Passion Sunday 2018; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson
Once there was a man who suffered from many illness, for a very long time. He had seen countless doctors, had countless tests, had taken countless prescriptions. But he didn’t get any better. He turned to alternatives. He drank exotic teas, took mega doses of vitamins. Still he was no better. He heard of a master diagnostician. Made an appointment and waited to get in. Finally, he thought, his problems were over. This master doctor would be able to cure him, he was certain.
The day came for the examination. The doctor sat with him and she said, “My friend, you are not a healthy man. But you can be well again if you follow my advice. You need to lose about 60 pounds, maintain a regular course of exercise, and eat more grain, fruit and vegetables. You don’t need the medicines you are taking, or the vitamins, or the teas.”
The man was indignant. He demanded a new drug, a cure. The doctor smiled and said. “You don’t need medicine. You need to change your lifestyle.” The man stomped out and cursed the doctor and for the rest of his sickly life he told everyone about that the quack who didn’t deserve to be called a doctor.
Once there was a woman in serious trouble with the law. She had run up all sorts of debts. In desperation she had embezzled money from the company she worked for. The company was pressing charges. She was fit to be tied, with nowhere to turn. A friend of hers told her about an outstanding defense attorney who seldom lost a case. So, she called the lawyer immediately and he agreed to see her. “At last”, she said to herself, “I have a lawyer who will get these charges dropped. I’ll be able to get on with my life.”
When she met with him and explained her situation he shook his head and said, “What you did was wrong and you may need to spend some time in prison. After your release you’ll need to get into a program to pay off your debts. You’ll need a steady job to repay the company you stole from. If you do all this, you’ll be able to get your life back together again.”
The woman was outraged. She complained loudly, “I don’t need you to give me a lecture, I need you to defend me against these charges and get them dropped.” With that she dismissed the lawyer, bad mouthed him all over town, and resumed her search for someone who would do just what she wanted.
Once there was a small nation that was deeply troubled. For centuries foreign armies had controlled and dominated and oppressed the people. Many citizens had become cynical. They cheated even their own friends and neighbors at the market place. There was no peace. Reform movements came from time to time but soon failed for lack of support. A tiny ray of hope emerged.
People began to speak of the need for a leader who would overthrow the foreign army, establish a strong independent government and bring peace and prosperity to all. Word came that there was a man from Nazareth, a carpenter’s son of all things, who was able to heal, cast out evil, and do all sorts of wonders. He drew large crowds when he spoke because of his authoritative words.
“At last,” the people said to each other, “here is the messiah who will lead an army against Rome and re-establish Israel again. He will fix everything for us, economically, politically and religiously.”
One day, this man rode into the capital city of Jerusalem, on a donkey. They poured into the streets to welcome him and cheer his arrival. They waved branches, with the shouts of “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest!” That was on Sunday.
By Monday things were going downhill. Where was the army? He didn’t have an economic recovery plan. The people were not united. Nothing was happening. They were disappointed. Then a few days later they became angry. By Friday, when they learned he was facing death at the hands of the Romans for treason they filled the streets and their shouts turned from Hosanna to Crucify Him. And they did. This man, on whom all their hopes and dreams rested, this one they hoped would fix everything, this Messiah, was executed. And when he died, their hope for a mystical, presto-chango, quick-fix savior died as well.
The world has a way of eliminating that which doesn’t deliver just what it wants. The world doesn’t want a god who doesn’t make good on their expectations. The world wants a lapdog god it can domesticate and control, a sweet god who indulges and blesses the sickness and selfishness of the world, or “thank you very much” the world will just get by on its own.
The people of Jerusalem wanted a conqueror who would drive out the Romans by any means possible. They wanted victory, peace and prosperity. Instead they got a messiah who insisted that military victory was not the way to peace. They got, “Love your enemies, forgo the sword, seek justice not victory.” Jesus wasn’t what they wanted and they turned on him.
It’s easy now to look back, point our fingers of blame, shake our heads, wonder how Judas could have betrayed him, how Peter could have denied him, how the disciples could have slept in the garden. It’s easy to see the religious authorities were in cahoots with the Romans. Theologians create theories of a sacrifice necessary to pay for sins of the people, including you and me in that equation. They turn the whole thing into some sort of cosmic bargain struck to placate a vengeful god and so we join our hosannas with those of all the generations since, heralding the Messiah’s arrival, trusting Jesus will save us from whatever afflicts us now—sin, fear, death.
It’s harder to see that our wishes are much the same, still. Year after year we hear these texts. And there he is, riding into the capital on a donkey, making a mockery of all the hopes for a messiah who will get us off the hook. Jesus is an inconvenient messiah.
Even though the crowds had their way, even though his insistence that violence is not the answer was met with violence, even though the powers of the day threw their worst violence at him and caused him to cry out as he hung there dying, believing that even God had abandoned him, even then, he continued to love. “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” Not even a horrible lonely death like his could kill his belief that violence is not the answer.
Jesus’ life and death point to a way of life that meets violence with love, that seeks justice to find peace, that values the least and the lost, that puts people before treasure, that teaches anyone who will listen that life is to be lived with a spirit of generosity that echoes the grace of our Creator.
Jesus’ ways are not our ways. His teachings are demanding, life changing, pure, and they turn our conventional wisdom upside down. If we’re honest we can see that we love our lives, our stuff. We long to be on top. We learn to work the system and succeed. We consume all we can, including the beliefs that hold our world in place. We try to have our cake and eat it too. In order to do that, to keep Jesus as our messiah, we twist his teachings into that old bargain the theologians of old dreamed up. We make him into a knight on a white horse who rides in to save us with a grand and cosmic bargain so we can go on ignoring his inconvenient teachings.
But each year, there he is, as we read these texts, as we face the Hosannas turned to Crucify him, there he is, riding smack dab into the middle of the camp of the greatest military might of his day, the messiah, on the back of a donkey.
They didn’t want his teachings and the life changes that would result from following them. No, they wanted a majestic leader who would do it for them. We’re convicted right along with them—isn’t that what we want too? For Jesus to pay the price, make us right, solve the cosmic bargain for us?
But here we are. And Jesus’ teachings won’t die. Jesus is still showing us that we are not perfect creatures who fell from grace. No, we are each of us imperfect, “working out our salvation with fear and trembling, changing from one degree of glory into another,” struggling to follow this inconvenient messiah who shows us the way.
Jesus’ pathway means opening ourselves to the pain of others, choosing love over violence, self-giving over self-serving. Jesus points us to a way of being in the world, a leader on a donkey not a white horse, who insists we follow the wisdom of peace through justice, generosity over greed, selflessness over selfishness, mercy over vengeance, hope over fear, and most of all—love over hate. The way of this inconvenient messiah is dangerous. It may mean people will take advantage of us, it will mean sacrifice on our part, certainly.
The passion of Jesus’, the events of this Holy Week are not a doctrine to be dissected, but a drama to be experienced and explored again and again by those who would dare to conform our own lives to the courageous, inconvenient and faithful identity it presents. May we follow the Christ. Amen.