From my perspective as a pastor some of the most interesting sermons to preach are the ones involving those religious holidays where the whole Christian world is celebrating. Palm Sunday, Easter and Christmas time qualify under this heading. I think what makes it interesting is the challenge of it in that the questions come. How many sermons are being preached this morning on this and how many times have people heard this. Sermons should be done in such a way as to leave people with some form of impact and over exposure can lessen this. This is the challenge of the universal Christian holidays.
The question in my mind in preparing this sermon this week was more the product of meditation on the passage than anything else. “What type of Worship does Jesus deserve?” The triumphal entry conjures an image of reckless abandon in the worship of Christ. This is seen in the reaction of people to Christ as he enters the city.
Firstly, is the reckless abandon of the people who owned the colt who just give it to the disciples simply when they inform them Jesus needed it. Next is the reckless abandon of the people as they cut palm branches and take off their coats to spread in front of Jesus so that even the hooves of the donkey he is riding on do not have to touch ground. There praise is from Psalm 118 a psalm which Jesus will use later when he tells the religious leaders about the ‘stone’ that the builders rejected but at this point is shouted to give reference to the fact that Jesus is the Messiah.
This invokes a strong reaction from the religious leaders. They have never accepted that Jesus is the messiah they were looking for as they see him as an imposter. I can’t help but draw a parallel between this story and a similar story from David’s life where he praised the ark’s coming to Jerusalem and his wife Micah was critical of his reckless abandon. Now, the people are worshiping Christ and it is the religious leaders who are critical. The spirit in the religious leaders is the same as Micah’s was and with the same results.
Jesus response is classic as he point to rocks and says that if someone did not praise him they would. It is an insult really. Jesus is telling the religious leaders that rocks have more sense than them. To further make his point he then prophesies against the city of Jerusalem that they will be destroyed with not one stone left on another. Jesus will later in the week expound on this in his Olivet Discourse, but for now it is a telling lament for a city who God had reached out to so many times. As much as we like to the look at the power of the praise of the triumphal entry, it was truly an act of war with the religious leaders. Everything they opposed was shoved in their face and they reacted by having more fear and being more jealous of Christ.
This of course brought me back to the question of what kind of worship does Christ deserve? I have often found it amazing how reserved and critical we can get in talking about the greatest miracles of our lives. Salvation gets talked about in such a matter of fact manner that I wonder sometimes if we truly appreciate the wonder of its power in our lives. I see miracles take place and people treat it as if it was just another day at the office. I must freely confess I have found myself in this mode. Palm Sunday should be a day to remind ourselves of the need to thank and praise our savior with a little more reckless abandon than we sometimes do. To come to a realization that if we don’t praise Christ in this way, the rocks may take our place as well.