Readings: Psalm 118: 1,2, 19 to end, Matt 21: 1 – 11

Holy Week has begun…..

We now enter into the period of the church’s year where we can walk alongside Jesus and his disciples at the same pace as the events that took place. In fact, this is true right up to the feast of Pentecost 50 days after Passover.

If we so choose through reading the scriptures, e.g. in Matthew/John and Acts, we enter into the story and allow the NT writers to open up to us the events in real time.

It all begins with Jesus entering into Jerusalem as the prophet Zechariah had foretold (Zec 9:9,) on a donkey with a colt beside.

Not the kind of transport we would have thought that a King would enter his city on. Someone has commented that it is highly likely that Pontius Pilate would have been seen entering Jerusalem on the other side at exactly the same time.

Pontius Pilate would have been accompanied by Roman Soldiers, their armour gleaming, there would have been trumpets blaring, standards blowing in the breeze. All very impressive but Pontius Pilate represented the kind of human power that Jesus referred to about Gentiles ‘lording it over people’, the kind that Satan claimed he had could give Jesus in the temptations in the desert.

Jesus by contrast came in humility into Jerusalem. However, he didn’t stop the crowds acclaiming him as king. When challengedhe said, ‘if my disciples keep silent these stones will shout aloud’. And so, they shouted with all their strength… “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

This week was to be the final showdown. Jesus chasing the money changers out of the temple, his teaching the crowds in the temple, further conflicts with the temple authorities and finally, his betrayal, arrest, trial and execution. Darkness was going to have its’ hour but it was not going to have the final word.

The crowds were acclaiming Jesus to be the Messiah but not everyone was so enthusiastic. To say that the authorities were twitchy would be an understatement for there were huge crowds staying in Jerusalem and if there is any time they feared most about a revolution taking place it would be during a major festival such as Passover.

Protest is nothing new, and authorities cracking down on dissent is nothing knew too. So, Jesus’ own decision to enter Jerusalem on a colt would have aroused their suspicions immediately, for Zechariah had prophesied some 500 years earlier. Zechariah 9:⁹ Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! For behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with

salvation, Humble, and mounted on a donkey, Even on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

For the authorities what was even more alarming was the response of the people. They spread their cloaks on the ground in front of him. In the hot and dusty Middle East, where most people only had one or at the most two sets of clothes and probably only one cloak – to place a cloak on the road so that in the expectation that it will get trampled on, showed just how important Jesus was seen to be. Their shouting was loud – the chanting had overtones of messianic prophecy. Psalm 118: ²⁶Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. We bless you from the house of the Lord.

The whole city was stirred and asked, ‘who is this?’ Those who were there responded: ‘This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee’. Now one of the reasons why the authorities had dismissed Jesus as being the Messiah is that he was known as the Nazarene. They believed therefore that he had been born there, not in Bethlehem which is where the Messiah was meant to be born. This is why the story of Jesus’ birth in the Gospels makes clear precisely where Jesus was born.

Tom Wright in his commentary makes an interesting observation: the people wanted a prophet, but his prophet would tell them that their city was under God’s imminent judgement (Matt 24). They wanted a Messiah, but this one was going to be enthroned on a pagan cross. They wanted to be rescued from evil and oppression, but Jesus was going to rescue them from evil in its full depths.

And so the story of Jesus’ grand, though surprising entry into Jerusalem is an object lesson in the mismatch between their expectations and God’s answer. This is the moment when salvation is dawning. The ‘Hosannas’ were justified, but it would take the journey of Holy Week, Good Friday and Easter for them to be truly fulfilled.

Henri Nouwen the spiritual writer wrote these words:

“Joy does not come from positive predictions about the state of the world. It does not depend on the ups and downs of the circumstances of our lives.

Joy is based on the spiritual knowledge that, while the world in which we live is shrouded in darkness, God has overcome the world. Jesus said it loudly and clearly: ‘In the world you will have troubles, but rejoice, I have overcome the world. The surprise is not that, unexpectedly, things turn out better than expected. No, the real surprise is that God’s light is more real than all the darkness, that God’s truth is more powerful than all human lies, that God’s love is stronger than death.”

Every blessing for Easter. Peter