A sermon that describes another parade between Palm Sunday and the Parade to the Cross. By my good friend Pastor Greg Pagh.

Texts: Mark 11:1-11 Rev. Gregory M. Pagh
Christ Church – Otsego
March 24, 2013

“Two Processions!”
Good morning again and a very blessed Palm Sunday to each of you. Be of good cheer! After a long, cold winter, Spring is coming, it really is… and even better, Easter is coming! Today we begin Holy Week.
Some of you have known me now for 22 years. You know a lot about me. We’ve celebrated a lot of Holy Weeks together. But still, in the interest of full disclosure, I need you to know that “I’m not a big parade guy.”
As a matter of fact, and Colleen will verify this, I’ll do just about anything I can to avoid going to a parade. I don’t know what it is. Either I suffer from “Shriner’s Syndrome” or as a child I was scared by a clown. I’m not sure, but parades are just not on my list of favorite things to do.
Several years ago, however, I did go to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City. It was just awesome! We stood by the curb and waited for 4 hours in the cold and the rain to hear some marching bands, see some large balloon characters held down by ropes, watch a group of woman carrying lawn chairs in formation, and listen to a lot of semi-famous people lip-syncing on floats. Yeah… it was just great!
Friends, this upcoming week, the one we call Holy Week has two parades. And the truth is, I’m not big on them either. During the first parade, on Palm Sunday, Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey. During the second parade, on Good Friday, he walked out of Jerusalem carrying his own cross. I say that I’m not big on these parades either because the first was based on false expectations of Jesus and the second was the outcome of false judgments about Jesus. Two parades. Two processions. One joyous and one solemn.
During the first parade, the people exclaimed “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” During the second, many of the same people who had cheered on Sunday now shouted “Crucify him!” just five days later on Friday. During the first procession, they were ready to crown him as king. During the second, he wore a crown of thorns.
Have you noticed? Both parades involved Jesus and his disciples. Both involved crowds of people representing clashing kingdoms and widely contrasting priorities. Both parade routes were lined with compassionate characters and evil culprits.
Yes, during the first Holy Week there were two parades, two processions, just five days apart. Today we commemorate them as Palm Sunday and Good Friday. They reveal in stark contrast “who Jesus was” and “what he came to do.” Together, they represent decisions that changed the world! And most people missed it!
You just heard me say that the Palm Sunday procession was based on false expectations of Jesus. Make no mistake, these religious pilgrims were not cheering for a Jesus who would be crucified just five days later. When they shouted “Hosanna!” which means, “Save us, Lord!” they were not crying out for Jesus to forgive them from their personal sins. No! The Savior they had in mind was clearly one who would set them free from the oppressive and brutal Roman government under which they had suffered terribly for so long.
My contention, and it saddens me, is that we’re not unlike those crowds who first cheered for Jesus on that bright Sunday morning in Jerusalem. We’ve read the stories. We’ve seen the miracles. We’ve heard the testimonies. We’ve watched the mini-series. Like them, we too would have shouted “Hosanna” and waved our palm branches.
But also like them, many of us would have been driven by false expectations of our Savior. You see, too often we simply want Jesus to be the hero for our agenda, to put his stamp of approval on our plans, to free us from our suffering, and we fail to see that God is up to something quite different and so much bigger for our world.
There was another parade in Jerusalem that week, one sandwiched in between what we call Palm Sunday and Good Friday. It was a third procession not recorded in our Bibles but noted by historians. It gives us the back-story and helps us understand what a powder-keg of expectations greeted Jesus when his borrowed ride took him down that hill into his destiny.
You see, about the same time that Jesus rode into Jerusalem from the East, scholars of history tell us that the new governor of Judea, Pontius Pilate, led a procession into Jerusalem from the west. His parade was all about displaying the power of Rome to put down any potential rebellion on the part of the Jewish people.
There was a long-standing history. It was the week of Passover and that always meant the potential for trouble. Passover celebrated the freedom of the Jewish people from Egypt centuries before and it always aroused both the faith and the passions of the people.
Just 30 years earlier, about the time of Jesus’ birth, 2,000 Jews had been crucified in Jerusalem following a “Passover week uprising” that had been put down by Rome. We picture three crosses on Golgotha. Can you imagine 2000? That’s a 911! That’s a holocaust! So the purpose of Pilate’s grand entrance at the beginning of this week of such great religious significance to the Jews was to illustrate the unmatched power of the Roman government.
