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The world has gone after the King

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Sermon for Palm Sunday

Philippians 2:5-11  +  John 12:1-19

All four Gospel writers describe Holy Week. Many of their accounts overlap, but each one also includes certain details that the others leave out. Some years, we hear a combined account, a harmony of the four Evangelists. Other years we focus on just one. This year, we’re going to turn to St. John, every day this week (except for Wednesday, our one day off), to view the events of Holy Week and the Passion, that is, the Suffering of the Lord Jesus, from the inspired perspective of the apostle who often referred to himself simply as “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” May the Lord grant us His Holy Spirit to guide and to bless our meditation.

John, like the other three Evangelists, includes an account of Jesus’ ride into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, sitting on a donkey. We’ll get to that in a moment. But first, John records what happened the day before, on the outskirts of Jerusalem, in the little town of Bethany, at the house of a man named Simon the Leper.

Matthew and Mark include this account, too, but it’s John who tells us when it happened, the day before Palm Sunday. It’s also John who names Martha as a servant at the dinner, and Martha’s sister Mary as the woman who anointed Jesus’ feet with that expensive perfume, and who wiped His feet with her hair. Their brother Lazarus was also there—an important detail added by John, because Lazarus is the one who had recently been raised from the dead by Jesus after he had spent three days in the tomb. That’s where we get that beautiful discourse between Jesus and Martha, where Jesus said to her, I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die.

Well, some who were in attendance at that supper were there especially to see the resurrected Lazarus, and the Jesus who had raised him up. Word was spreading quickly that this Jesus was truly the Son of God, the promised Christ, and it was the resurrection of Lazarus that sealed the deal for many of them—which added to the Palm Sunday multitude, and which also convinced the chief priests that they not only had to kill Jesus, but Lazarus, too, to regain their iron grip on the people of Israel and to keep them from following Jesus any longer.

We learn from this encounter that Judas was a thief even before he was a traitor. That’s why, John says, he was upset with the “waste” of this expensive perfume that Mary poured out on Jesus’ feet. But we also learn that Jesus accepts the humble service of His saints, both men and women, as well as the costly gifts they give to honor Him, because they love Him, and because they’ve been listening to His word, as Mary had been listening to Jesus talk about the crucifixion He would soon endure—something that had gone right over the heads of all the apostles. Leave her alone, Jesus said. She has kept this for the day of My burial. For the poor you have with you always, but Me you do not always have.

And with that, the tone is set for Palm Sunday.

The next day, Jesus came with His disciples to the Mount of Olives, just up the road from Bethany, to the east of Jerusalem, with the Kidron Valley running in between. Jesus sent two of His disciples to go fetch a donkey and her colt, knowing exactly where they would be, and that the owner would gladly send them in the Lord’s service for this special day. He needed the donkeys, because He had a prophecy to fulfill, from the book of prophet Zechariah: Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is righteous and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. The donkey was there to identify Jesus as the Christ, the promised King of the Jews, riding into Jerusalem as foretold, without Him having to say a word. And, it was also there to remind the people what the Christ would be like, and what He was coming to do: Lowly, humble, righteous, He was coming to bring them salvation—to bring it in a lowly way, not by destroying sinners, not by making war with their earthly enemies, not by raising Israel up to rule over the other nations. How, then? How would He bring them salvation? For that, they needed to turn to the prophet Isaiah (as we’ll do again on Friday): He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. The King would bring salvation by suffering and dying for the sins of His people, so that, by His blood, He might make peace between God and sinners, so that all who believe might be saved.

No one there that day understood what Jesus was coming to do during that Passover week. No one knew on Sunday that He would be dead by Friday evening. No one could have imagined the turmoil and the drama of the coming week. No one, except for Jesus, who faced it willingly, who faced it “gladly,” in the sense that He knew the salvation His suffering would accomplish for millions of people, past, present, and future. And so He kept going, all the way into the city, all the way to the cross.

