Palm Sunday 2024: “Save Us”

Palm Sunday 2024: “Save Us”

“Hosanna!”

“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”

“Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!”

“Hosanna in the highest heaven!” ~ Mark 11:1-11

Jesus riding into town“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” — *photo by: www.LumoProject.com*

The word Hosanna comes from Psalm 118:25 “Save us, we beseech you, O Lord! O Lord, we beseech you, give us success!”

They looked at this prophet riding on a borrowed horse, perhaps he was the Messiah, the man they had heard about. Perhaps they had seen or actually heard him in person in the days, weeks, months or years before he rode triumphantly into the city like Cesar himself leading a military parade.

“Hosanna!” “Save us. Save us.”

To the Roman authorities, this looks exactly like a military parade. It appears to them that Jesus has been in the rural regions raising and training an army to overthrow the Roman authorities and to take back the city of Jerusalem and all of Judaea.

People are following Jesus because they expect him to save them . . . to save them from their Roman occupiers. The people in the streets aren’t waving palm fronds and asking God to save them from their sins . . . these people are in Jerusalem to offer sacrifices at the Temple to atone for their sins.

They aren’t asking Jesus to save them from hell – there is no concept of Hell in the Jewish tradition. So what exactly are the people talking about? What are they asking Jesus to save them from?

“Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!”

They believe Jesus is here to drive out their enemies and restore the Jewish kingdom of David.

The people want to be saved from the occupying Roman army. The brutal, oppressive, outside authority controlling their lives.

But Jesus didn’t save them in a way they could recognize. He didn’t take up a sword and send the Romans fleeing. He arrived in town, visited the Temple and then left.

Jesus didn’t plot the overthrow of the government with his co-conspirators, instead he washed their feet like a humble servant. He didn’t march into battle like a Christian soldier marching as to war. Instead, he prayed alone in a garden while his supporters slept.

Within just a few days, the calls of “save us,” turn into demands to “crucify him.”

Why would people welcome Jesus one day, and then demand his death just a few days later?

The people turned on Jesus because he wasn’t who they thought he was. They wanted a revolution and instead they got a guy who not only refused to fight but when the authorities came to arrest him, he didn’t even try to escape.

In fact, when the soldiers arrived, Peter thought the time had come for the revolution and in defending Jesus, he attacked a Roman solder and cut his ear off. Jesus said ‘put away your sword,’ and Jesus healed the wounded man who had come to take him away.

I’ll make it plain and say it again.

Jesus healed the enemy solder arresting him. While his closest and oldest friends and followers ran in fear, Jesus helped a man who intended to harm him.

The question isn’t, “why did people turn on Jesus?” The question is, “Why would anyone still support him?” They wanted an uprising to throw off their Roman oppressors, not a guy who surrenders peacefully without a fight. Jesus wasn’t who they thought he was.

Palm Sunday says, “Jesus has come to save us and restore the Jewish Kingdom, Hosanna.” And Good Friday says, “nope, he’s not the one to save us. Next.” And the people look for another leader to lead them.

This went on for another three decades – Jewish people rising up, following one leader or another, until the year 69 CE, when Jewish rebels took control of Jerusalem.

Roman troops laid siege to Jerusalem in 70 CE. After five months, future emperor Titus crushed the rebellion, murdered or enslaved the entire population, destroyed the city and dismantled every stone of the Temple, except the portion of the wall that remains today.

The looted treasures of the Temple were put on display in Rome for people to come and see, a museum of the looted relics of a primitive, provincial religion.