Upside Down
Matthew
21: 1-11 (NRSV)
When
they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives,
Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, “Go into the village ahead of you,
and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them
and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, just say this, ‘The Lord
needs them.’ And he will send them immediately.” This took place to fulfill
what had been spoken through the prophet, saying,
“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.”
The
disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them; they brought the donkey and
the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them. A very large crowd
spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and
spread them on the road. The crowds that went ahead of him and that followed
were shouting,
“Hosanna
to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!
Hosanna in the highest heaven!”
When
he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking, “Who is this?” The
crowds were saying, “This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee.”
For one week, the world was
upside down.
The King had been on a great
journey, on his way to the capital of his Kingdom, his own homeland. The great
city of Jerusalem.
On a Sunday he finally
arrived. And after so many months of buildup and great anticipation, it was
finally time for the King’s royal procession.
And what would you expect
from a King’s royal procession? The finest steed pulling a golden chariot. A
noble man sitting proudly in the finest robes, linens, and jewels, while his
many servants tend to his every comfort, and the trumpets sounded the fanfare
of his arrival.
But that didn’t happen.
This man, who before the
week was over, would proclaim, even upon pain of death, that he was the King of
the Jews, didn’t act like any king anyone had ever seen before. In fact, it’s
as if this man, Jesus of Nazareth, took the whole idea of what it means to be a
king, and turned it upside down.
He traded in the fanfare,
the pomp and circumstance…for something disturbingly humble. There were no
trumpets. There were no jewels, no robes, no finery. He traded the steed for a
donkey—and it wasn’t even his donkey, he just borrowed it from some local
farmer for the day. He traded the chariot for a simple cloak, just the shirt
off someone’s back, as a saddle. He traded in his red carpet entrance for a
bunch of rags on the dirt. And servants? He neither had nor wanted any. This
man, this man who would be called the King of the Jews, acted like he was
entitled to nothing, and accepted nothing but just the charity of friendly,
willing people.
And that was just Sunday.
Jesus spent a whole week in Jerusalem turning everything anyone thought they
knew upside down. And sometimes that meant literally turning things upside
down—after his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, he went straight over to the
Temple and turned over the money changers’ tables.
And he called the money
changers, and the dove vendors—an ordinary, everyday presence in the Temple
entrance—robbers. Then he told the
chief priests and elders, the most respected men in all of Jerusalem, that
prostitutes and tax collectors were going to get into to heaven before they
ever would. Then he got really angry,
and made this big speech where he denounced the Pharisees and Scribes, and
called them hypocrites. Then he started telling everyone about all these bad
things that were going to happen—Jerusalem wouldn’t last, the Temple would be
destroyed, everyone in the city would be persecuted, and the world was going to
end.
What in the world is going
on here? Before Jesus was in town for five days, he had turned over everything that it meant to be a
Palestinian Jew.
And, of course, we know that
Jesus wasn’t done yet. It’s almost easy to understand why Jesus’ disciples
became so frightened, and eventually all took off, one by one, during Jesus’
final days of life. We may very well have done the exact same thing if we were
them. The twelve disciples observed a traditional Passover meal with Jesus,
and, finally, for one moment, it was as if everything was back to normal. But
then, right in the middle of the meal, Jesus picked up a loaf of bread and told
everyone it was his body. Then he
took a cup of wine, and told everyone it
was his blood. And if that wasn’t hard enough for his disciples to try to
wrap their minds around, he told them,
“I
will never again drink of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it
new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
What are you talking about,
Jesus? He and his disciples drank wine together frequently. But this time was
different.
In one week, Jesus turned a
royal procession into a daring display of humility. In one week, Jesus declared
that the people you look up to might not be all that worthy of respect, and
that the people you look down on might have more integrity than anyone. In one
week, Jesus warned us that the places and things we find most sacred won’t be
here forever—even the earth itself will be gone someday. In one week, Jesus
turned an annual tradition into a whole new way to remember him, made normal,
common food holy.
And it was Thursday.
By Friday, Jesus turned
being a King from something to lord over people to something worth dying for.
He turned power into lowliness, and purpose into sacrifice. He turned life into
death.
And by Sunday, he turned
death into life.
For one week, the world was
upside down. All the ordinary rules of life and the universe were suspended,
and the only thing that mattered was love.
It was one week. One week in
history.
And yet, although this week
happened only once, we observe it every year, and we call it Holy Week. And
even though Jesus was only in Jerusalem for a week of his life, what he did
there has made an impact on us, our lives, and our world for all of time.
Because having Jesus as the
center of your life, as the most prized one in your heart, as your Lord and
personal Savior, means worshipping a man who turns things upside down.
So think about it: is there
something about this life, this world, that you wish you could radically
change?
Even if you’re a pretty even
keel type of person, if you’ve been living on this earth long enough, I’m sure
you can come up with something that you wish was different.
I can come up with a few things,
a few things I would change radically if I could. Sean and I had the lovely
experience of filing our income taxes this week. And of course, you know I’m
being sarcastic when I say “lovely”. Because there’s nothing “lovely” about
income taxes. They’re positively awful. As much as I’d love to live in a world
where that process could be less tiresome and grueling, what I really wish is
that I lived in a world where we were all such responsible stewards of our
resources that some would not live in luxury while others live in poverty. I
wish I lived in a world where the money Sean and I paid in taxes might make a
big difference in ending poverty in our country, because programs that help the
less fortunate—social security, disability, welfare, food stamps, Medicaid, and
Medicare—could be adequately funded and supported. But only the power and love
of Jesus could so radically turn our world upside down that poverty could be a
thing of the past.
I have a few friends right
now whose lives are being touched by cancer—either their own, or the illness of
a loved one of theirs. I wish I could eradicate cancer from the world. But
Jesus alone has that radical healing power.
And then I think of my
friends and former seminary classmates who are now serving as chaplains at
Strong Memorial Hospital, like I did last year. And I think about all the
emergencies they get called to respond to, and I think about how many of those
emergencies are victims of an act of violence being brought in to the hospital.
I wish I lived in a world where that violence didn’t exist, and where we would
all live in safety. But only Jesus can create that kind of peace.
I could go on naming things,
but my point to you, today, is this—our Lord and Savior is the radical Son of
God. This week, more than ever, we rejoice that our Jesus turns the world
upside down when he has to, and calls us to do the same. We also rejoice that
when we’ve done all that we can to make our world the kind of place we want it
to be, and it’s still not enough, that we can turn it over to Jesus, that our
faith will see us through, and that our King will triumph over all of it until
the end of time.
Amen.
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