But the crowds, in spite of their ignorance, were glad to welcome their King that day. “Hosanna!, they cried. ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!’ They weren’t just making up their own song of praise. The whole thing, including the Hebrew word “Hosanna” is a quotation from Psalm 118, a song of praise and thanks to the LORD, the God of Israel, who brings salvation to His people, who acts on His people’s behalf—a Messianic Psalm that speaks of the suffering of the Christ and of His eventual deliverance from His suffering. That part they didn’t connect to Jesus.

But we do! And when they acclaimed Him as the The King of Israel, not really knowing what kind of King He was, we acclaim Him as King in the fullest sense, because we know Him as the King who suffered and died for us, as the righteous King who shares His righteousness with all who believe in Him, as the King who now sits at the right hand of God the Father, reigning over all for the good of His holy Church.

Still, not everyone acclaimed Him as King that day. The Pharisees were livid at this “triumphal entry” into Jerusalem, appalled that their fellow Jews were welcoming Jesus with their palm branches and their praises, and with these Messianic verses. They said to one another, “See? You are accomplishing nothing. Look, the world has gone after Him!”

It must have felt like that to them, at that moment, as it seemed like their power was slipping away through their fingers. The world has gone after Jesus. Everyone’s following Jesus, listening to Jesus, believing in Jesus, talking about Jesus! They couldn’t stand it. So they made plans to kill Him, so that no one else could go after Him ever again.

It would have worked, except that He rose from the dead after they killed Him, and He has kept on calling out to the world, through the ministers whom He has sent, “Repent and believe the good news! Your King has come to save you!” And ever since the Day of Pentecost, the world has been “going after Him”—many going after Him to kill His religion, to persecute His Church, or, even worse, to corrupt it, and to persuade Christians to abandon Him, to abandon His word, to fit in with the world, to focus on an earthly life where Jesus is little more than an afterthought. Such enemies of Jesus have been around as long as the Pharisees have, and they’ve had far too much success in the world.

But some, a few, a remnant have gone after Jesus, and go after Him still, to seek Him, to worship Him, and to receive the salvation He came to bring. A few still believe in Jesus as their Lord, their Savior, and their King. A few still gather together in His name, every Sunday if possible, and then every year for Holy Week, to spend the week hearing the word of their King and meditating on His teaching and on His Passion. For this we, too, have gathered, by the grace of God, having been chosen by God to hear His Gospel and to believe in His Son, and to receive life in His name. May His Holy Spirit accompany us in our worship and in our devotion as our King comes to us again this week in Word and Sacrament. And let us always be found among those who go after Him! Amen.

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The events of Palm Sunday (and the day before)

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Sermon for Palm Sunday

Philippians 2:5-11  + Harmony of the Gospels for Palm Sunday

And so it begins, our annual walk with Jesus through this Holy Week. We don’t pretend that the events are happening all over again. Jesus didn’t ride in on a donkey today, nor will He be crucified again on Good Friday, nor will His body return to the tomb for the great Sabbath rest. So there’s no need for us to be overly somber or mournful this week. Holy Week isn’t for reenacting these events from Jesus’ life. It’s for remembering—or, if necessary, learning for the first time—what that special week was all about, the lessons Jesus taught, the things Jesus suffered, and the reason why He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. As Martin Luther wrote in his order for the German Mass, “Lent, Palm Sunday, and Holy Week shall be retained, not to force anyone to fast, but to preserve the Passion history and the Gospels appointed for that season…Holy Week shall be like any other week save that the Passion history be explained every day for an hour throughout the week or on as many days as may be desirable, and that the sacrament be given to everyone who desires it. For among Christians the whole service should center in the Word and sacrament.” And so it shall.

Just about everything that took place during that first Holy Week took everyone by surprise, except for Mary, the sister of Martha and of Lazarus. Mary knew, at least in a general way, how that week would end. That’s why she poured out all that expensive oil on Jesus’ head and feet, to anoint Him for His burial, which would take place within a week’s time.

