O God of love, help us to find our place in the holy drama of this week, that we might encounter anew the grace and wonder of our salvation. Amen.
The best storytellers have a way of creating space for everyone to enter into the story. The way this is usually accomplished is through characters that we can imagine being friends with, or running into around town, or maybe even being ourselves. When we connect with a character, we enter into the story and the story becomes more than education, where we learn something, and more than entertainment, where we enjoy the story. What happens when we connect is that we enter the story on an emotional level; the story gets into our heart and gut, and from there, a story can achieve its highest purpose – transformation.
Given
that Holy Week is told by the author of all Creation, it’s not surprising that
the drama of Jesus’ Passion is masterfully told, giving us many characters to
connect with and many opportunities for transformation. The sermons this week
are intended to be opportunities for us to connect to the story of our
salvation through the characters of Holy Week. Each sermon will focus on a
different character as an entry point to these stories of grace and love. I do
hope that you’ll be here for as much of Holy Week as possible. Even if you have
to shuffle a few things around in your schedule, fully entering the drama of Jesus’
last week can be a powerful and amazing experience. Truth be told, that’s why
we do it. There is no rule that says a Parish has to have so many opportunities
for worship in Holy Week. But for thousands of years, Christians have found it to
be true that daily worship in Holy Week is a commendable discipline that draws
us into the story of God’s abundant love for us.
This
is why we’ve provided a bulletin that spans all of Holy Week. In your hands,
you hold all of the liturgies that help us to tell the story of Jesus’ Passion.
You have all of the Scripture readings which present the characters through
whom we will connect to the story of grace. You have all of the daily prayers
that you can use to punctuate your days and make this week sacred. And if you’re
not able to make it to a service – use the bulletin from home or work. Read the
Scripture and pray the prayers. We’ll also be livestreaming it all and the
sermons will be available on our podcast.
I
do want to thank Caroline for her great work in getting this bulletin put
together, Stephen and the choir for preparing so diligently for the music that
is in it, the Altar Guild for the work they will do in, quite literally, setting
the table for our worship, and all those who serve as ushers, vergers,
acolytes, chalicists, and readers this week. Holy Week is certainly a busy
week, and one of the things that I appreciate so much about it is that it
brings so many of us together in beloved community this week.
As
we enter into Holy Week, the character that I want us to focus on is the Jewish
crowd. It is important for us to start here because the Church has a long and
sad history of anti-Jewish rhetoric in Holy Week. Horrendous atrocities have
been done against Jewish people because of false and heretical claims about the
Jews being responsible for Jesus’ death. Jesus was very clear about his death
and how it was the trajectory of God’s story of salvation through Israel. In
his own words as recorded in John, Jesus says “I lay down my life in order to
take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.”
Secondly, Jesus died on a Roman cross, not a Jewish one. Thirdly, the Jewish people
in these stories were imperfect and broken sinners, just like you and me. Our
task is not to assign blame, rather it is to rejoice in the grace of God’s
mercy is for us all. Which leads to a fourth disclaimer, we would have been
shouting “Crucify” just as loudly as they did, maybe even louder. We are just
as willing to turn a blind eye to injustice, we are just guilty of choosing comfort
over the needs of others, we are just as addicted to vengeance and scapegoating.
To put it clearly – the Jews did not kill Jesus, humans did. We did.
But
anti-Semitism has poisoned the well that we drink from. Even without intending
it to be there, we are infected with an anti-Semitic way of thinking. In the
same way that you don’t have to be a blatant racist to perpetuate racism, you
don’t have to be anti-Jewish to add to the legacy of anti-Semitism. Instead, we
learn, repent, and restore.
There
was heresy in the early Church known as Marcionism. It is perhaps the most pernicious
and enduring of all heresies. It runs rampant in Christian theology today, and
particularly in Holy Week. Marcion lived in the 2nd century and put
forth the argument that while Jesus is the Son of God, he is not the figure from
the Old Testament. Marcion said that the character called “God” in the Old
Testament was a lesser sort of deity, one who is vengeful, bloodthirsty, nasty,
and legalistic. In contrast, the God he supposedly found Jesus pointing us
towards is loving and full of grace. How I wish this were a heresy only studied
by historians.
I
don’t blame anyone for coming to a similar conclusion. I did until I learned
better. To be clear, the conclusion is wrong; but it’s a pre-packaged interpretation
that we’ve been handed. The Church has been far too silent in correcting this.
Through the centuries, Christians have picked up this flawed understanding and
furthered it. Martin Luther had some absolutely repugnant things to say about
the Jewish people. And we know the tragedies that have been done by Nazis and
Klansmen. We have to actively work to unlearn these cultural and religious assumptions
that we have been given.
