Sermon for Palm Sunday, 2021

Palm Sunday

You pick up a Prayer Book for the first time and want to know which Gospel passages will be read on Sunday. Starting with Advent, through Christmas, Epiphany, and Lent, you would find almost all of the Gospel readings are no more than half a page in length. When you arrive at today, however, Palm Sunday, you would be shocked to find a Gospel reading that runs more than three pages. Tomorrow, the Monday of Holy Week, the Gospel reading is more than four pages. This holds true for Tuesday through Friday, as well. What are we to make of this? 

The answer is simple. The lengthy Gospel readings in the Prayer Book for Holy Week reflect the Gospels themselves. Nearly a fourth of each of the Gospels is dedicated to the last week of the earthly life of Jesus.  Today through Good Friday, the Prayer Book Gospel readings are the four accounts of the Passion of our Lord, read in their canonical order. Reading the Passion narratives of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John during this time of the Church calendar goes back to the earliest days of the Church. Understanding His final days are critical to understanding His entire life and ministry. It brings into the sharpest focus who He is and what He came to do. 

As we read and think about the events of Holy Week, one thing becomes clear. His Passion – the agonizing prayer in Gethsemane, the betrayal and arrest, the trials before Caiaphas and Pilate, the Crucifixion, the seven last words, and His death - He did for us. How does the Apostle Paul summarize the Gospel message?  “Christ died for our sins, according the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” Each week in the Creed we say, “Who for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven.” This morning we will look at how His Passion was for us by looking at key moments in our salvation history as found in Genesis, Exodus, and finally, Revelation.  

We begin with Genesis chapter three and our most fundamental problem. We consistently underestimate the calamity of sin. Sin is not just falling short of a standard, or not quite living up to our potential. The fall was the single most destructive event in human history, for it affected our very natures – our most essential qualities as human beings. When our first parents sinned, our original righteousness was lost. Our intellect was darkened and our wills corrupted. Our fellowship with God was ruptured. We became subject to disease and death. The mysterious, ancient requirement that the way for creatures in such a state as this to be restored to God was not only by repentance, but also by some death – the shedding of blood. The Old Testament sacrificial system was built on animal sacrifice. What was sacrificed, however, was always inferior to the one for whom for the sacrifice was made. Goats and bulls are quite unlike us. They do not possess will, intellect, or purpose. And their sacrifices were not voluntary. But God accepted these sacrifices anyway, because they were a type, a prophecy of a greater and perfect sacrifice to come later. This once-for-all sacrifice must be of a different order than these animal sacrifices. But what sacrifice would be worthy enough to atone for the sins of all mankind? Moreover, the sacrifice must be made by Man, for it was Man who had sinned. When the second Person of the Holy Trinity was born of a human mother by the Holy Ghost, He took our human nature without ceasing to be God. He did what we were never capable of doing. He lived a perfect, sinless life on our behalf, and perfectly submitted His human will to the Father in complete obedience. “He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” He accomplished, in His human nature, what we could not. He did this for us. And what He accomplished - His merits - are communicated to all those who are “in Christ.” 

Let us now move to Exodus chapter 12. All the firstborn in Egypt are going to die, except for those families who sacrificed a lamb and applied some of its blood to the doorposts and lintel - the horizontal supporting piece. For that first Passover, a protective sacrifice made according to God’s instructions meant that the firstborn were spared. Judgment passed over the faithful Israelites. This Thursday, God willing, we will commemorate the events of the Last Supper, when Jesus celebrated the Passover meal for last time with His disciples in the Upper Room. Christ’s disciples had celebrated Passover meals with their families since they were children. It was always about looking back at something God had done many years before. But this was to be their last Passover meal with Jesus, and He would give it an entirely new meaning. “This is my body, which is given for you.”  The first Passover had occurred about 1200 years earlier. Why is Jesus now speaking in the present tense? This “is”?  The reason is because the countless Passover meals observed for centuries always pointed toward Him. He is the Lamb, slain from the foundation of the world. All of the firstborn sons spared that night in Egypt were because of this unique Son. Judgement can now pass over all people because of one Lamb - the Lamb. He is the once-for-all fulfillment of all the Passover lambs. God can now pass over the sins of His people.  When the early Church grasped the meaning of “Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us, therefore let us keep the Feast”, it is no wonder they would celebrate this not once a year, but every week. 

The early Christians did not have church buildings, and often lacked the resources with which to make crosses, but this did not stop them from constantly reminding themselves of its significance. Tertullian, the second century apologist, described this early Christian practice: “At every forward step and movement, at every going in and out, when we put on our clothes and shoes, when we bathe, when we sit at table, when we light the lamps…we trace upon the forehead the sign [of the cross].” These Christians were under constant threat of disease, death, and persecution. They knew about demon possession. Invoking the Cross by tracing it on themselves so often was seen as protection from all that might harm them. They constantly reminded themselves of the power of the Cross because the Cross had been the instrument of the greatest victory - when God, in Christ, defeated death and all the powers of darkness. We may not cross ourselves as often, or at all, but the Cross should still always be present to us.  

In a mystery we cannot fully understand, Christians have a share in Christ’s suffering, and as strange as it sounds to say, this can be a source of rejoicing. First Peter 4:13: “But rejoice in so far as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.”

For the Christian, therefore, there is no such thing as mere suffering. Our sufferings are all Cross-shaped. And not just these. As the only true and perfect sacrifice for sin, His sacrifice on the Cross is the only basis for divine forgiveness and favor. Every spiritual benefit, every blessing we receive, is also Cross-shaped. 

We close with this from the Book of Revelation. God revealed to the Apostle John that Satan and all the forces of evil will finally be overcome and destroyed. The Church is purified and presented to Christ as His heavenly bride. There will be a new heaven and a new earth. 

Anything in us that has been stained by sin and suffering will be changed – when mortality puts on immortality. Human language is stretched to its very limits to try to convey such victory, triumph, and exaltation centered on Christ. And do you know the name John uses most often for this all-conquering Lord of History? “The Lamb” - 28 times in just 22 chapters. 

“Those dear tokens of his passion

Still his dazzling body bears,

Cause of endless exultation

To his ransomed worshippers:

With what rapture

With what rapture

Gaze we on those glorious scars!  

 “O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world” is not just what we say in the Liturgy each week - it will be our song for eternity.