Should we celebrate Palm
Sunday? Twenty years ago, this would have been a silly question.
Even ten years ago, it was pretty much a given that Christians start down the
road toward the Passion by shaking greenery in the direction of the Messiah.
We like to picture ourselves among the crowds that welcomed Jesus to
So, it may come as a surprise that over the last ten years this day, Palm
Sunday, has fallen under scrutiny. Some theologians, good theologians,
have asked if we need to change it. Why? Well, in a nutshell, their
concern goes like this... Mid-week services on Maundy Thursday and Good
Friday are not as well-attended as they used to be. Many Christians are
not making it to Holy Week worship. Why, you ask? Well, your guess
is probably as good as mine. I have heard some say that attendance is
down because we are simply too busy. After all, the rest of the world
doesn't pause on Friday at noon. Our workplaces, our schools, the rhythms
of our society are not set up to accommodate mid-week worship. Maybe we're
trying to swim upstream. Others suggest that problem lies in the
soberness of Maundy Thursday and the sheer brutality of Good Friday.
Perhaps the story of Christ's final days is too hard for some to bear--too much
of a downer, in a culture that savors a more upbeat religion.
Whatever the reason, it's true that many contemporary Christians go from the
parade of Palm Sunday directly to the party of Easter without journeying down
the rocky trail of Holy Week. And thus, the theological rub.
Liturgists are concerned that Christians who skip over the events of the
Passion--arcing from one celebratory Sunday to the next--will develop a puny
faith.
Well, what happens to faith that has not had a chance to struggle--faith that
has not grappled with truly difficult moments in the life of God? It
might become a faith that wilts in the face of hardship and tragedy.
After all, if you believe that life is one long party for those who trust in
God, then what happens when the party ends? Does faith end too?
Wondering about all of this, the lectionary has suggested a compromise:
Palm/Passion Sunday--a day on which we recognize both the triumphal entry and
the events of the Passion.
I think the theology here is right on target, although I wonder if the
compromise that has been reached is not. Most of the Palm/Passion
services that I have seen end up looking a lot like the Chevrolet product that
came out in about 1965--the El Camino. The El Camino aspired to be both a
cushy sedan (up front) and a rugged pickup truck (in the rear). In the
end, though, it failed. The people who wanted a comfy ride bought sedans,
and the people who wanted to haul stuff bought trucks. The ugly duckling
El Camino had a pretty short shelf life. To have a Palm--"slash"--Passion
service runs the same risk. In trying to do too much, it ends up
disappointing. Perhaps, then, some have suggested, we ought to jettison
the Palm Sunday portion of our current hybrid. If we need the Passion to
be spiritually whole, then shouldn't we make the crucifixion the central focus
of the Sunday before Easter? And maybe that's where we'll end up.
But, I wonder, will we miss something if we discard our annual parade?
As I have thought about this question, I keep coming back to that strange word,
"Hosanna." You've got to admit that it is not a term that comes
up in everyday conversation. If you are like me, the last time you
uttered "Hosanna" was, well... a year ago in March, last Palm
Sunday. It is a peculiar word--one that is difficult to define.
Scholars' best guess is that "Hosanna" is a contraction of two Hebrew
terms: yaw-shah, meaning to save or deliver, and naw,
meaning to beseech or pray. So you might translate the shouts of the
crowd as: "We beseech you to deliver us." The people
cheered. They tossed branches from the nearby trees to the ground, and
they called out, "Hosanna." They looked upon this
prophet--rumored to be the Messiah--and they cried out to him, "Save
us. Save us." I'm thinking that the meaning of Palm Sunday
hangs on those two words--on that simple plea. Do we feel compelled to
shout "Save us!" to our God as we prepare for Holy Week?
Last year I played stump-the pastor with a group of students who had come to
tour my seminary. They asked a group of
us questions they had scribbled on 3x5 cards. Four of the twelve cards asked:
"Is Jesus the only way to salvation?" Being an annoying pastor,
I told them that before I would answer that question, they had to answer one
for me. "Since salvation implies that you are being saved from
something, what do you think Jesus is saving you from?" The first
answer that came back was "hell." Jesus saves people from
hell. Now, I don't think this is a bad answer. But I must admit
that my initial reaction when someone answers that "hell" is what God
saves us from … is suspicion. I am suspicious: first,
because, for a good portion of American Christians, this is the (obvious and
only) "right answer." In other words, I had to wonder if the
youth were thinking: Here is the preacher; the question is, "What
does Jesus save us from?" She must want us to respond,
"Hell." It's kind of similar to what happens when I go to see
my doctor, and he asks, "So, have you been exercising?" and I know
what he wants me to say.
