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Sermon for Palm/Passion Sunday – March 24, 2024
Mark 15:1-39
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
There was a scene from “The Simpsons” from many years ago which has stuck with me, for reasons which will become obvious. Homer Simpson, through his own stupidity (as usual) finds himself in grave danger. The details aren’t important, but if you’re wondering, he’s in a bucket truck floating down a river, about to sink. Homer, high up in the boom bucket of the truck but sinking fast, falls to his knees in a posture of prayer. He folds his hands piously and says, “I’m normally not a praying man, but if you’re up there, please, save me Superman!”
If you’ll forgive the silly illustration on such a spiritually serious day, I think it helps us to understand this jarring transition we experience as we move so quickly from palms being waved in celebration to reeds being used to strike Jesus, from shouts of “Hosanna” to shouts of “Crucify him,” from a joyful procession to a horrific crucifixion, from palms to the Passion.
You see, the crowds waving palm branches at Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem were not unlike Homer Simpson. These were people who were in trouble. They were sinking under Roman oppression. These were people who needed help, who needed saving. In fact, the word “Hosanna” literally means, “come and save us!”
But the adoring crowds cheering for Jesus were expecting a Superman of sorts. They were expecting a strong man who would swoop in and rescue them from all their problems. They were expecting a king in the mold of David. They said as much: “Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David.” They believed they were welcoming a Man of Steel who would flex on the Romans and restore their kingdom to its former glory. “Hosanna!” they cried. “Save us, Superman!”
The crowds were not wrong in celebrating Jesus’ arrival. They were not wrong in treating him as a Messianic figure. For the first time, Jesus let people publicly celebrate him as such! Jesus seemed to soak it all in as he made his way through the city gate on the back of a donkey. Those Messianic shouts and accolades and praises were appropriate. The people were not wrong in placing their hope in him. They were not wrong in shouting “Hosanna.” They were not wrong in expecting that he had come to save them. He had!
But they were very wrong about what he would save them from, and how he would do it.
When this became evident, the people turned on him pretty quickly. Notice how when Pilate offered to release a prisoner for them, they chose Barabbas – an insurrectionist. He was a rebel against Rome. He was a strong man, a fighter. This is a very revealing choice. This was the kind of savior they were looking for – someone who would help them build their earthly kingdom.
Even the disciples turned on Jesus, each in their own way. Judas outright betrayed him. Peter denied even knowing him. They all ditched him after he was arrested.
We heard the gory details of what happened to Jesus next. He was beaten with a whip. He had a crown of thorns painfully pressed onto his head. He was struck with a reed. He was cruelly mocked and spit on. His hands and feet were nailed to a cross. Then he was lifted up from the earth, just as he said he would be. He hung there by the tendons in his wrists for six hours, his life slowly draining away, until he gave out a loud cry and breathed his last.
This certainly didn’t look like a Superman type of savior. Jesus didn’t look like he was saving anyone. He looked like he needed saving himself! That’s what some of the people at the foot of the cross said! They heard him say, “Eloi, Eloi,” and misheard him, thinking he was calling for Elijah to come save him.
But something happened the moment Jesus died which shows that he knew exactly what he was doing by being lifted up on the cross. It shows that he was indeed the savior, even if he wasn’t the kind of savior people expected. At the moment of his death the temple curtain was torn in two. There was this enormous curtain in the temple separating the people from the inner sanctum of the temple where God was believed to be most powerfully present. At the very moment Jesus died, this curtain was ripped open! It had stood for centuries as a sort of guard rail preventing sinners from stumbling into the Holy of Holies. It prevented sinners from coming into the presence of the Holy God. And when Jesus breathed his last, this curtain was torn right down the middle. There would no longer be any separation between sinful humanity and a holy God. Jesus had taken the sin of the world upon himself. The wages of sin is death, and Jesus paid it for all of us! And in so doing, he has torn open the curtain, giving us immediate and eternal access to God.
I find it very interesting that the only person in the Passion narrative who recognized Jesus as God’s Son was a soldier, a centurion. Seeing how Jesus gave out a loud cry and then breathed his last, the centurion responded to what he witnessed by saying, “Truly this man was the Son of God.” This centurion had almost certainly seen hundreds of crucifixions before. Maybe thousands. What was different about this one? Yes, there was the eerie darkness that had fallen over the land, but everyone saw that, and they didn’t respond like he did. Some scholars have suggested that it was the way Jesus gave that last loud cry. Usually, victims of crucifixion die of suffocation. They are very quiet at the end. They don’t have any breath left to shout with. Perhaps he saw a unique strength in Jesus, as he gave that last loud shout.
Or maybe this unique strength went deeper. The ethos of a soldier, especially one who was responsible for 100 men, includes an understanding of sacrifice. Yes, they are fighters. Yes, their goal is to defeat their enemies. But every soldier understands that they may be called upon to sacrifice themselves for the sake of others. Perhaps this centurion had a revelation that this was what Jesus was doing. Perhaps he saw in Jesus the unique strength of sacrificial love. Perhaps he saw God at work in Jesus’ sacrifice of himself. Perhaps this is what made him say, “Truly this man was the Son of God.”
When we sing “Hosanna” now – which we do every Sunday in our communion liturgy – we are not asking for Superman to come save us with muscle, with earthly power. We are not calling for a savior who merely comes to help us with our earthly projects. We are not calling for a savior who will swoop in and immediately take all our problems away. We too will have crosses to bear in this life.
When we sing “Hosanna” now, we are welcoming a savior who comes to us in the midst of our problems, in the midst of the crosses we bear, assuring us that we are not alone, and that our suffering will not have the last word.
When we sing “Hosanna” now, we are celebrating the coming of a savior who has saved us from sin and death by dying for us. We are celebrating the savior who has torn the curtain in two, from top to bottom, giving us immediate and intimate and eternal access to God. We are celebrating the savior who took all our sin upon himself so that we could approach God in all boldness and confidence. We are celebrating the savior who sacrificed himself for us, so that we could live in the hope and peace and joy of God’s gracious and forgiving love, today and forever.
Jesus wasn’t the savior anyone expected, but he is indeed the savior we need the most.
And so when we sing “Hosanna” now, we are joining the centurion in looking at our Lord on the cross, and confessing our faith that, “Truly this man was God’s Son.”
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church