Palm Sunday
Matthew 21:1-11 | Isaiah 50:4-7 | Psalm 21(22):8-9,17-20,23-24 | Philippians 2:6-11 | Matthew 26:14-27:66
And so it begins.
As the massive crowd cries “Hosanna!” and enters with Jesus into Jerusalem, a lone figure in the distance follows breathlessly behind.
That would be me, running late from an emergency consult that also meant I missed writing yesterday’s blog entry. That emergency occurred because maintenance problems that were foreseen and forewarned actually came to pass, causing a customer’s mission-critical services to grind to a messy halt.
You might say that a default (choosing to do nothing about known issues) became a default (failure to fulfill an obligation to keep things running smoothly).
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You can bet that Jesus foresaw all that would happen to Him during those few days in Jerusalem that we commemorate each year, because He forewarned His disciples about the events to come.
Yet He chose to embrace all the cruelty and suffering that He saw ahead of Him, instead of avoiding them for business or personal reasons.
He chose to complete His mission, instead of hustling off to do something new and exciting and not-painful.
He chose not to default, so that we can look forward to eternal life today.
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But we too have been forewarned about the choices we make in our daily lives, and how they affect our progress towards the eternal life that Jesus promised through His actions.
We can choose anew each day to embrace His Holy Way, to do the right thing even when it’s the hard thing.
Or we can default to cavorting along the wide boulevards of secular ease, casting others aside in our hedonistic rush to personal glory.
Shall we choose life together?
Hosanna to the Son of David!
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,
the King of Israel.
Hosanna in the highest!
Amen.