Still, beyond being suspicious of people's tendency to want to tell the pastor
what they think she wants to hear, I have some theological concerns about this
answer. It is a complicated thing to ask, "What does God save us
from?" I don't believe that the people lining the streets of
One of the youth raised her hand and said, "Death." Another
fellow offered that God could really help him out by saving him from an
upcoming math test. Then one of the seventh graders said,
"Pressure." And another youth said, "My parents' expectations."
Then another, shy individual, almost in a whisper said, "Fear. I
want God to save me from my fears." All of these answers struck me
as more sincere than "hell." Although, I think you could argue
that their comments gave a pretty clear picture of what "hell" looks
like to a 7th grader.
Can we dip down into our souls and be as honest as these young people
were? When we wave our palms and boldly cry out, "Hosanna," do
we dare imagine what we really want God to save us from? Save me from
anger. Save me from cancer. Save me from depression. Save me
from debt. Save me from the strife in my family. Save me from
boredom. Save me from getting sent back to
In viewing Palm Sunday from that angle, we can begin to see the potential for
some real depth in this celebration, for embedded in our waving palms is an
appeal to God that originates in the most vulnerable places inside of us; and
it bubbles, almost beyond our control, to the surface.
"Hosanna." "Save us." Please God take the
broken places that will tear us apart and make them whole. We beseech
you, God, jump into the water and drag our almost-drowned selves to
shore. "Save us." "Hosanna."
The trajectory suggested by those seventh graders may redeem Palm Sunday from
triviality, but it also forces two important follow-up questions. First,
after we ask God to save us, we want to know: Does God respond to our
cries? Does God do anything to save us? And, second, how does God
save us? These are crucial inquiries for those of us who cling to the Christian
faith, and I want to take my own meager shot at answering them. But
before I do that, I should say that I believe that the answer to these
questions (to the extent that there is any "answer" that makes sense
at all) is entrenched in the mystery of this coming week. In other words,
I think that the journey from Maundy Thursday through Good Friday and finally
to Easter is the closest thing to an answer that we Christians have.
Of course, the danger in this assertion is that the story we will experience
this coming week may not feel like salvation. That is one of the stark
outcomes in today's text. The people wanted salvation, which they defined
as "freedom from the Romans." When it became apparent that
Jesus was not "that kind of Messiah," the people's jubilation quickly
vanished. "Save us," they cried, but then Jesus did not set
about saving them in a manner that they could recognize. He did not take
up a sword and send the Romans fleeing. Instead, he went and had supper
with his friends; he went and prayed in a garden. Some Messiah!? It
only took a few days for the crowds to switch from crying "Hosanna"
to the shouts of "Crucify him." So, yes, the risk of Holy Week
is that we'll take a peek at Jesus' actions and think, "Hmm, this doesn't
look much like salvation to me."
So what does it look like to be saved by God? In experiencing the
fullness of Holy Week, one of the strands that I have always clung to for
comfort is the notion that this story is about God being with us. How
does God being with us save us? I am not completely sure, but I do think
that part of being saved involves a God who would stoop to step right into the
messiest and scariest parts of life with us.
Nine years ago my father took his life.
To say that I was devestated is a masterpiece
of understatement. I was standing in the
funeral home in
You know this too, don't you? To be approached by friends in a time of
great need is to experience a fierce solidarity that smacks of the holy.
I have got to believe that this is, in part, how God saves us. God
doesn't fax salvation in from some suite in heaven's ritzy district. God
comes. God incarnates. God steps out of grandeur to stand with us
in awkward places at awful times to experience life and death. God
answers our cries of "Hosanna" in ways so utterly unexpected that we
have got to look (a second time) to see if they can possibly be true.
I wonder... Is there any better way to commence Holy Week than with palms in
our hands and "Hosannas" on our lips? Is there any more
faithful way to embark on this sacred journey than to ask God, out of the deep,
honest places inside of us, to "Save us... please, save us"?
Let us pray.
Holy and gracious God, we need you to rescue us from the depths.
Please do what you have always done when your people have cried out,
"Please save us!" In Christ's name we pray. Amen..
Mary Anne Biggs, Pastor
Nekoosa United
Nekoosa