A WORD FOR TODAY, April 9, 2025
Peggy Hoppes
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Blessings. Peg
A WORD FOR TODAY, April 9, 2025
Lectionary Scriptures for April 13, 2025, Palm Sunday and Sunday of the Passion: John 12:12-19; Deuteronomy 32:36-39; Psalm 118:19-29; Philippians 2:5-11; Luke 22:1-23:56
“See now that I myself am he. There is no god with me. I kill and I make alive. I wound and I heal. There is no one who can deliver out of my hand.” Deuteronomy 32:39, WEB
The life and ministry of our Lord Jesus was filled with incredible signs, wonders, and teachings. From the first miracle at Canaan when he changed water into wine, to the raising of Lazarus from the dead and everything in between, Jesus showed Himself to be different from anyone the world had ever seen. People were amazed at the Word He taught in the temple and on the hillsides because it became alive before them. He helped people understand that there was a better way of living and that there was a deeper meaning to the scriptures.
Jesus was controversial. Many would follow and listen as He breezed through a town or village. However, there were others that did not believe Jesus came from God. His own hometown rejected Him. Many claimed He was from Satan. Some tried to stone Him for the things He said and did. The teachers in the temple and other religious leaders began to fear His power over the people.
The people saw Jesus as the answer to their prayers. They sought a Messiah, someone who would set them free from the oppression of the Roman invaders of their land. They wanted to be a free nation again and live as they did during the Golden Age of David and Solomon. As Jesus gained fame and followers, His disciples pleaded with Him to go to Jerusalem and claim His place. They knew that there were enough people to support Him, and that they would fight to give Him the throne they felt He had come to fill. However, Jesus refused to go to Jerusalem until the right time.
As the Passover of His third year of ministry approached, Jesus knew the time had come for Him to fulfill the promise of His Father. It was time to go to Jerusalem. He was in control of every moment, of every detail of what was to come. A donkey was waiting, to carry Him into Jerusalem; it was a sign of His kingship. Yet, this gathering of praise and thanksgiving for God’s mercy would not last very long. It seems impossible that the crowds who sang “Hosanna” on Palm Sunday would be screaming “Crucify Him” just a few days later. But this is how it was meant to be. We can read about the three years of ministry and be amazed at His wonders, impressed by His teaching, and excited about His ministry to the poor and outcast, but Jesus’ life was about much more than feeding the poor and healing the sick. The Passion was all part of God’s plan, a plan we do not fully understand, but one that brought salvation to the world.
The people had every reason to look for a king that would be like David. Their ruler, if you can call him that, was nothing but a puppet for Rome. He was one of them, but not really. He was willing to compromise and tolerate the Roman rule because he had the power to make himself comfortable. The religious and other leaders felt the same way. The Romans may have abused the average citizen of Israel, but they had everything they needed. They even had justification in their interpretation of the Law: if the people were suffering, it was their own fault. They were sinners that deserved everything that came to them. The people in power did not want anything rocking the boat.
They may have talked a good game, teaching the people about caring for neighbor and living according to God’s Law, but they were hypocrites who promoted that which benefitted them and rejected the suggestion put forth by Jesus that they had lost touch with God. They demanded offerings and sacrifices but forgot what it meant to be merciful. They insisted on strict obedience to their laws but lost sight of God’s laws to love Him and one another. It was more important for a son to give an offering to the Temple than to care for his aging parents. It was better to speak long agenda filled prayers than to admit that they were sinners in need of a Savior.
In the text from Deuteronomy, we are told that the Lord will judge His people. The problem with human nature is that we tend to create our own gods, and we ignore or reject the true God. For those in the days of Moses, the gods were localized, specifically attributed to certain aspects of the world. They had a god for rain and one for the sun. They had a god for procreation and another for the harvest. If there was a death in the family, they prayed to a god that helped their beloved go to the afterlife.
