The Jewish leaders certainly did not want this Jesus person to start a rebellion and upset what was, after all, a reasonably satisfactory mutual relationship. Caiaphas, the high priest and Sadducee said 48 If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation.”(John 11:48). So on that Palm Sunday the Jewish religious leaders were also extremely worried.
 
There was also probably an element in that crowd that greeted Jesus who would have been even more radically inclined. For the Jewish people, the Passover was more than just a religious festival, it was also a time when they celebrated their liberation from Egyptian slavery and captivity.  They would also, during this holiday period, express their longing to be free of the oppression from Rome. Indeed the praise word “Hosanna” is a Hebrew word that can mean save, rescue or saviour. It was also a slogan word or catch cry word used by the Zealots, who were a rebellious Jewish political group, and could also meant Save Us, Give us Freedom, We are sick of these Romans!
Even the simple palm fronds had a significant meaning. The Palm was a symbol of victory, triumph and peace. It was also a symbol of Judea, representing abundance, and was a motif found on walls, pillars and coins. Was this the moment when the Messiah would ride into Jerusalem, A King on a stallion, to lead the rebellion that would finally overthrow the hated Roman invaders?

So the atmosphere was pretty tense at the gate of Jerusalem that first Palm Sunday. It was a powder keg of expectations and possibilities. The Romans wondered whether they would be able to control the crowds; the Jewish religious leaders were determined that Jesus would have to be destroyed, and quickly, and the general population were expecting that within the next hour or two a war of liberation would begin. I suspect if CNN were covering the news that day, there would have been updates every 5 minutes.

So what was Jesus’ view point in all this? Was he going to inflame the masses and trigger a popular uprising?

It was that donkey on which Jesus was riding that gives us the clue to exactly what Jesus's intentions were. It was prophesied by Zechariah, nearly 500 years previously when he wrote;

Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.  (Zechariah 9:9)

You wouldn’t expect a senior government minister or head of state to arrive in town on a push bike? No, his mode of transport would be commensurate with his importance, be it a BMW, a Mercedes Benz or possibly a Rolls Royce, complete with outriders and flags flying.

No earthly king would ride into his capital on a donkey - he would use a fine horse bedecked in bright colours and shining metal. Traditionally, entering a city on a donkey symbolized arriving in peace, not the aggressive, dominating presence of a war horse.
 
Jesus had deliberately ordered a donkey in fulfilment of the prophecy made by the prophet Zechariah. That was the kind of King that Jesus knew himself to be. He came into Jerusalem to take over his kingdom, certainly, but it would not be an earthly kingdom. By riding on a donkey, as Zechariah had foretold, he was proclaiming to all who would get the point that it was the kingdom of God, and not any kingdom of men, that Jesus was about to win.
 
Make no mistake, things were going to change after Jesus’s arrival in Jerusalem. He did not go to the Roman barracks, or make a speech from the town centre, but he went into the temple. Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. (Matthew 21:12) He was in a sense, overthrowing the business of selling forgiveness that had been going on for centuries.  On the very day that people were choosing and buying their own Passover lambs and sacrifices, Jesus had come as the Lamb of God, a spotless sacrifice, who was to die on humankind’s behalf.
The crowd had totally missed the point and wanted Jesus to be their political and military deliverer.
 
Yes Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ, the King but only on his terms. His battle was not with the Romans, not with Caiaphas, not with the money changers, but with the power of Sin in this world,
 
So ended the first Palm Sunday.
So started the last week of Jesus’ life on this earth, a week that was to see him teach, be anointed, rest and share time with his friends, share the Passover meal with his disciples, pray and prepare himself for death, be betrayed, arrested tried and sentenced to death, flogged and then crucified on the cross and to rise again from the dead on the first Easter Day.
 
As we consider Palm Sunday 2021, Let us think on how we are going to accept Jesus as our King?
Are we going to be like Pilate and wash our hands of the affair and let others take the responsibility for his fate. He had a notice placed on the cross “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews” Pilate was, sadly perhaps the only person who understood who Jesus was, in Jesus’s own sense of the word
 
Are we like the high priests and Jewish leaders and see Jesus a threat to our positions, incomes and status quos and be determined he would never be crowned? These leaders did not believe that Jesus was to be their King, in any sense of the word.  
Are we like the people, who welcomed Jesus on the Sunday, but by the end of the week, were chanting Crucify Him, Crucify Him, in a fickle change of attitude?
They were all responsible for His crucifixion.
 
In the words of a hymn for today
“All glory, praise, and honour
To thee, Redeemer, King”
 
Let us not be under any doubt as to who Jesus the King was and is today.
Palm Sunday 2021 is the start of Holy Week. Let this coming week be a time when we, in penitence, share the journey with Jesus towards the cross. Let us remember in penitence who we are, but remember in joy what our Lord Jesus Christ has done for us. He died, but rose again, so that we might have life, and have it abundantly.
Amen