Showing Up for Jesus: Shouting & Silence
In their book, The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’ Final Days in Jerusalem, Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan paint a picture of two competing parades on the first day of the week of Passover in Jerusalem.
Imagine that on a particular day, through the western “main” gateway into Jerusalem, Pontius Pilate rode into the city on a mighty steed, flanked by officers and standard bearers. Perhaps alongside him were banners bearing the image of Emperor Tiberius, whom he served.
Pilate entered the city with military fanfare and with troops he led from Caesarea Maratima, troops whose mission was keeping the peace, making sure the city was “safe” and “secure” as pilgrims arrived to celebrate the Passover.
In our reading of Luke’s gospel just weeks ago, we witnessed a conversation about Pilate murdering faithful Galilean Jews making their sacrifices in the Temple.
Peace – the Peace of Rome, the Pax Romana – was of highest importance to the Emperor Tiberius and therefore to Pilate.
But keeping peace in Judea wasn’t necessarily peaceful, if you see what I mean.
The military parade into Jerusalem at the West Gate was about power over people, it was about order, and it was a call to a kind of obedient submission to Rome.
It is possible that on that same day, on the other side of town, there was a different parade unfolding. The East Gate was the “backside” of the walled city of Jerusalem. The East Gate faced the Mount of Olives, a location referenced by the prophet Zechariah as the place where the Messiah was to appear:
14 See, a day is coming for the Lord, when the plunder taken from you will be divided in your midst. 2 For I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city shall be taken and the houses plundered and the women raped; half the city shall go into exile, but the rest of the people shall not be cut off from the city. 3 Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations as when he fights on a day of battle. 4 On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives, which lies before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley, so that one half of the mount shall withdraw northward and the other half southward.
From somewhere on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples to gather a colt, and in that way Jesus was outfitted to fulfill the expectation set in Zechariah’s 9th chapter:
Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you;
triumphant and victorious is he,
humble and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
On that borrowed colt, Jesus rode up the steep road into Jerusalem. This man from Galilee who amassed a following as he moved through the countryside teaching about an authority so much greater than Rome or than the Temple leaders, (this man) was met by shouting crowds who took off their cloaks to cover the road as Jesus passed by.
In Luke’s gospel, the crowd isn’t waving palms. Why cloaks? Palms could have been scavenged along the roadside, something free, something of little personal worth to the person waving it. Here in Luke’s gospel, the people remove an item of clothing, something that would have been of personal value, to place in the dirt of the road for Jesus to pass over.
As Jesus rode in, the crowd shouted out a variation of psalm 118, which was a traditional acclimation by pilgrims to Jerusalem as they arrived for the Passover:
“Blessed is the king
who comes in the name of the Lord!
Peace in heaven,
and glory in the highest heaven!”
Can you imagine for a moment the feelings in that crowd – the Jewish people were struggling to maintain an identity and to honor God as was their tradition under Rome’s rule. They were being squeezed – politically, economically, socially.
In counterpoint to the parade happening on the other side of town, these people feel no fear of this man. Instead there is praise for what they believe this moment represents – liberation from the oppressive political powers of Rome. These people see this man riding in from the Mount of Olives and they remember their scripture. This must be the Messiah. This must be the new King!
Maybe this explains why they shout “blessed is the King” rather than blessed is the ONE which is how the psalm is actually written.
Imagine the religious leaders watching this unfold. I have to imagine that some of them were conflicted by what they saw.
They were living in a moment when peaceable relations with Rome and with Pilate made life bearable. By tending the relationship, keeping the peace, they could keep Temple practices alive. And Rome had helped to bring clean water to the city. Rome had improved the roads, which might make it easier for pilgrims to come to the Temple. Not everything Roman was bad.
Too much stirring the pot, too much inciting the crowd, too many demands for too much freedom probably felt very dangerous to some of the religious leaders that day. Better to still have the Temple and be inside the walls of the holy city after all…
Some of those religious leaders asked Jesus to silence the crowd. Jesus’s response to them draws our attention back to something John said as he was baptizing in the wilderness. Jesus told them that if the people are quiet, even the stones will sing.
Can you remember John in the wilderness pronouncing that God could raise the children of Abraham from the stones around him?
Jesus echoes John, proclaiming God’s power to animate even the inanimate stones, here in a city built of stones.
In Luke’s gospel, there is a growing disconnect between what the gathered crowd expected and what Jesus was doing. They might have been expecting a king with military might, a king who honors God.
But in Luke’s gospel, Jesus is up to something far bigger than military, political and social might.
When Mary announced her pregnancy to her cousin Elizabeth, she proclaimed what God was doing through this baby’s birth;
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones
and lifted up the lowly;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things
and sent the rich away empty.
And Jesus himself, in his first teaching in the synagogue, declared:
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
The people gathered expected Jesus to challenge the political powers that occupied Israel, but with all that we’ve learned about Jesus throughout Luke’s gospel – with all of the proclamations of his power to release the captives, to fill the empty with good things, is it possible that the crowd’s expectations were too small?
Too narrow?
Too worldly?
Could they have possibly expected the fullness of what Jesus was proclaiming?
…You know, that stuff back in the sermon on the plain:
“Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.
21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now,
for you will be filled.
“Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.
22 “Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. 23 Rejoice on that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven, for that is how their ancestors treated the prophets.
24 “But woe to you who are rich,
for you have received your consolation.
25 “Woe to you who are full now,
for you will be hungry.
“Woe to you who are laughing now,
for you will mourn and weep.
26 “Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.
27 “But I say to you who are listening: Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; 28 bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you. 29 If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. 30 Give to everyone who asks of you, and if anyone takes away what is yours, do not ask for it back again. 31 Do to others as you would have them do to you.
From the moment Jesus launched his public ministry, he proclaimed the Kin-dom of God, not the Kingdom of Israel. Everything he taught was a non-violent protest against or resistance to the dominant powers. He demanded power for the meek, food for the hungry, sight for the blind.
Today as I ponder that parade into the East gate, I hope that I can show up in the places where Jesus and the justice Jesus represents is riding into town. I hope I can raise my voice in hopeful acclamation of peace and love.
And I hope I can silence my own voice at the right times in order to hear God’s voice and really know Jesus – not as a political force but as a cosmic force of peace and love.
Am I willing to shout for Jesus? Even when I don’t quite get the whole big picture, kind of like the gathered disciples that day, am I willing to cheer him on in the streets? Will my shouts be rooted in what I have learned, what I have heard, what I know because of my silent time with God?
I close today with some words from a sermon preached by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the pastor turned anti-Nazi resistor who was executed in 1945 for his role in a plot to overthrow Hitler. Preaching on 2 Corinthians 12:9, “my strength is made perfect in weakness,” Bonhoeffer said:
Christianity stands or falls by its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness and pride of power, and by its apologia for the weak. I feel that Christianity is doing too little in making these points rather than doing too much. Christianity has adjusted itself much too easily to the worship of power. It should give much more offence, more shock to the world, than it is doing. Christianity should take a much more definite stand for the weak than for the potential moral right of the strong.
Beloved, are we showing up and shouting for the weak right now?
For God’s justice for the poor and oppressed?
Are we shouting for Jesus right now?
For the refugee driven out of their homeland because of violence?
For the working poor who harvest our fields and stock our grocery shelves?
Are we protesting against violence and power?
And if we are not, are we actually following Jesus?
In our moments of silence may we find the words to shout.
Amen.
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