Mary knew. And, of course, Jesus knew. He knew everything, even where His disciples would find a pair of donkeys tied up, a mother and her colt. And still, knowing how the week would end, He sent for the donkeys. And He got up on that young colt on which no one had ever sat. It had been reserved in God’s master design for this sacred use by the Son of God. Not that He needed it to get to Jerusalem. He had always walked to the city before. No, He needed it to send the intended message—a message which even His own disciples didn’t fully understand until after the fact. It was the message God had sent to Israel hundreds of years ahead of time, through the prophet Zechariah: Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. The message was that Jesus was the promised Christ, that He was the true, eternal King of the Jews, that He had come to bring salvation to His people, and that He had come to do it first in a spiritual way, not as a glorious champion, but as a humble one, not as a commander of armies riding in on a horse, but as the Commander of angel hosts riding in on a donkey, not as a king sitting on a throne, but as a King hanging from a cross. He would bring salvation to His people, not by seizing power, but by allowing Himself to be seized. He would bring salvation, not by punishing the guilty, but by bearing the guilt of all men, not by ushering in an age of justice among men, but by suffering the most terrible injustice at the hands of men. The One who occupied the highest place of power and glory, together with God the Father, would humble Himself down to the lowest place of shame, disgrace, and death.

And yet, for all His humility, He welcomed the praises of the people that day. They weren’t the empty praises of flatterers. They were the genuine praises of people who knew they needed saving somehow, and who believed that Jesus was coming to save them somehow, although they didn’t know what kind of saving they actually needed or how Jesus would accomplish their salvation. They didn’t realize that the devil was their greatest enemy—a far greater enemy than poverty or than social injustice or than political oppressors—the one who had approached the first human beings in a garden and overcame them by convincing them to rebel against God by eating from a forbidden tree, whence death arose. They didn’t grasp how big God’s plans were, that He had ordained the salvation of mankind to come from another tree, from the tree (or the wood) of the cross (listen for a reference to this later on in the Proper Preface before Communion), so that people might “eat” from that tree and live forever. How? By believing in the crucified Christ, who was delivered up to death for our sins and raised again to life for our justification, that we might be justified by faith in the One who willingly made His way to the cross for us, through all the opposition that He faced during Holy Week, through all the suffering He endured from the Garden of Gethsemane up to the great “It is finished!”

The people of Jerusalem couldn’t fathom all that Jesus, their true Passover Lamb, would endure on their behalf during that Holy Week. And yet they still went out to meet Him and sang His praises with joy in their hearts. God the Father had ordained that Jesus must receive this well-deserved praise as the One who comes in the name of the Lord. Yes, the Father insisted on it, so much so that, if the people had remained silent, then the stones themselves would have had to cry out in praise of Jesus, the King of the Jews, as Jesus told the angry Pharisees.

But the joy wouldn’t last, at least, not for most of Jerusalem. Jesus foresaw that and wept for the city, for the people whom God the Father had invited ahead of time to His Son’s banquet of salvation. He wasn’t weeping for what the Jews would do to Him on Good Friday. Yes, their behavior would be wicked and appalling, but they could have been forgiven for that. Jesus was about to give His life to make atonement for all the wickedness of men, even the wickedness of crucifying the Son of God. But there is no forgiveness, only condemnation, both temporal and eternal, for those who refuse to repent of their wickedness, who go on living in it, who are proud of their sins, or who try to make up for them in some other way than by trusting in Jesus Christ, whose blood alone can reconcile sinners to God.

But you are here today as those who have repented of your wickedness, who do repent of it, and who recognize the Lord Jesus as your King and your Savior. You know that He came to Jerusalem on Palm Sunday to spend the week there fighting for you, suffering for you, and teaching you the things you need to know for your salvation. So may the Lord bless our meditations this week as we hear large portions of His inspired Word. May God bless our learning and our remembering, and may He grant us the spirit to hear and to listen, to thank and to praise, to love and to appreciate Jesus, our Savior and King, and to rejoice in Him and in the peace of His kingdom. Amen.

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