Historians tell how Pontius Pilate rode an armor-clad war horse into the city with hundreds of cavalry in procession behind him. Just imagine the sound. The cavalry was followed on foot by Centurion Soldiers, Rome’s finest, each of them serving as captains of 100 foot-soldiers. Just one Roman Legion consisted of 60 Centurions leading a total of 6,000 men, and at this time in history Rome had 28 Legions, the most feared fighting force in the world.
On each Centurion’s head, hammered helmets gleamed in the bright sunlight topped by the famous Roman bristle. At their sides were swords crafted from the hardest steel; and, in their hands, each soldier carried a spear; or if he was an archer, a bow with a sling of arrows across his back.
Drummers beat out the cadence as they marched. It was a full-on show of force meant to get the attention of everyone in the holy city. You see, normally, about 100,000 visitors came to Jerusalem for Passover. This particular year, however, some estimate that there were more than a million in attendance. Why? They knew that something was about to happen if Jesus dared come to town!
So this was the back-story, the context for the bookend processions we call Palm Sunday and Good Friday. When the Jewish visitors shouted “Hosanna!” for Jesus, it was because they expected this miracle-working prophet to do something spectacular that week. They believed that he was the Messiah they had been waiting for, the one who would set them free from Rome.
Even their cheers for Jesus quoted scripture, in this case the prophetic words found in Zechariah, chapter 9. Listen through the filter of what I have just shared with you. They shouted, “Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will take away the chariots from Ephraim and the war-horses from Jerusalem, and the battle bow will be broken. He will proclaim peace to the nations. His rule will extend from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth.”
There was only one message on their minds that day. Jesus was the one! The Messiah had finally come to deliver them! He would restore the throne of King David! He would bring freedom and peace!
You may not have known about Pilate’s grand entrance… but don’t miss the contrasts. Pontius Pilate arrived majestically from the West riding on a horse. Jesus arrived humbly from the East riding on a donkey. Pilate came to keep a false peace. Jesus came as the Prince of Peace. Pilate’s procession was a display of the kingdom of Caesar, who claimed to be a god. Jesus’ procession was a display of the kingdom of God, because he was God in the flesh. Pontius Pilate remains buried in some ancient tomb. Jesus is alive and seated at the right hand of God!
When I was a kid I couldn’t help but wonder what happened at the end of a parade. Where did the bands and the floats go after they disappeared around the corner? Well at the end of Jesus’ Palm Sunday parade the events of the first Holy Week began to unfold rapidly.
I want to put a challenge before you this week. These two bookend processions by Jesus are found in all four Gospels – both the Palm Sunday “ride into Jerusalem” and the Good Friday “walk to the cross.” I want you to find these stories in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John in your Bibles and also read everything that happened in between.
You’ll be amazed at how much took place in just a few days. There was a tremendous acceleration of teaching and revelation coupled with growing opposition and accusation. Jesus cleared the temple of the money-changers. He taught on marriage and the “end times” and several other important topics. He answered the accusations of the religious leaders.
He gathered with his disciples for the Passover Meal and expanded its meaning into what we now celebrate as Holy Communion. He washed his disciples’ feet in an act of love and servanthood. He was betrayed by Judas.
He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane. He was arrested by the Jewish authorities, who by the way, came not with palm branches but with swords and clubs. He endured an all-night religious trial before the Jewish Sanhedrin. He suffered a Roman civil trial at the hands of Pontius Pilate and Herod Antipas. Not exactly “due process,” as we know. He was betrayed by the Jews and viewed as threat by the Romans.
His robes were ripped off him. He was beaten and spit upon. A crown of thorns was pushed into his head. He was sentenced to death by crucifixion, carrying his own cross until he could carry it no more. He suffered on the cross for six hours and died alone, abandoned by everyone who had hailed him as king.
All this in five days. From Sunday through Friday. From “Hosanna!” to “crucify him.” Two parades… two processions that are like Holy Week bookends. How could it all take such a terrible turn so quickly?
Two reasons. First, Jesus was not the Messiah the Jews expected, and second, God’s plan of salvation was not the plan the world expected. So here’s what I want to leave you to chew on as we begin this Holy Week, 2013.
During these next days ask yourself, “What am I expecting from God?” And ask yourself, “Have I embraced God’s plan of salvation for my life or am I still trying to work out my own plan?”
You see, our job is not to stand at the curb and watch as these parades go by. Holy Week is about entering in! Jesus said, “Take up your cross and follow me.” We are to walk with Jesus. We are to experience the suffering and passion of our Lord. We are to be participants in the parade. What a privilege! What a challenge! What an opportunity! Let us go through this coming week with our eyes and our hearts wide open… asking the right questions… asking the hard questions… and see what God will do.
These two parades… these two processions… and the Easter that followed, changed the world! Will they change you?