The gods we create are not always so easy to identify, especially when we claim to believe in the one true and living God. The gods of Jesus’ day were, of course, the Greek and Roman pagan gods, but even the Jewish religious leaders had their own gods. They conspired with the secular authorities to keep their power, and by doing so honored their ruler as a “god.: In some ways, they even acted as if they were also gods because they put their power and position ahead of God. They missed the grace and mercy of God in Jesus Christ because they were focused entirely on themselves. We are, too often, our most beloved god.
So, in Deuteronomy, when God sees that His people have stumbled and that they are left powerfulness, He asks, “Where are their gods? Where are the ones they relied upon to save them? Where are the gods that ate their sacrifices and drank their wine?” Those gods, whether they are the ancient gods of the pagans, the Olympic gods of the Romans, or the gods of self and power and position, have no power to save. There is no god but our God; no god has the power of our God. He can kill and He can bring life. He wounds and He heals. And no one can do anything to defeat His power.
The tide turned very quickly for Jesus. He didn’t present Himself as the conquering hero they expected. He didn’t call the troops to arms or confront the Roman leaders who were oppressing them. Instead, He confronted the priests and religious practices, attacking the piece of their world they thought was right. They willingly supported Barabbas, a Jewish insurrectionist who was in Roman custody. Instead of choosing Jesus as their Messiah, they chose the man they thought would lead them to a victory against their oppressor. They didn’t understand that they were oppressed by something greater.
There was once a funny commercial for a tissue company that showed some sort of holy man being kind to several different kinds of animals. He sneezed and grabbed a tissue but then read the words on the side of the box: “kills 99.9% of germs.” He was torn because it was obvious from his kindness that saving life was important to him. How could he kill anything, even germs?
Perhaps this seems extreme, but there is a story about another holy man. He was sitting on the bank of a brook while meditating when he noticed a scorpion that was caught in a whirlpool in the brook. Every time the scorpion tried to climb on a rock, it slipped back into the water. The holy man took pity on the scorpion and tried to save it from certain death, but whenever the man reached out to the creature it struck at its hand. A friend passed by and told the man that his actions were futile because it is in the scorpion’s nature to strike. The man said, “Yet, but it is my nature to save and rescue. Why should I change my nature just because the scorpion doesn’t change his?”
On Palm Sunday Jesus rode victorious into Jerusalem on a donkey, greeted by crowds of people singing “Hosanna.” The Jewish leaders were already very nervous about the things Jesus said and the things Jesus did, especially the raising of Lazarus. They were beginning to conspire against Him. In another Gospel, we are told that the Pharisees told Jesus to rebuke His disciples, but Jesus answered that even the stones would cry out if the people were silent. It seemed like all that was happening was beyond Jesus’ control.
This seems especially true as we read the Passion story. As each day passes, the signs of the end become clearer. Jesus was ready to die, and He was unwilling to do anything to stop it. He could have pronounced Himself king on Palm Sunday, but that was not His purpose. He, like the holy man with the scorpion, came to bring life even when it meant death to Himself.
Human nature is not much different than a scorpion’s: we quickly strike out even at those who want to help, even if we are trying to share the Gospel message. It doesn’t make sense, it is impractical, it is foolish to think that one man had to die for all of humanity. The message of the cross turns the world upside down, going against our expectations and desires. Those who do not believe in the Christian story or message think Jesus was nothing more than a man who got stung by the scorpion and died.
Lent is almost over. This Sunday, Palm Sunday, begins Holy Week. We have spent the last six weeks considering our own place in the Passion of Jesus Christ. Why did He have to do this? What have I done? We’ve tried to repent, to turn back to God. We’ve fasted and prayed. We have done our spiritual disciplines, read our devotionals, and gone to church a little more than normal. We’ve walked with Jesus toward the cross.
