WHAT KIND OF KING IS THIS?

Luke 19:28-40; Philippians 2:5-11; Luke 19:41-48

Palm Sunday, April 10, 2022

Pastor Ritva H Williams

One of the highlights of my trip to the Holy Land in 2019 was a walk along the Palm Sunday road from the top of the Mount of Olives down to the Garden of Gethsemane. As  you see in the two  photos on the left, the road is paved, but narrow and steep with skinny little sidewalks and strategically placed handrails. The hilltop provides a panoramic view of the Old City of Jerusalem.  In the picture on the upper left you can see the golden dome of the Al-Aksa Mosque located precisely where the temple stood when Jesus walked there.

Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem started in Galilee and involved a 100 mile walk along the Jordan River valley to Jericho. The final 15 miles from Jericho to Jerusalem is challenging, as the topographical map on the upper right of the monitor shows. From Jericho to Bethany on the southeastern slope of the Mount Olives there is an elevation change of 2726 feet. Jesus and friends would have been traveling uphill on rocky roads like the one in bottom right photo of the slide. It’s no wonder Jesus needed a ride! He sent two disciples to fetch a donkey from the village.  How did he know there was a donkey waiting for him? Could it be that some prior arrangement had been made with the family of Mary, Martha and Lazarus who lived in Bethany? 

With Jesus seated on the colt, the disciples and pilgrims toiled up another 600 feet. As they reach the top of the Mount of Olives, they see the Holy City laid out before them. Only two more miles to go. The whole multitude of disciples erupts in praise, giving thanks to God for the deeds of power they witnessed. They shout, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven.” Jesus is their king. Hurray!

Some Pharisees accompanying them want Jesus to silence his disciples. They are worried and scared. You see, this pilgrim throng was on its way to celebrate Passover in the Holy City.  Passover commemorated God’s liberation of Israel from Egyptian slavery and oppression it was the most volatile and political of ancient Israel’s temple festivals.  As one commentator writes, “God’s triumph over the greatest superpower of its day must have resonated [with the Jewish people of Jesus’ time]. The political — nay, the revolutionary runs through the entire feast. This explains why Pontius Pilate and his legions would have left the comfortable confines of his palace in Caesarea Maritima for the parochial space of Jerusalem.” The Pharisees’ fear how the Romans will react to the disciples proclamation that Jesus is the king who comes in the name of the Lord.

As the crowd of disciples and pilgrims descends into the Kidron Valley, and approaches Jerusalem, Jesus weeps, lamenting the coming Roman war that will destroy the Holy City. Jesus enters the city and goes immediately to the Temple where he drives out the people who were selling things there.

Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem is made up of three moments captured in these paintings: (1) Jesus’ ride up and down the Mount of Olives on a donkey surrounded by his cheering disciples. Notice the two with their hands covering their mouths. They represent the Pharisees who want to silence the disciples.  (2) Jesus’ weeping and sorrow-filled lamentation for the city and its people in the coming war. (3) Jesus’ clearing vendors out of the temple courts. 

The disciples proclaim Jesus to be the king who comes in the name of the Lord. But what kind of king rides a donkey? What kind of king weeps? What kind of king disrupts the business of the holiest place in the land? 

In the world of Jesus, horses were war machines, symbols of power and might. Kings and military officers rode horses. Donkeys were draft animals used to carry ordinary people and their goods. Jesus was a builder of low social and economic status. Yet his disciples insisted he was the king who comes in the name of the Lord. They knew their scriptures and remembered God’s promise that someday “your king will come to you, triumphant and victorious, humble and riding a donkey. He will cut off the chariot … and the war-horse … and the battle-bow … and he shall command peace to the nations” (Zechariah 

9:9-10). For the disciples, Jesus was the king who comes in the name of the Lord, riding a donkey on a mission to dismantle the weapons of war under which they suffered, and bring peace. 

Jesus, the king who comes in the name of the Lord, wept over Jerusalem and its people because they did not recognize the things that make for peace. If nothing changed it would all end in conflict and violence.  The biblical concept of peace — shalom — is rooted in ideas about wholeness and completion. Shalom involves right relations — fair, and harmonious relationships  between people, and between individuals and God. Shalom includes healthy living that promotes  wholeness of body and life, and enables the flourishing of all creation. The mission of Jesus, the king who comes in the name of the Lord, is peace experienced as physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being for all people living together in harmonious and nurturing relationships. 

Jesus, the king who comes in the name of the Lord disrupts the business of the Temple. He calls it a den of robbers. In those days, the temple had its tentacles in politics, policing, legislative and judicial decision making, trade, commerce, and banking. The high priestly families collaborated with their Roman overlords in extorting and amassing wealth at the cost of the ordinary people. Jesus, the king who comes in the name of the Lord, led an unarmed disruptive protest against the Judean Temple state. Our gospel lesson ends with Jesus teaching every day in the cleansed temple and the people hung on his every word as the ruling elites tried to find ways to destroy him.

As Professor Emerson Powery writes, “Jesus’ movement into Jerusalem was a statement about power.” In contrast to the power exercised by the Judea Temple State which was propped by military might, Jesus was filled with the power of the Holy Spirit given by God. Jesus does not hoard this power or use it to dominate others. He uses his power to heal, to restore well-being to broken bodies, minds, and spirits. Jesus’ power comes out of him to make hurting people whole again. Jesus shares his power with the disciples by empowering them to be healers and make things right in the world. Jesus, the king who comes in the name of the Lord, shows us how to use the power and privilege that we have. 

Please pray with me this prayer adapted from one written by Pastor John van de Laar:

We call you ‘King’, Jesus, but you’re not like any king we’ve ever heard of; You don’t flaunt your power, waving your hand dismissively to change the lives of your subjects; You don’t hoard your wealth, and tax your people just to grow more comfortable in your isolated palace; You don’t exploit the weak and unconnected, or use the ambition of ladder-climbers to further your control.

No, you are the King who lays down his crown, to walk among us as one of us; You are the King who lays down his life, to bring abundant, eternal life to all who seek it; You are the King who draws the weak, the rejected, the poor, and the child  into the centre of the conversation and into the heart of where real power lies.

 You, Jesus, are the King whose kingship redefines everything we know, and who walks with us through every moment of our lives. Amen.