Jesus' entry means what?

 

Palm Sunday      Luke 19:28-48

 Jesus’ Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem was an indictment of empire.

The Romans would parade their troops into the city after a conquest of the land, and people would be coerced to come out into the streets and lay down their cloaks, shouting, “Io Triumphe!” as the generals, on large steeds would go by.  It was a spectacle of violent control over the people, and it built careers for the triumphant generals.  Their troops, not so much.  Empire’s gods of Power and Status demanded the devotion of the people.

 Jesus, fulfilling the prophets, came humbly, on a colt.  It must have looked ridiculous.  The people spontaneously threw their cloaks on the road and shouted a welcome to Messiah.  The corrupt religious leaders could not have that, so they ordered the parade to stop, but Jesus rebuked them, saying that this genuine and sincere outcry would happen, even if by the creation itself.  Matthew’s Gospel has the people, crowds of them, shouting, “Hosanna!”  “O Save Us!”  Save us indeed, from Rome, from empire, from ourselves.  Save us, O Lord, from the evil we have shown ourselves capable of using against one another.

 Then, Jesus wept over the city and its future.  He lamented that the people did not embrace the things that make for PEACE, things that empire had obscured from their vision with its inundation of greed, lust for power and desire for status.  For there can be no peace without justice.  There can be no Shalom – completeness, wholeness and well-being, and the resulting peace – unless ALL have Shalom.  The people had no Shalom.  There can be no Shalom while empire rules – then or now.  Jesus had seen what generations under empire had done to the people of God in Jerusalem, and what it was yet to do to them, and it broke His heart.

 Then, Jesus entered the Temple and cleaned it out – the place where coins were exchanged from Roman (idolatrous) coins to shekels for offerings and the purchase of sacrifices was changed into a market place, because under empire, one of the gods who are given devotion is wealth.  Even in the Temple of the Lord, the normative value had become profit over faithfulness to God.

 That was the final straw.  It always is the final straw.  Jesus had crossed the line.  Empire was challenged on its abuses of power, and the end of that was told to the people.  Now, Jesus really did it, when He attacked the coffers of the corrupt religious leaders.  They now actively sought to have Jesus killed.  As was told Martin Luther during the 16^th Century Reformation, “Now, you have attacked the bellies of the monks.”  He had attacked the corrupt gains of the church.  As it happened for Dr. King, who launched a poor peoples’ campaign, now he had dared attack the systemic economic injustices of the nation.  They had to go.  Jesus, too, had to go. 

 The people need to be saved, still.  As the few reap the benefits designed for them under empire, the many are crying out to welcome the Lord and be saved, not just from sin and death, but from the evil corruptions of empire that continue to hold them down, back and out, and which diminish and destroy any possible Shalom in their lives.  We have learned what Jesus did and taught against empire and the evil corruptions born of empire.  Jesus enters our lives, and we will either welcome Him with blessings or we will plot to silence Him in our hearts, minds and lives for good.  We will give our devotion to God by living in Jesus’ Way that sustains life, or we will kill Jesus within us and live in the way of empire, the way of greed, power and status that destroys lives. 

Jesus comes to us.  Now.