From
the Old Testament, we hear in the prophet Nehemiah, “You are a God ready to
forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love
and did not forsake your people.” In Isaiah, God says to the people, “You are
precious in my sight and honored and I love you” and also “Fear not, I have
redeemed you, I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the
waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned and the flames shall
not consume you.” Elsewhere, God says “Can a mother forget the baby at her
breast and have no compassion for the child she has born? Though she may
forget, I will not forget you.” In the Exodus, we are told that God heard the
cries of the people and was moved to pity and action. God is constantly known as
a God of saving grace, just ask Daniel, Esther, Jonah, or Ruth. This is the sort
of God I want – one who is always on our side, one who loves us fiercely, one
who fights for justice, and one who makes a way out of no way.
Now
consider some quotes from Jesus, “Let the dead bury their own dead;” “Whoever divorces
and remarries commits adultery;” “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father
and mother, wife and children, brother and sister, yes, even life itself cannot
be my disciple;” “You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I
put up with you?;” “As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer
darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth;” “Whoever does not
abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers, such branches are thrown
into the fire and burned.”
Cherry-picking
Scripture, interpreting it out of context, and assuming the worst is always a
bad interpretative strategy. For too long, the Church has overlooked and
apologized for those harsh sayings by Jesus while not giving any such grace to
the Old Testament. This must end. Marcionism has been a heresy for far too long
and must be rejected as such. God is one and there is no division between the Old
and New Testaments. As one of my professors used to say “Jesus looks good on
his own. We don’t have to make Jews look bad in order for Jesus to look good.”
That professor is Amy Jill Levine, a Jewish New Testament scholar. I’d highly
suggest picking up a book of hers or watching a lecture on YouTube as a way of unlearning
anti-Jewish readings of Scripture. Consider it a Holy Week discipline.
As
to how this helps us to enter the story of the Passion – it allows us to
identify with instead of vilifying the Jewish crowds, and it reframes the cry
of Palm Sunday. As Jesus entered the holy city of Jerusalem, the Jewish crowds
shouted “Hosanna,” which is a prayer. Hosanna means “save us.” The question is “from
what?” Not from an angry and wrathful God. Holy Week is not the story of how we
deserved punishment for our sins but Jesus stepped in on our behalf and took God’s
rage. Nor is the drama of Holy Week about liberation from Rome, or whatever
forces are occupying our lives. As you know, come Easter Sunday, Pilate is
still the governor and Caesar is still the emperor. Hosanna is not about saving
us from our enemies or from the evils that we create and condone. No, the cry
of Hosanna is a plea that we be saved from ourselves.
This
crowd that shouts “Hosanna” today will be shouting “Crucify” by Friday. When we
reaffirm our Baptismal Covenant, we promise to persevere in resisting evil and
repent when we fall into sin, and yet when diversity, inclusion, and
anti-racism work comes up, a lot scoff and dismiss it. We pledge to proclaim by
word and example the Good News, yet we keep faith as a private matter or say it
has nothing to do with politics. We say that will strive for justice and
respect the dignity of every human being, apparently except for those who look
different than us, have different life experiences than us, or vote differently
than us. We are just as fickle as the crowd in Jerusalem. Which is why it is so
important for us to not read them in an anti-Semitic way. They are not the
enemy or the problem. They are us. They are our entry point into the story.
What
Jesus wants us to see is that we need saving from ourselves. We heard in the
Gospel reading that when Jesus comes back into the city the next day, he curses
an unfruitful fig tree. It’s a parable about the expectation that we bear
fruits of justice and love. Jesus then cleanses the Temple, and there are a lot
of anti-Jewish readings of this incident that I don’t have time to get into.
But Jesus is not cleansing the Temple because there was anything wrong with the
Temple or its practices. If that was the problem, Jesus would have said “Stay
away from this place” and his disciples would not continue to worship there.
No, the problem wasn’t with the Temple, it was with the people’s mindsets. They,
and we do the same, fall into the trap of unintentional worship; worship that is
an empty ritual that doesn’t transform us or society.
Jesus’
anger is directed at the fact that they are making the Temple a den of robbers.
And what is a den? It’s a place where people feel safe and at home. People who are
dishonest in their business, people who exploit others, people who lie, cheat,
and steal should not come to the Temple or the Church and fit right in without any
call to repentance or transformation. There was no fruit in their worship. It
had become transactional instead of transformational. Again, the problem isn’t
with the Temple, it was with the people. It’s a trap we fall into as well. The
character of the Jewish crowd is an invitation for us to consider where our
faith has become fruitless and where we need to be saved by God’s gracious love
from our apathy, blindness, and routines.
Jesus
tells us that he came not to abolish the Torah and the Prophets, but to fulfill
them. That is the story of Holy Week. It is not about replacing or improving Judaism,
rather Jesus is bringing forth the fruits that God has planted and nurtured within
the Jewish people, who help us to see and trust that when we cry “Hosanna,”
help is on the way.
