Living With Palms Joined: A Palm Sunday Meditation

I have been thinking a lot recently about the need to live with open palms rather than clenched fists. There are many reasons for it, which I will reflect on in this Palm Sunday meditation. The aim is to live not only on Palm Sunday but every day with open palms and palms joined rather than clenched fists.

One reason why I have been thinking a lot about the need to live with open palms is because we continue to work with my son Christopher’s right hand to open it. Spasticity resulting from his traumatic brain injury three years ago often makes it quite difficult to open that hand. Christopher often pulls back if we pry the fingers open beyond a certain point, no matter how slowly and gently. Some days are better than others. Still, we have witnessed marked improvement in flexibility resulting from his baclofen pump surgery. The hope is that new therapies which we will soon put in place will increase flexibility even more.

Another reason I have been thinking a lot about living with open palms and palms joined rather than closed fists is that the second edition of the book I wrote with the late Zen Buddhist Abbot Kyogen Carlson of Dharma Rain Zen Center will soon be released with Cascade Books of Wipf & Stock. You can find here the link to the forthcoming book, which is titled Evangelical Zen: A Christian’s Spiritual Travels with a Buddhist Friend. Kyogen often closed his emails “With Palms Joined.” He lived that way every day in his interaction with other people, including Evangelical Christians like me.

You can find here a link to a video of us from many years ago talking about our friendship and partnership in cultivating understanding and trust with people from across the ideological spectrum. We can either approach life with open palms or clenched fists in how we engage others, operating with open minds or closed minds toward “the other.” Kyogen and I worked and wrote together in an inquisitive rather than inquisitional posture. How I miss my friend.

The last reason I have been thinking about living with open palms rather than clenched fists is because today is Palm Sunday. I had the privilege of preaching today on this topic at Cascade View Covenant Church thanks to Pastor Jim Sequeira, who beautifully models an open palms approach to life. He radiates his Hawaiian cultural background of the Aloha spirit.

During the sermon, I shared about how Jesus modeled an open palm rather than closed fist posture in his life before God and others. He trusted fully in God and did not take matters into his own hands to establish his kingdom reign. Notice how he rode into Jerusalem on the foal of a donkey, a beast of burden, rather than a mighty stallion fitted for war. As Matthew 21:5 reads, “Tell the daughter of Zion, look, your king is coming to you, humble and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” (NRSVUE)

During this Holy Week, we recount on Maundy Thursday that Jesus prayed with open palms raised toward Heaven that his Heavenly Father’s will would be done, not his own. We also remember on Good Friday that he was lifted up to reign from a cross with open, nail-pierced hands. But may we not think for a minute that Jesus was a passive victim. He confronted the fallen principalities and powers that operated by way of a clenched fist of retribution with his open hand of gracious redemption. Jesus invites us to battle on, opening our hand to the power of undying love, while also shunning the love of power, indifference, and hate.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr and the Civil Rights movement operated in the spirit of Jesus Christ. I love the Wales Window that the people of Wales had made for the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. Welsh artist John Petts designed the image of a black Jesus with one hand open to shun evil and injustice and the other hand open to welcome fellowship and solidarity.

Here is a picture of the “Wales Window.” The title of the picture at Wikimedia is “Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, Birmingham, Alabama.” The photo was taken by Carol M. Highsmith. This image is available from the United States Library of Congress‘s Prints and Photographs division under the digital ID highsm.05063.

The Wales Window was part of the reconstruction effort to rebuild the church after the horrific tragedy in which a bomb that the KKK planted exploded. It killed four girls attending Sunday School on September 15, 1963. The window symbolizes solidarity in pursuit of a just peace.

All these images shape my imagination on Palm Sunday. They serve as spiritual baclofen and spiritual therapy that take away the closed-minded spasticity that would lead me to operate with a clenched fist in my interaction with others. We continue to advocate for my son Christopher, his wife Keyonna, and their daughter Jaylah in pursuit of a just peace. We seek to do so with an open hand that shuns indifference and injustice and another open hand that welcomes fellowship and solidarity.

Here is a picture of when I could open Christopher’s right hand and raise his arm in the fight for life!

May we all continue to learn from Jesus who, like in the Wales Window, shuns evil with one open palm and welcomes fellowship and solidarity with the other open palm. Living with open palms and palms joined is worth the fight!

PS: If you wish to read the various posts on Christopher’s journey with TBI, you can find them here at this link. Thank you for your prayers and caring thoughts!