Friends
Peace be with you.
It’s difficult to preach on Palm Sunday because the reading is so robust. It’s long and, unlike much of St. Mark’s gospel, rather theologically complex. For instance, let’s look at one of the more bizarre passages that’s unique to St. Mark: a streaker. You may have noticed that, smack dab in the middle of this passage, as the roman soldiers arrive to arrest Jesus, there is a man who is lightly clad who, in his rush to leave, loses his loincloth and runs off naked. You may have thought this a strange detail to include but St. Mark is doing this quite deliberately. Think back on the story of Adam and Eve. When they eat the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, their first instinct is to sew clothes together and cover themselves because they feel shame. Theologians believe St. Mark is saying that, as Jesus is being condemned for the sins of the world, this man comes to symbolize our life without guilt and without shame.
But the part that stuck with me are the last two lines spoken by the Voice in our reading of the passion. Towards the end, you could hear four different groups mocking Jesus and refusing to take pity on him. First, the soldiers mock him and spit on him and stip him of his purple cloak to crucify him. Then, the chief priests mock him by saying that if he could save others he should be able to heal himself. Then the people crucified with him abuse him. Lastly, when he cries out to God, the bystanders claim he’s really calling out to Elijah and, rather than give him a little bit of wine to try and numb his pain, they say, “Wait, let us see if Elijah comes to take him down.” This is the ultimate in vengeance, the ultimate in spitefulness: to not give a dying man a drink of wine because you feel like he bragged about being God’s son.
But, that’s the second to last phrase the Voice said. The last was a roman soldier, from the group among whom the mocking had begun. He is the one who said, “Truly, this was the Son of God!” These Roman soldiers likely could have come from our ancestors. They may have been from the Gaul or Goth tribes from whom our German and Luxembourgish and other European ancestors came from. Maybe I just say that because I’d like to think a German can actually do something good in history, I don’t know. I only know this guy gets it. And then, Joseph of Arimathea, one of the high priests, takes the body of Jesus and buries it in his tomb.
We’ve lost people in the last year. There have been people in my life who have not come back to church because, as they have said to me and others, they haven’t really missed it. We must tell them that we have missed them. We must be the voice in their life inviting them back to church. We must invite them to experience the one who removes our sins, who removes our shame and inviting them back to experience the one who was truly the Son of God.
