NOTE: This was the "script" that inspired the spoken sermon. There were, as always, points of departure.
With a well known & important scripture like ours today I think that it is important to set the scene - know what we are dealing with. Jerusalem would be the destination for pilgrims and faithful from all over the land and this city would be teeming with people taking up residence in every nook & cranny. Jerusalem at this time isn’t a very big city & with the population swelling for Passover there eventually was a point with it couldn’t hold anymore folks. This is where Bethany & Bethphage come in. Only about a mile away from Jerusalem, just on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives, these cities became something of a hub for the travelers who were not staying in Jerusalem but making the journey into the city day after day. So it is safe to assume that the route Jesus takes on his journey would have been well traveled and well known.
When pilgrims were not in Jerusalem they would have been in ground zero for Jesus related chatter and fandom. These cities, not too far apart, were the backyards of Mary, Martha, & Lazarus. Just about anyone taking advantage of the hospitality of these lands would have heard the story of Lazarus’ raising from the dead at the hands of Jesus & might have had encounters with Jesus’ disciples or other locals who had first hand experiences with Christ’s teaching & healings. The Gospel of John even goes as far as to say that Lazarus himself was around at the time of the Triumphant Entry & that a “great crowd” had gathered to see for themselves Lazarus & Jesus. If we roll all this together we get a pretty compelling picture of a crowd, swelled with stories and firsthand experiences of the power and person of Jesus Christ who now climbs atop a donkey; a ritualistic clue as a fulfillment of prophesy. King Solomon rode a donkey to his coronation. The Prophet Zachariah tells us that the King comes triumphant & victorious riding on a donkey. The King is coming. The new King has arrived and he does great things! He raises men from the dead, upon him rests the power of God! His teachings are with authority! “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” Hosanna, Hosanna, Hosanna! And now we are parading! We are waving our palms, we are shouting, whooping & hollering because today is the day! Today is the day when we finally can give those Romans a piece of our mind! And all this happening during Passover! We are being delivered! “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” What? What are those Pharisees saying to him? No we won’t quiet down! Even louder now “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” If I tell them to stop the stones would shout out.
Since college I have been captivated by this phrase: The Stones would shout out. When I learned it I was reading another translation - the Stones would cry out. That is the one that sticks with me. If I tell them to be quiet the stones will cry out. For years I have thought of those words of Jesus when I think about Palm Sunday, Easter, all of Christ’s life to be honest. Lately, as I have been working on this sermon I have begun wondering. What would the stones have said?
What would the stones have said if the “multitude of disciples” had stopped their parade? Jesus seems to give us the impression that the stone would echo the sentiment of the parade but I wonder - how many marching in this parade knew where it was heading? Did the palm waving, praise shouting, Pharisee denying average parade go-er know what their new King was up to? See, the popular understanding was the Messiah, the one who comes in the name of the Lord, would come in and establish rule, a government & civil rule in the classical sense that would ordain a season of God’s will upon the land. The King they were looking for was like the Kings of old. They were looking for another David. Did those men and women marching along the path know that this King, this Lord was not going to assume the throne? Did they know that this King wasn’t going to raise an army, defend the land, throw out the Romans & begin the rebuilding? Did they know that in just a few short days they would be shouting something different when it came to Christ? Did they know where this parade was headed?
What would the stones have said then?
One of my regrets is that I never had a chance to talk to my grandparents about their lives in more depth. I was either too young or too interested in Football, and girlfriends, and maybe school to sit down with them and ask about the war, the dust bowl, the history that they lived through & the experiences that shaped their lives. I treasure the little nuggets I have but I regret that much of their lives is a mystery. I believe that the mistakes that I make honestly come from my lack of wisdom when it comes to living & working and wisdom is something that I think age can get you. Wisdom to see the big picture. Wisdom to see the long, hard lessons of life played out over the course of your years. Wisdom gathered from the good & the bad, from a life spent in prayer, in love, in work & for some, in pain. And I bring this up because this is what I believe the crowd lacked: wisdom born out of a long life observing the coming and going of all things.
You see crowds will turn. Give them a little hope, give them what they want, answer a prayer or entertain them and they are like lambs. Any politician, celebrity or sports star will testify to this. But fail to meet up to the impossible, misguided, or self-serving expectations & lambs become lions; seeking to feast on the carcass of another disappointment. Crowds have virtually no memory but the stones have been around since the beginning. They have seen the comings and goings for centuries. Conquering Kings, outgoing slaves, the blood of the poor & the gold of the rich. They have seen it all. The stones have seen their fair share of parades of adulation. They have seen their faire share of funeral processions too. War Horses arrive all the time & yet what the stones have that we do not is the wisdom to see that our systems, our fixes, our Kings of the here and now are not ultimately able to save us. They are not ultimately what makes things right. The stones cry out Hosanna, Hosanna, they cry out Save Us, Save Us. A testimony born out of wisdom speaks of the whole world needing redemption & this does not happen with coronations, elections, or surrenders. The redemption that the world needs happens at Calvary. Redemption comes not from the makings of our governments no matter how popular. Redemption comes not in teachings, healing, popularity contests, or memorable slogans. Redemption is the work of God. Who can redeem the creation other than the Creator?
Palm Sunday & to a larger extent Easter happens apart from our ability to recognize what we need. The life & death of Christ, and the redemption that happens therein is the will of a God who’s ways are not our own & who’s message challenges the status quo yet twenty centuries later we still fail to recognize what ultimately saves us. Twenty centuries later we still cling to our colorless dreams of a world made better but hardly the fundamentally different world Christ spoke of.
Brothers and sisters, the stones are still speaking. Can you hear them? The concrete where the homeless sleep, the asphalt of our busy streets, the marble of the luxury condos, the very stones that make this church, all of them, they are shouting because twenty centuries later we continue to, as the scriptures say, put our trust in princes & reject Christ. Yet twenty centuries later Christ stands overlooking our city seeking to enter. Waiting to overturn our tables, to bring the Kingdom near, to redeem, to make whole, to sustain.
Do you want something that lasts forever? Immutable, unchanging, true today as it was the day before? Then we must find the one who comes in the name of the Lord. He makes his way to the Temple to do a new thing. If we hurry we can catch him.
AMEN.
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