The King goes back [Palm Sunday; The Passion according to St. Matthew]

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE.

Thus, Jesus speaks today, saying:

"When Jesus had finished all these sayings, he said to his disciples,'You know that after two days the Passover is coming, and the Son of Man will be delivered up to be crucified.'”

Palm Sunday. The Sunday where our children dance through the church and bright green palm branches fill our hands. The Sunday where Jesus rides in triumph. The Sunday where all of Jerusalem finally acknowledges all the work Jesus has been doing, rightly. The Sunday where every knee bows and every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord.

Everyone is so excited, even non-Christians get Palm Sunday. Pomp and circumstance, joy, and a parade. The victory is won. The after-party starts tonight. Throw out your cloaks. Throw out your palm branches. We are on our way to the Promised land, boys. Don’t count on anything you’re carrying. Dump it with no thought of tomorrow. Today is the day.

Rejoice, rejoice greatly! Shout aloud! The King! The King has returned! We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what deeds you performed in their days,

    in the days of old: you with your own hand drove out the nations, but them you planted;

you afflicted the peoples, but them you set free; for not by their own sword did they win the land,

    nor did their own arm save them, but your right hand and your arm, and the light of your face, for you delighted in them.

You are my King, O God; ordain salvation for Jacob [this day]!

Through you we push down our foes; through your name we tread down those who rise up against us. For not in my bow do I trust, nor can my sword save me.

But you have saved us from our foes and have put to shame those who hate us.

In God we have boasted continually, and we will give thanks to your name forever.

Thus far from Psalm 44 (v.1-8), King David sings out with us on this Palm Sunday and we rejoice with him. We have seen and heard what God did in the past and can’t wait for what He’s going to do this time. But what David did not yet know, or what he knew backwards, was that defeat comes before victory. The cross before the empty grave. Suffering before glory.

David knew it backwards, because in his experience, you don’t win battles by losing them. You don’t gain victory by dying. St. Peter also knew this and wanted glory instead of suffering when he told Jesus that Jesus would not be dying on his watch (Mt 16:21-22). Jesus will not be going to Jerusalem, he said, will not suffer many things from the elders, chief priests and scribes, will not be killed and will not be raised on the third day. God forbid it!

Little did Zechariah know just what it would mean for his King to be humble and mounted on a donkey. Little did he think that cutting off Ephraim’s chariots and Jerusalem’s warhorses would mean cutting off His God from the land of the living. Little did he think that the peace of God would be the destruction of the Son.

Repent! Little did you know that being a Christian meant managing a budget, or making friends in your community, or attending Bible class. Little did you know the humility required. Little did you know how much of the world you would not be able to be a part of. Little did you know that the power that the Holy Spirit gives is something as small as simply believing.

How does Jerusalem acknowledge her King? She crucifies Him. How does she shout all day “Hosannas” to her king? She scourges Him and crowns Him with thorns.

Do not be fooled! The meekness of Christ is not seen in riding on a donkey. He is meek without the donkey. The donkey is the beast of the king as is proven by 1 Kings: “And the king said to them, ‘Take with you the servants of your lord and have Solomon my son ride on my own mule, and bring him down to Gihon. And let Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet there anoint him king over Israel. Then blow the trumpet and say, ‘Long live King Solomon!’” (1 Ki. 1:33-34)

Because we are fooled, the kingdom of God comes even without our prayer, even without our say-so, and even without our understanding. Jesus WILL be going to Jerusalem, WILL suffer many things from the elders, chief priests and scribes, WILL be killed and WILL be raised on the third day. This is the Road of the King. This is the King of Salvation and the crucifixion is the Way.

David the king and prophet has already turned the mood in the Divine Service. He preaches from Psalm 22 in the Introit and Gradual, telling us Jesus’ own lamentations, on this historic occasion. Even the Jews teach this psalm as having only to do with the Messiah and His suffering. David had to have witnessed the cross in a vision otherwise his words would not make sense: “they pierced my hands and my feet...They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture.” (Ps. 22:17-18)

St. Paul the great preacher of the cross, summarizes Zechariah’s prophesy, in saying that the chariot and warhorse from Ephraim and Jerusalem will be cut off by Jesus becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

St. Matthew, who best describes our Lord’s humanity, portrays the beginning of the Messiah’s utter abandonment, rehearsing, as it were, our own death march towards Jerusalem on the Last Day. Yet, today, it is Jesus Who advances to suffer and die for our sakes; to win our resurrection by His terrible passion and death.

Your salvation depends on this moment of Jesus’. We must follow Him and we must die with Him if we are to ever rise with Him. At the end of church, we take our palms and place them behind our crucifixes to continually remind ourselves of all of this, that Christ’s grace rests wherever these branches are brought and with His right hand He has defeated every evil for us and grants us His protection, whom He has redeemed with His holy, precious, innocent Blood.

These palms are not instruments of magic. They, like the crucifix, are a visible sign to us of what has transpired this Holy Week. That our King of kings, humble and riding a donkey, has accomplished salvation for us, cutting off the chariots of sin, death, and the devil for us, setting us free from the waterless pits and taking us to the New Jerusalem, restoring 100-fold of what sin and this world has taken away.

Make no mistake. The King rides today. But His victory is in suffering and the cross, the exact opposite of how the world sees victory.