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The Work of Release
Spirituality of Imperfection Week 6
April 17, 2011
Palm Sunday
Matthew 21:1-11

When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the
Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples,saying to them, ‘Go into the village
ahead of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with
her; untie them and bring them to me.If anyone says anything to you, just
say this, “The Lord needs them.” And he will send them immediately.’This
took place to fulfil what had been spoken through the prophet, saying,
      ‘Tell the daughter of Zion,
     Look, your king is coming to you,
     humble, and mounted on a donkey,
     and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’
The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them;they brought the
donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them.A
very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches
from the trees and spread them on the road.The crowds that went ahead of
him and that followed were shouting,
     ‘Hosanna to the Son of David!
     Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!
     Hosanna in the highest heaven!’
When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking, ‘Who is
this?’The crowds were saying, ‘This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in
Galilee.

We officially concluded the sermon series on “The Spirituality of Imperfection”
last week, but I am going to admit to you that I am going a bit further with it
this week, because the book on which the series is based is a rich text, and
full of wisdom, and I think it can continue to be companion to us on this day,
and in the long shadow that the church calls us into during the upcoming
days of Holy Week. Jesus will soon meet his death days from now, after this
seemingly triumphant entry into the holy city of Jerusalem, as a much
anticipated Savior of Israel.  Still, the shadow is just emerging, it is just
beginning to take shape, because surely Jesus knew that his choice to come
into Jerusalem during the Passover, and to do it in this manner, with his
entry as some sort of conquering hero, though a peaceful one, surely he
knew that would raise the ire of the Temple forces threatened by his
newfound celebrity.  And certainly the Romans couldn’t be pleased, since
they had always had a handful with the Jews, because of their unwillingness
to submit to the Roman yoke, especially in the religious arena.  I think Christ
knew that this was the end, and I think he knew it because God had laid out
it out before him, the patterns of event, the moments to come, but I tell
you, it doesn’t take divine knowledge to notice the obvious, to assume that
the Romans were not going to tolerate any pretenders to the throne, even
someone like Jesus who publicly declined any interest in human thrones.  

Certainly, that didn’t matter to the Romans, and so when Jesus sends forth
for the donkey and the colt, he knew what he was doing.  Now, I have to tell
you, as a quick aside, this is a teaching moment for us, because you have a
moment here where you can see the writer of Matthew’s obsessions with
having Jesus fulfill what he believed to be the Messianic prophecies, and to
fulfill them to the tee, exactly and literally.  Note that he has Jesus riding on
both a colt and donkey at the same time, as if such a thing was possible.  In
Mark and Luke, it is only a single animal, a colt, he rides in on, and thus it
really does highlight how obsessed with Matthew was with having Jesus fill
each and every prophecy he felt spoke to the Messiah, so as to prove to his
reader that this Jesus of Nazareth was indeed the Jewish Messiah.  It’s a
wonderful moment to remind us that each of the Gospels in our Bible really
do have their own character, their own way of presenting to us who they
understand Jesus to be, and for Matthew it was all about showing how Jesus
fulfilled all the texts from the Jewish Tanak, the Old Testament in our Bible,
that he believed told of what this Messiah would do when he arrived on the
scene.  

But the irony of it all is that this Messiah was not going to be the kind of
Messiah that so many had hoped for, perhaps even the kind of Messiah
Matthew himself had hoped for—a man of power and might, someone who
would route the Romans, defeat them, re-establish the kingdom of Israel to
the glory days of David.  Instead this Jesus comes riding into town on a
donkey, not a warhorse, as conquering heroes so often did in the ancient
world, and the people cry out Hosanna, “save us” they yell, hoping that
indeed he would restore a humiliated people to their rightful place of honor
and independence.  They tear down palm leaves, simple palm leaves as a way
of greeting this man, this Jesus, who had making waves for almost three
years now, and now, they hoped these waves would become a storm,
sweeping away the shackles of Roman rule.

And I think Jesus knows this and he knows that he will disappoint most of
them in that crowd because he knows he will not be the Messiah they want,
the man they want him to be, and so some of those faces that he is looking
out at right now, whose smiles he sees, whose joy is etched on their faces,
whose shouts echo in his ears, they will turn on him in a fury and a rage that
only those who have been deeply disappointed can really do.  Jesus knows
that this will happen, as he sits upon the colt, receiving their adoration, he
knows that it is a shallow wonder, a shallow joy, one that will not last the
week.  And still, he rides into that city, looking out on their faces, their
emotions, the children running beside him and his disciples, the men and
women, old and young, shouting and waving palms, hope showing forth in
their bodies, their faces, their hands and feet.  What a wonder it must have
been, to be there, to witness it all, and yet, to know that it will all be fleeting,
that it will not last the week.  

