Along the Parade Route (Luke 19:28-40)

            I love a good parade.  The marching bands, the floats, the merriment of the children as they watch the parade go by (or their giddy excitement as a handful of candy comes sailing towards them).  Back home, one of the small towns had an annual parade around the time of the county rodeo.  The parade consisted of a line of floats being pulled by tractors and pickups, a marching band, a few kids on bikes and four-wheelers, and a handful of people on horseback.  The parade was small enough that at the end of the four-block parade route, the parade circled the block and went back down the street, just in case somebody missed it. 
            Last November, Kerry and I spent Thanksgiving in New York City. We wanted to see the Macy’s Day parade, however, we soon realized that everybody else had the same idea.  The streets were packed with people, so we stayed in and watched the parade on the television.  Afterwards, we found ourselves walking along the parade route about two hours after the parade.  The city cleaning crews were busy sweeping up an entire forest’s worth of confetti on the street, and we waded past piles of litter knee high. 

            The night before, we went to the place where the famous balloons were inflated and then tethered down.  We thought it might be fun to see the balloons.  Unfortunately, everybody else had the same idea.  Before we left, I was able to see one of the balloons on its side, so I like telling people I got to see a Macy’s Day balloon up close.   Unfortunately, it was just a fleeting glimpse of the hem of Sponge Bob’s square pants….

            To understand the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem, imagine the scene with me:  It’s the great metropolis, and a parade is coming down the street.  The people start craning their necks to see who is coming.  There’s a lot of commotion: people shouting and singing.  Instead of the grand procession they expected, it was a humble little affair, a group of peasants escorting some thin fellow riding a young colt. 

It was not what Jerusalem expected.  It was Passover, so the religious fervor was in the air.  More pilgrims flooded into the city daily, singing and carrying on. A passerby might have expected the noise as a sign some important Roman official was making his way through the city.  A huge entourage accompanied Pilate or a military general, reminding Jerusalem who really ran things.  The crowd of ragged looking peasants and the rather solemn looking rider did not fit in. Jesus rides into town on a very young colt, likely he struggles with dragging his feet on the ground and trying to keep the colt under control.  Pilate and the other Roman officials would be riding only the finest steeds.  

The Triumphal Entry was about as ludicrous as a New Yorker expecting to see the grand balloons, marching bands, and celebrities, and instead down the road came the parade from small town Kansas, tractors puttering down Broadway.

            The story of the “triumphal entry” only got this grand name after the fact.  In the moment, Jesus appears to be in the midst of some political and religious mischief.  The disciples sing a song of praise, paraphrasing the 118^th Psalm, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!”.  Note the disciples add the rather subversive title of “king” to their psalm singing.  His followers while on the way to the Temple proclaim Jesus royalty.  Upon arrival, Jesus will claim religious authority by his “cleansing” of the Temple, chasing away those who he believes exploit the Temple’s true purpose.  As scholar N.T. Wright observes, Jesus is coming to Jerusalem with the intention to claim his royal authority, despite what the imperial and sacred authorities would say (Jesus and the Victory of God, Fortress Press, 1996, p. 490-3).

After creating the commotion that church tradition calls the “cleansing” of the Temple, Jesus stays in the Temple complex for quite some time (the next two chapters!), teaching all who gathered to hear him.  By occupying the Temple, Jesus is claiming the seat of power that the people would claim as the true power over Israel, the Temple, and Jerusalem. “It was the king [long awaited in the messianic hope of the people] who had ultimate authority over the Temple” (Wright, p. 492).

The crowd of disciples seemed so happy, so optimistic, just a few days before, singing of Jesus:

Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord.

Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven! 

Anyone familiar with the Christmas carols picks up on this latter phrase.  The disciples echo an earlier section of Luke as the story of Jesus’ birth is told.  The angelic host sings in the heavens above as Jesus is born.  The disciples sing as Jesus enters into his last week of life.  For Luke’s gospel, the glory of God and the peace of heaven and earth resound at both ends of the story of Jesus’ life.  Nonetheless, this story will not stay in the heights of praise.  In a few short days, the story will come crashing down.

These scenes of “triumphal entry” and “Temple teachings” fade quickly as Luke furthers the story.  The religious rulers are furious and conspire to deal away with Jesus.  One of the inner-circle disciples decides to conspire with the powers that be.  The week that began with such high praise shall end with the drama of a betrayal, a show trial, and then a summary execution.  The disciples will lose their euphoria and disappear into the night, frightened for their very lives.  Jesus will be written off as yet another zealous messianic type, consigned to death by Pilate, a Roman official who just waves the matter away.  Soon, Jesus will be put to death, abandoned by even his closest of disciples, and his corpse is left in a hastily selected tomb.

This story filled with its drama and tragic turn is our focus for this week.  Holy Week is our journey with Jesus.  By undertaking this journey, we encounter the deadliness and finitude of Good Friday.  In the days leading up to the Cross we mourn the world in its ease with resorting to violence and escalating conflict.  Holy Week reminds us that the world has yet to allow the peace and hope taught by Jesus to take abiding root. 

While we enjoy the parade of children with palm branches and the food awaiting us at each of our three services, the festivities will take a necessarily solemn character as well.  During these next few days, Christianity goes on a journey that guides us through disturbing questions about the world’s brokenness.  Jesus heals the marginalized and excluded, yet he is ‘rewarded’ with a humiliating death. 

We see in Pilate and the Temple priests the brutal consequences of humans exercising power and authority with little sense of restraint.  We move along the narrative arc of Jesus’ life and death, facing that dreadful pause of Good Friday’s aftermath and the reality that we do not skip over death when telling the gospel story of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

            Along the way, if we learn how to tell the gospel story rightly, we sort out the curious “final word” of Jesus as he rides down the parade route.  As the parade is going by, the Pharisees, longtime critics of Jesus, step forward and criticize the raucous singing of the disciples.  Jesus will have none of this.  “Even if my disciples were to be silent, these stones would shout!”

            Where do Jesus’ words about the stones shall shout fit in with the rest of the week ahead of him?  If you find this language puzzling, you need to read the gospel of Luke again.  In Luke’s gospel, people cannot help but burst out into song.  (The Nativity as told by Luke is a veritable musical.)  The parables of Jesus that Luke alone records (i.e. the Prodigal Son is the most celebrated) cannot help but speak of the Kingdom of God being like the party that the father gives when the ne’er-do-well youngest son slinks back home after blowing his inheritance. 

For Luke, the heavens and the earth shimmer with stories of God’s abundant love, and Jesus eats heartily alongside the people that the religion and politics of the day had written off as expendable or without redemption. Nothing will stop the praise of God and the Kingdom that Jesus sees well on its way.  Even the inanimate stones will join in God’s praise if we would somehow fall silent or forget.

There is surely a cross looming large as the gospel draws to a close.  There will be great loss ahead, for this story is part of the world’s story where brokenness and tragedy are to be found.  Yet in this story, cross-shaped as it is, we shall find a joy that breaks forth, beckoning all to join and sing of the King who comes in all humility, with all justice and peace for which this world has been yearning.