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The Scandal of Palm Sunday
Matthew 21: 1-17

March 22, 1970

John M. Buchanan

The scandal of Palm Sunday is that on this day Christians come to church for
the wrong reasons, in the same way that the followers of Jesus cheered and waved
branches for wrong reasons. William Stringfellow observes that, "The disciples of
Jesus Christ today keep returning to Palm Sunday, possessed with nostalgia for the
parade." [Free in Obedience p. 37] It is called "the day of triumphal entry."

The motif of the celebration has always been victory, ~+ Jesus receiving the adula-
tion and popular support he deserved. Christians, generally, feel pretty good about
this doy.

The scandal of Palm Sunday is that everyone was wrong about Jesus Christ. He
was thinking one thing: his friends and followers another: the priests and scribes
still another. And because of that the day ended quite differently from the way it
began. When it was all over he was alone, and quietly left the city he had entered
several hours before.

Palm Sunday, properly understood, separates the men from the boys. It draws
the whole created order, mon and their institutions, into confrontation with Jesus
Christ. I+ revealed him for who he really was, not who men wanted him to be; and
by inference it reveals what the Gospel really is, not what we wish it to be. The
scandal is that when it happened 2,000 years ago the machinery was sect in motion
which brought about his crueifixion five short days later. The scandal is that Palm
Sunday is not really a day of triumph at all. It is a prelude to crucifixion.

So let's forget about all those Sunday School pictures of the day's events:
let's lay aside the comfortable myth that Jesus was "King for a day", and look at
the meanings of the event that aren't telked about much.

The ancient historian Josephus colculated that about 2.7 million Jews camo to
Jerusalem from all over the world for the passover colebration. Now, that's a lot
of people - a lot of Woutsider, tourist types’ inclined to do the kinds of things

country cousins do on a big week in the city. There are two things to remember

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about those people. First, they were there to celebrate the Passover, that event

in their early history which resulted in their liberation from political servitude.
The angel of the Lord, you will recall, "passed-over" their homes while visiting
death on the Egyptians. Herod relented from his obstenancy long enough for them to
pack up and leave Egypt. It was a “freedom festival". The Passover marked the event
in thoir past that transformod thom from a group of hapless slaves, into a nation, 4
people - the Covenant People of God. That's the first thing to remember. 2.7 million
Jews wore in the capital of their nation, the cite of the Tomple, to colebrate thoir
independence as | nation, their special identity as a people.

Tho second thing to remomber is that they weren't a nation at all. They were
a Roman province. Tho law onforcemont officers were Roman logionnaires. Rome called
the shots in Jerusalem and the Roman presence contradicted overything the Passover
moant. It denied history: it was a rude, insulting slap in the face for every Jcw.
And so the burden of Raman occupation had given birth to a new wave of hope regarding
the Messiah. Now was the time for God to act. Now was the time for the redeemer
+o come and throw off the yoke of Rome. Those two things thon ~ 2.7 million pilgrims
engaging in patriotic cclcbration under the hecl of political oppression - madc
Jerusalem a "tindexbox" ripe for revolt and revdlution. I+ was a little like going
to Washington to celcbrate the 4th of July if this nation were a satclite of the
Soviet Union. That's the stage for Palm Sunday, one of the givens as Jesus made
his decision to onser the city.

He had a plan, thore can be no doubt about that. He had arranged for the donkey
ahoad of time. All his disciples had to do was pick it up and use the proarranged
"pass word’ — “the Lord has ncod of it." He had thought about it and come to the
hard decision to enter the Holy City on the first day of the Passover. He had
deliberately chosen to ride a donkey, the beast Kings rode when they camo in peace.
He carefully chose to fulfill one of the more graphic and popular messianic pre-
dictions in the Seriptures: “Lo your King comes to you = riding on on ass." He
was courageous, but it was 2 stvengaieed terrible kind of courage. Bravery in the

crisis of battle is one thing. Calculated, planmed courago is anothor thing

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altogether. Josus had decided to come to Jerusalom, in this specific way, for a
specific reason. He knew exactly how he would be received. He knew what was going
to happen.

We can only speculate about his disciples. The New Testament tells us that
they were"afraid and amazed" when he made the decision to go to Jerusalem. They
were practical men: they kmew the risks’ they saw clearly that the best strategy
would have been to stay in Galilea: or at least to slip into the city anonymously
as part of the crowd. In their hearts they hoped that he would be King. If he
insisted on going they would follow, hoping that finally he would make the right
move and claim his Kingdom. But they were afraid - in the presence of this terrible
courage.

So they came from Bethany, Jesus riding on an ass, they following behind. The
predictable happened. The crowd recognized him: the crowd - the rabble, the country
people who had seen him in Galelia, the poor, the sick, the sinners. Not the suave,
urbane Jerusalemites. The crowd - the volatile mass of country people who had
glutted the city. They recognized him - and knew immediately that he was coming in
the way the scriptures had promised. And so they tore the shirts from their backs
and the branches from the trees and welcomed him as only an oppressed people welcome
their liberator.