Now, during this past, thousands of years later, in the here and now, I’ve
wondered a lot about how Jesus must have felt like as he entered into
Jerusalem, knowings that his days were numbered, that he had only hours to
live, only a certain amount of breath to breathe.  Do you think he did what
many who have received word of their impending death do, which was to
survey their life, to think about all that was done and all that was left
undone?  Do you think during that week, knowing what he knew was about
to happen, that he thought about his childhood, playing with the other kids
in the streets of Nazareth?  Or did his parents come to mind, especially his
mother, who seemed to be beside him during these last days, and whom
Jesus, on the cross, puts into the loving care of one of his disciples,
according to John’s Gospel?  What about the past three years, the ups and
downs with these ones who had followed him, faithfully to the end, or at
least up until the last few hours of his life, as the upcoming drama will surely
show…These men, these women, these disciples of his, they had been such a
disappointment, in so many ways, but he loved them all, even the one who
would betray him, dear confused and selfish Judas.  Do you think all of this
was running through his mind, as the streets of Jerusalem fell underneath
the heavy hoofs of the colt on which he was riding, with all the shouts and
fanfares echoing in his ears, and the faces of hope right in front of him, the
pilgrims of Jerusalem believing that he was the One, surely he was the One…

I know it is bit presumptuous to guess what Jesus might have been
thinking—in fact, I was reminded by a colleague of mine this week who I
shared my thoughts with, that it was probably more than a “bit”
presumptuous to imagine what Christ must have been thinking and feeling at
that moment, as if such thing was even really possible for us nowadays,
much less this one who was going through it some two thousand years ago.  
But that has never stopped me in the past, being presumptuous, but maybe
I am just hoping that he was feeling what I think he was feeling, and
thinking, as the city of Jerusalem began to take him in one last time, like a
child to her mother’s breast, and yet, also like a grave claims its new
occupant.  

And frankly, we humans tend to be fascinated by what happens near the
end, by what is going within the one who is careening towards the end of
their life—and I don’t think it’s a morbid fascination, but rather it is our own
wondering about how we might meet our end, if we are given the chance to
know that it is coming.  Even the Gospels give us details about the death of
our Christ, in profound ways, and, in fact we are given Jesus’ last words,
though there are differences in the Gospels about what those last words
were:  

•        In Matthew and Mark :
o        My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?
•        In Luke:
o        Father forgive them, for they know not what they do
o        Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise (in response
to one of the two thieves crucified next to him)
o        Father, into your hands I commit my spirit (last words)
•        In John:
o        Woman, behold your son: behold your mother (directed at Mary, the
mother of Jesus, either as a self reference, or as a reference to the beloved
disciple and an instruction to the disciple himself)
o        I thirst (just before a wetted sponge, mentioned by all the Canonical
Gospels, is offered)
o        It is finished (last words)          
                                                     (from Wikipedia)

So many of us are fascinated by the last moments of our loved ones,
especially if we were not there.   When I tell the story of my last moments
with my father, when he told me that he was proud of me, and proud of who
I had become, when I tell that story, II notice people really pay attention—
they know something is up and this moment, this story demands their
attention.  When Martin Luther, the great Protestant reformer, died in 1546,
someone sketch a portrait of his face just hours after his death, a death
mask, and they did this because people in the Middle Ages thought that the
manner of one’s death, the way your face found its final repose, was an
indication of what state of relationship he or she had with God.  If the face
was contorted, in pain, anguished, surely God was displeased with them, and
thus God had not given them an easy death.  If, on the other hand, the face
was at peace, then surely God was pleased with this servant, and thus their
life had been lived in honor of God. For those who were wondering whether
or not the Protestants were right, or the Catholics were right during this
tumultuous time, Luther’s face at the time of his death was of supreme
importance, and so when the sketch of his face was completed hours after
his last breath, it immediately began making its rounds around Europe, so as
to show that Luther had a good death, and thus his life’s grand work, the
Protestant Reformation, was surely the will of the living God.  When the
Gospel writers tell us Jesus last words, and the manner of his death, they
too know that it matters to those early listeners of the story of Jesus—if he
died a criminal’s death, what were those last minutes like, and what can it tell
us of his life, of his work in this world?  