Though Sunday is Palm Sunday, most churches will also look at the entire Passion Narrative, which is two chapters of Luke this year. It begins with Judas’s betrayal, through the Last Supper and prayer on the garden, the trial and journey to Golgotha, and then the nailing of His flesh to the cross. It ends with Joseph of Arimathea asking for permission to bury Jesus’s body. We can’t possibly talk about every detail in this devotion, and no pastor can preach on every detail on Sunday, but sometimes the stories are best read without comment anyway. It may seem like a very long passage to read, almost overwhelming, but I suggest that you take the time to read every word, no matter how familiar you are with the story. As a matter of fact, it would be valuable to read it out loud, either to yourself or gather with a group of friends to share the reading of this story once again.
It is overwhelming, not only in the length of the text, but also in what it says. After all, this is story of Jesus’s struggle in the last days of His life. We tend to skim over these stories because we know them so well, after all, we’ve heard them a thousand times before. However, each time God’s word is read there is something for us: a word of comfort, a word of hope, a word of peace. Maybe this time you will find a word of warning or admonition. When we assume that we know the story so well, we stop listening to what God has to say to us today.
We could spend years studying this text, line by line trying to understand what was happening and what God would have us get out of the story. Yet, there are times when we should just let the Word of God speak for itself, to listen to the story as it was given. There are so many subtleties that could be brought out, details that could be debated. There are so many verses that have both historical relevance as well as spiritual meaning. There are hundreds of questions to be asked, some of the answers are widely accepted and others are contested. Yet we all can find common ground in the belief that in the story of the Passion Jesus did for humankind what no other human being was able to do: He died so that we might be reconciled to God. Whatever path His Passion took, our faith rests on that moment when Jesus hung from the cross, because without His death we would never know life as God intended.
We might act as if we would never leave His side, but the reality is that we are more likely to be like Peter than John. At the Last Supper, Peter insisted that he would stand with Jesus even unto death, but it was Peter who denied Jesus three times. Peter eventually received forgiveness from Jesus, but he went into hiding during the three days like the rest of them. We like to think that we wouldn’t be like that, but how often do we deny Jesus in our everyday lives? How often do we continue to willfully sin when we know what we are doing is wrong? How often do we ignore the call of God’s Spirit, going our own way and doing our own thing? How often do we stay silent when we should be speaking the Gospel? We might think that we would have followed Him to the very end of this journey, but we wouldn’t be able.
We are sinful, imperfect, frail human beings. It is beyond our ability to be righteous, to be the people God has created us to be. We are fallen from the first man, and no matter how hard we try we will betray and deny our God in our thoughts, words and deeds. We will run and hide from the dangers of faith. Oh, we can claim that we haven’t been too bad; we can claim our neighbors are worse sinners than we. However, even the tiniest sin against our neighbors and God’s creation is a sin against God. No matter how we try, no matter how good we are, we are still sinners in need of a Savior.
That’s why Jesus walked this journey that ends in a cross. We have followed Him this Lenten season to be reminded of our need to repent.
Our Father knows that we are unable to be righteous, so He sent His Son to be our righteousness. Even when God judges us, He has mercy. Even when He knows we have turned to false gods, He keeps His promises because He knows that those false gods cannot do for us what we think they can. He has compassion on us “when he sees that their power is gone; that there is no one remaining, shut up or left at large.” We will abandon Jesus at some point in our lives, probably many times. Every time we sin, knowingly and unknowingly, we are doing so. The disciples disappeared because they knew they had no power over what was happening to Jesus. They just didn’t realize that Jesus had all the power.
God is in control. Always. Even when we think we have everything in our own hands. “See now that I myself am he. There is no god with me. I kill and I make alive. I wound and I heal. There is no one who can deliver out of my hand.”
