Palm Sunday - Self Emptying Love

Palm Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week and the time we hear of our Lord’s passion for us and remember the last week of his human life: the culmination of his life of self-emptying love and obedience. We enter into Jerusalem with our Lord and progress toward the last meal, the garden, the cross and the tomb. (Palm Sunday. Matthew 21:1-11 and 26:14-46; Isaiah 50:4-9a; Psalm 31:9-18; Philippians 2:5-11)

Sentence:

“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.” Philippians 2:5-8

Collect:

Gracious God, Creator, Father, birth giver,

We give you thanks for your coming amongst us

in the humble form of Jesus, one of us,

that we might know your great love

and the learn the way of self-emptying love.

Help us to receive the gifts you give

and to share your good news with those most in need.

We pray in the name of your son, our brother and companion,

saviour and friend. Amen.

Reflection:

So let us begin. Jesus came riding the colt of a donkey, as he knew the prophet Zechariah had said a future king would - a king who would banish the weapons of war from the land.  But on that day there were two processions into Jerusalem; Jesus from the Galilee to the north and the Roman governor of Judea from the west. Jesus came enacting this long remembered promise at the very moment that the other procession was making its way into the city – the procession of the Roman governor of Judea and the imperial army for they were nervous this time, Passover, every year about Jewish uprisings against the Roman Empire.

You may like to read what I have previously reflected on for Palm Sunday.

Palm Sunday Reflections

So, Rome made its presence felt with the spectacle of its power and its theology of peace through victory and oppression. And Jesus came with a small disorganised group following that declared peace through liberation from oppression. They were on a collision course.

And in so many ways we have been on a collision course ever since, wanting the peace Jesus spoke of and yet looking to power plays more in keeping with the Roman empire. We see this at the level of international politics where we pray for peace between the nations but then watch them take proportionate actions that keep the game of peace through might going once more around the board game. We see it between religions and ethnic groups with a declared desire to respect one another’s differences but we shall get one more criticism in before we stop. And of course in our families, we desire connection and peace and yet each wants the others to give in first and admit they’re wrong and ask for our forgiveness (which we would of course grant them so long as they ask first!).

We somehow always feel called or entitled to be on the winning side of life. Jesus’ disciples over the next days will make clear that they felt called to be on the winning side of salvation. After all they had come to recognise Jesus as the anointed holy one of God, why would that not also mean that he was to be the winner, the new leader, the long-awaited King?

But in the language of Philippians Jesus emptied himself, taking the form of a slave ... Jesus found becoming the fully human and divine one meant becoming humbled, brought low. Now this was either something Jesus pretended to do, out of false modesty or as part of a prepared script for the sake of the audience, or he truly allowed himself to be emptied out and humbled. And then, only then, did he discover in the place of humility his own fullness and the exaltation of being the Lord’s anointed son.

There is nothing in Matthew’s account of Jesus’ passion for us that suggests an easy acting, rather there is this heart breaking journey through betrayal and abandonment and grief. Jesus must endure the waving of palms and calls of Hosanna knowing how misplaced those hopes are and how fickle the followers.

We could look back and ask how did his contemporaries not see that he was becoming the fulfilment of the suffering servant?  But what about us?  Do we not often prefer our Messiah triumphant, or at least the uncontested winner of history, the spiritual magician who will ease our burdens and sooth our brow, who would dictate the right decisions in language and volume we can easily digest and follow? If we are honest sometimes our Saviour, our King, is if not disappointing then at least confusing. And quite frankly sometimes a bit embarrassing. Jesus is about to become, dare I say it, the ultimate looser. If that language is too disrespectful then we may be more comfortable with ‘despised, rejected, a man of sorrows, one acquainted with grief’.

Maybe it is our false hopes for an easy journey to the winner’s seat that sets us up so often for betrayal – for being seemingly betrayed by the deal we think we have made and for betraying the one we say we follow. We know who the anointed one is but we do wish he would be more kingly. We know who the righteous one is but we want to be declared right our selves. We call him Lord and Saviour but we want to determine our own path and terms.

So before we rush to Easter Day and the joy and relief and certainty that it suggests let us hold our palms along the side of the road to Golgotha and confess our naive hope for a leader who would lead in inspiring ways and a saviour who would rescue us from being us, from the problems and consequences of being us.

Most of us long to be rescued and revived not forsaken and reviled, we wish to be honoured and raised high not brought low. As modern people we are, maybe rightly, suspicious of philosophies of humility and suffering fearing the loss of the individual self in the name of communal morality and endeavour.

Yet it is great love and great suffering that seem to most fully have the power to remake us and reshape us as loving souls, as compassionate beings, as deliriously joyous survivors.

Yet again, in the Easter mysteries we are about to be brought, ready or not, kicking and screaming, into the holy mystery of life that comes from death, love that is birthed out of hate, and victory that is entered through defeat.

Holy week should shock us, unhinge us a little, rework us out of our complacent hope and self pity into surrender to dying and stumbling into the blinding new light of love.

Do not let the familiarity of the story dull our senses to the anguish, the terror, and eventually the thrill of new life. Do not let our certainty about the meaning dull our availability for new birth. Do not let our fearfulness keep us away from the cross or the tomb in case we miss the beginning of the new age.

Even so, come Lord Jesus Christ, come give us courage to journey with you, to watch and wait, to enter into the process.

Intercessions:

Creator God,

who made yourself known in all of creation including in human form

We give you thanks and praise for all the wonders of this world

and pray your healing touch where there is injury and destruction.

We particularly pray for those places, creatures and peoples who are harmed by war and exploitation …

Stir up our hearts and imagination that we can find ways to live in peace, respect and generosity.

Creator God,

Hear our prayer.

Jesus Christ, our brother, friend and saviour,

We thank you for your life of self-emptying love

and pray that you help us receive your gifts and lessons

that we might share your love and wisdom with all those in need.

We particularly pray for all who are imprisoned by walls, addictions, illness and all who experience pain and fear …

Help us to be good neighbours to those near and far.

Jesus Christ, our brother, friend and saviour,

Hear our prayer.

Spirit that sustains and animates,

We recognise you in our longings and our joys,

our capacity for grief and imagining a more just and loving world.

We pray that you move among us all at this time and enliven us with the desire to find peace, to enjoy our neighbours and make real the kingdom of God.

We particularly pray that we children of the Book – Christians, Muslims and Jews – who are on holy journeys at this time might find ourselves bound together in your spirit of love and life with those of all faiths and no faith …

We also pray for our loved ones who can no longer be seen that we might entrust them into your eternal loving care …

Spirit that sustains and animates,

Hear our prayer.

Living God,

Creator, Jesus Christ our brother and friend, Spirit that sustains and animates,

We pray in the name of the Beloved Son, the Christ, who came as one of us and showed us how to live and love as he did. Amen.

This is my work informed by all that I have heard, read and experienced. I am indebted to the wisdom of others. This season I am particularly informed by:

Marcus J Borg & John Dominic Crossan,  “The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’ Final Days in Jerusalem”, Harper Collins, New York, 2006.