We could spend days on those last words of Christ, but I have no doubt that
Jesus had been thinking for days before the moment of his last breath about
his life and what it would amount to, about those he would leave behind, if
only for days, until his resurrection, but then, of course, he would leave again
afterwards, at least in body.  I’ll tell you what I presumptuously think he was
feeling in those last few days, before the anguish in the Garden, before the
betrayals and the pain of the crucifixion, all of which I think he knew would
happen—I think he felt, deep in his bones, deep within him, knowing
everything of the past, knowing of what the coming days would bring, I think
he felt deep and wondrous gratitude to God for what had been, and, in his
better moments, gratitude for even the coming days, for what was to come.  
In the book we just left, The Spirituality of Imperfection, one of character
traits that so often comes out of the experience of being a recovering addict,
is that of gratitude, that moment when one realizes that you have gone to
hell and back, and you are still here, that God has been with you, and you
survived hell, even the hell of your own making.  There is a story of a blind
man who was begging in a city park, when someone approached him and
asked him whether people were giving generously.  The blind man shook a
nearly empty tin.  The visitor said to him, “Let me write something on your
card.”  The blind man agreed.  That evening the visitor returned.  “Well, how
were things today?”  The blind man showed him a tin full of money and
asked, “What on earth did you write on that card?”  “Oh,” said the other, “I
merely wrote ‘Today is a spring day, and I am blind.’” (Kertz & Ketcham 175)  
Gratitude is all about being thankful for what you have, at this moment,
something we so often forget to do in the hustle and bustle of life, until we
encounter someone who does not have what we have or has gone through
hell and back, and we are in wonder that they are still standing.  Knowing
what Jesus knew was to come, all of it, I still think he rode into Jerusalem full
of gratitude to God, to others, even as he was thinking about the pain and
betrayal that was surely to come.  

Leonard Cohen, the musical artist and poet, has written a prayer that comes
out of his own Jewish tradition, and it is something I think Jesus must have
been thinking and feeling as the crowds pressed upon him in those heady
first days in Jerusalem.  Cohen writes this prayer: “For all that is, thank you.  
For all that is to come, yes…”  That last word, “yes,” the one so unexpected
in some many ways, because I would have probably put in another “thank
you,” after “for all that is to come…” that last word, “yes,” is the right word,
because that one three letter word looks to the past and says that God was
there, and it looks to the future, and says, yes, God will be there as well.  
When one truly appreciates what God has done in the past, that God has
been good to you and me, then one knows that we can embrace the future,
that we can say “yes” to that which do not yet understand, “yes” to the
coming Gethsemane’s in our own lives, knowing that simple word, “yes,” will
get us from pleading “let this cup pass from me” to the acceptance found in
the words, “not my will, but your will be done.” Jesus’ last words, whichever
they were, from the ones we have in the Gospels, all of them came out of
this gratitude to God, whether it was the painful words of abandonment
found in Mark and Matthew, words that were gifts to us, because they allow
us to express our hurt and pain, and still know that even Christ felt that way
in moments in his own life.  I think this deep gratitude also found its way into
the words “it is finished” recorded in John, or the words of submission, found
in Luke, where he commits his spirit to God.  

Thinking about endings and gratitude this past week, I’ve been wondering
about my own personal ending on this side of eternity, (I know that is
morbid to think for some of you) about how it might come about, or whether
it will be tomorrow or fifty years from now.  I think I want to know ahead of
time, that my days are limited here on this earth, though I know others that
don’t want to know, they want to die in their sleep and so forth, and, of
course, that is just a preference thing, and that is certainly fine.  But the
reason I personally want to know that my time is limited here is that I want
to make sure and say a few things, things that should be said on a daily
basis:  I want to tell my friends and family, that I love them, and to thank for
being who they were with me, and I want to tell my spouse, my partner, that
I love him, and to thank him for loving me and loving me so well  But, you
know, at the end, in those final moments, I want to say what I think, what I
am perhaps presuming, was in Christ’s heart that week, on his mind, as the
colt made its way through the Jerusalem streets: I want to that I am grateful
to God for the journey, and that, like Leonard, Cohen, I want to say, “For all
that was, thank you, and for all that is, thank you, and for all that is to
come, I say yes…”  What do you want to say, in those final moments, if you
are given that chance, to those you love, to those you struggle to love, and
to God, who has given you the very life that is about to be transformed into
something different, moments, hours from then?  I want to invite you to
think about that question, as this most sacred week winds its way to Easter,
to resurrection, to new life…Amen.