The parade now had become a mob. It moved slowly through the crowded streets”
and stopped at the Temple. He got off his beast and walked into the outer court.
There he saw something that resembled a carnival ~ a giant, vulgar bazaar. Here
were money changers, who for a fee would exchange a man's coins into sheckels -
the only money with which a man could buy sacrificial animals. Over there were the
animal inspectors who, for a fee, checked the animals a man brought from home —
or purchased outside - for blemishes and imperfections. There were the pigeons
and doves and lambs which the temple authorities had for sale. More expensive
than those outside, naturally, but pre-checked for blemishes. It was, of course,
nothing more than extortion. And as the noisy mob watched in amazement he fashioned

a whip and turned over the tables and drove out the merchants. I+ was something.

everyone of them had wanted to do. Now we have a yelling mob, and animals running
loose, and coins spilling on the ground, and greedy men scurrying around after
them dodging the lashes of his whip.

When the dust settled the poor and sick and lame came to him ~ there in that
dirty, dusty but now quict courtyard. And after them a very official~looking
delegation of priests and scribes. It boggles the mind to contemplate their rage
and fear. In oa study of disciplined understatement they asked him a rhetorical
question: "Do you see what you have done?" Poor men! 0 course, he saw. They —
were the ones who didn't,

Then he left - leaving thom to their frustrated rage - which would quickly
conceive the plan of exccution: leaving the crowd which thought it had a King —
now disappointed.

That's the story which the glossy pictures don't quite convey, and I always
feel that it bears retclling on this day, But what does it mean? What docs it soy
to those who would celebrate Palm Sunday today?

I would have us think, first of all, about the fact that Jesus came to Jerusalem
deliberately to confront the power structures of society; that he consciously set
out to claim his Lordship in the symbolic and literal center of his people's life.

He had spent three- years in Galilea, in the country, in the pleasant, rolling hills

of Judea. There had always beon conflict and the possibility of trouble, to be
sure. But, by and large, these were his kind of people: among them he had a large
following. They listened to his teaching and marveled at his power. But the

Galilean ministry was on the periphery. The city has always been where the action

is. The city is where powor is lodged and decisions are made. The city had the

courts and the Temple with its hierarchy. The city is where money was made and

spent. It was the hcart of the nation's life. Jesus, simply stated, was not content

to be a peripheral Lord. Sooner or later his Lordship would have to be validated

or rejected, right at tho conter of things. a

That speaks a rathor unmistakable word about the Gospel and the world, 3 i
eftpecially to those who arc cnamoured with the old litany that religion and politics,

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religion and economics, don't mix. That speaks a crystal clear word to those

who see no connection between religious affirmations about the Fatherhood of God
and political behavior which denies the brotherhood of all men.

You see, when Jesus made that fateful decision to come to Jerusalem he con
fronted - not only individual men, but their institutions. He confronted, not only
individual Jows, but also the institution of Judaism - the Temple, the sacrificial
system and its rotten economic base, the court system. That's really what got him
crucified. It's rathor harmless to be 4 Christ in Galilea: it's something alto-
gether to believe in Jesus Christ tomorrow when life resumes -— in education, in
business, in City Hall, the Court House, the banks, real estate offices and so on.
Being a Christian there - affirming the Lordship of Jesus Christ there just may
get a man crucified.

Because Jesus Christ came to the city, with all that entails, Christian people
are called to be involved, to be in the symbolic cities, the places of power and
decision making, not just as interosted taxpayers, but specifically as disciples of
Jesus. Because of what he did, our orders arc to be there too - in this city in
this day.

That's tho scandal. We don't want that. We prefer the safety of that old
hoax about separating our theology from our public life. We prefer to be Galilea
Christians, keeping our convictions on the safe periphery, far removed from things
like the welfare system and the housing code and the Human Relations Commission.
Well, the seandal of Palm Sunday is that it isn't possible. The Lordship of Jesus
Christ is meaningful in the city - or it is not meaningful at all.

You know - within cach ono of us there is a Galilea and o Jerusalem. There
is a periphery in our lives, and there is a heart, a conter, when we make our
important decisions, hold our deepest convictions, nurture our fondest dreams and
feel our greatest loves. And, you know, there is a lot about our religiosity which
deposits it out there in the outer circle, on the periphery, in Golilea. Again,
the scandal of this day is that Jesus Christ rides right out of Galilea and into

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Jerusalem: right out of that Sundaymmorning, 11:00 — 12:00 slot and into the center.

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of our lives, where we are who we are. ‘There he elamis Lasiahas - over us, Over
our hearts, over our dreams, loves, prejudices, values, motivations. The scandal
of this day is that you and I end up on the spot. What are we going to do with
him? He won't go back to the periphery. He confronts us on this day and we have
to respond.

There is great wisdom in the old Catholic custom of giving cach worshipper
a palm branch on this day. The branches are kept through the year and burned prior
to Lent. Then on Ash Wednesday, the ashes from those branches are used to mark the
sign of the eross on the forheads of the devolt. It is a mark of cortrition and
penatence. It says what needs to be said on this day. We are involved in the
scandal. We are part of the crowd: part of the religious establishment: we are
those who want him on the peripheries of life. We are those who need, on this day,
the grace of his forgiveness.

On this day our Lord Jesus Christ rode into Jerusalem. On this day, let us
remember ‘that he rides into the center of our lives ond claims his Lordship there.

May our "Hosanna's" mark our simple aceoptance of that Lordship.

Amen.

Help us, our Fathor, to see the terrible significance of this day. Keep us
from disguising the issucs involved in Christ's coming to Jerusalem. Open our

hearts and lives to his Lordship.
Amen.