The Passion and Easter story is the most difficult thing about Christianity to believe and to accept. Why did Jesus have to die and how does that line up to the ideal of a loving and caring God? How does that help Jesus’s social ministry and seemingly political aspirations? It doesn’t make sense. It might seem like Jesus had no control, but the reality is that Jesus was in control of every moment. The disciples could see with hindsight that Jesus fulfilled the prophecies of the past during His passion. Every moment that followed the Triumphant Entry was planned and foreseen as God’s plan for the salvation of His people through His chosen One, the Messiah. Every moment of the Passion, from Judas’s betrayal, through the Last Supper and prayer on the garden, the trial and journey to Golgotha, and then the nailing of His flesh to the cross, was purposeful. Jesus knew what He was doing, and He did so for our sake. At the very moment of death Jesus commended Himself to the hands of God. The Father never abandoned His Son, but was there all along, watching as Jesus was obedient as we have never been able to be.
Paul wrote, “Have this in your mind, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form of God, didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, yes, the death of the cross.”
Paul is not calling us to die like Jesus; we are to follow Jesus wherever He leads us. We can’t do what Jesus did; He already finished that work. But we have been saved for a purpose, to continue the work that Jesus began. Now that sin and death have been defeated, it is up to us to take God's promise of forgiveness, healing and restoration to the world. We can't do that if we are busy chasing after our self-created gods. We can’t do that if we are focused on ourselves.
It won’t be easy. We will suffer persecution at the hands of those who would rather worship their own gods. Should we let it stop us? Jesus did not and Paul encourages us to have the same mind as Christ. After all, He left the glory of heaven to come to earth in flesh to reconcile us to God our Father. His nature is to love and save. He willingly suffered humiliation in life and death. We are called to do the same, not necessarily on a cross but in our everyday experiences.
We all deserve God’s wrath, but Jesus took it for us. Shouldn’t we try, as best we can, to make sure our neighbors know that Jesus died for them too? Until they recognize Jesus as Lord, they will remain enemies of God, chasing after their own gods and following their own way thinking they have all the power. We are not yet perfect, but we have something the world needs: the promise of salvation. We know that God recognizes that our power is gone and that the gods we rely upon can’t help us. He has mercy. He relents for the sake of His people, no matter how much we fail. We deserve the consequences of our failure to live according to God’s Word. We deserve His judgment, but Jesus Christ has made us children rather than enemies, and by His blood we are saved.
God did not abandon Jesus, and in the end His plan was fulfilled. We all rejected Jesus in our own way, but God made Him the cornerstone of our lives. We see how He had promised all along to make these things happen for our sakes. We see how we mistakenly expected God to do what we want rather than what He knows is best. With our hindsight, we know it was all for good and that knowledge fills our hearts with joy and peace. We can join in singing with the psalmist, “I will give thanks to you, for you have answered me, and have become my salvation.” This is indeed God’s work and it is marvelous. This is the day which God has made, not only the joyful day of Resurrection, but every day including the day Jesus died on the cross. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!
Through our baptism and faith, we are called to live in Christ and be of His mind in all we do. We live in a world where there are many people whose nature is like the scorpion’s: quickly striking at anyone who wants to help. Even when we share the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, those with such a nature will reject it and us. We suffer persecution at their hands, just as the holy man risked being stung by the scorpion. Do we let it stop us? Jesus did not. After all, He left the glory of heaven to come to earth in flesh to reconcile us to God our Father. His nature is to love and save and He willingly suffered humiliation in life and death. We are called to do the same, not on a cross, but in our everyday experiences so that others might know God’s love and mercy and grace. The day will come every knee will bow to our Lord Jesus Christ, but will they bow in thanksgiving or fear? We are called to bring salvation to the world even when it strikes back so that all will bow by faith.
Take time this week to read this story. As a matter of fact, read and reread it several times before Good Friday. Make the reality of the Passion a part of your being. Don’t try to pick it apart or try to understand every detail, simply listen to God’s story. Put yourself in the place of the characters – the crowds, the disciples, the Pharisees, Pilate. Experience it, not as a theologian trying to understand its meaning two thousand years later, but as someone who was there in Jerusalem that horrific day. Feel the pain, the anger, the hatred, the guilt, and remember that Jesus experienced it all for you. Remember that this was God’s way of making things right between Himself and His people. God was in control every moment. There is none like Him, and only by His grace will be ever know salvation and peace.
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