Jeremiah 23:5-8; Romans 13:(8-10) 11-14; St Matthew 21:1-9
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Our Lord has a strange way of acting. He shows His power in mercy. He demonstrates His glory in humility. His crown is made of thorns. His throne is a place of execution. His priests kill Him.
Our Lord has always acted in way that are the opposite of what anyone would expect. He makes the slave Joseph ruler in Egypt. He uses a homicidal, inarticulate shepherd to free His people from slavery. He takes the shepherd boy David from the fields to be king. He visits an obscure young virgin in some backwater town and makes her the Mother of God. He uses plain water and His Word to rescue from everlasting death and give enteral life to a young man.
Today, as we begin a new Church Year, we see again how God acts in strange, paradoxical ways. His ways are not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts. His timing is different and always better than our own. Hear, O daughter of Zion, the watchmen are calling on the heights, the night is flying, your Bridegroom comes. His Advent is nigh. But you nor I would stage a grand entrance into the capital city in the manner that Jesus enters Jerusalem. We would bring out the ceremonial military marching bands and honor guard. The parade would not be lead by children. The attendants of our new leader would not be bedraggled fisherman and itinerant preachers. For a vehicle, we would demand an armored, black Cadillac Escalade, or whatever equivalent kind of chariot Cadillac was making back then for Roman Emperors.
But here comes our Lord on a borrowed donkey! Why? We always see in Jesus the fulfillment of His own preaching. He says to two unnamed disciples, “Go. You will find it this way.” They go. And they found it just as He said. But its more than that. Here Jesus lives out exactly what He said in the Sermon on the Mount: Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Only Jesus doesn’t come meekly because He is weak, but because He depends completely on God His Father for deliverance.
He needs no soldiers, for He does not come to battle against flesh and blood, but with the ancient adversary of man, the devil. He needs no weapons, for He is armed only with the Word of the Lord which endures forever. The Word which the prophets foretold. St Matthew is at pains to point out that Jesus does all things in order to fulfill Old Testament prophecy. But he never quite quotes the whole verse. I think its because he wants us, that is, the Holy Spirit wants us, to look it up. Zechariah was the prophet who spoke concerning the coming King, saying, Say to the daughter of Zion, “Behold, your King is coming to you, humble and mounted on a donkey.” That same prophet went on to say, I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace to the nations (Zech 9:10).
Why does He come this way? He who once in royal David’s city came in a lowly cattle shed, comes now on borrowed donkey to show you that He does not come to destroy you, but to save you. He needs the donkey and her colt, not for Himself, but for you. In order that He might fulfill the prophecy for you. All that Jesus does, He does for you. He comes as great David’s greater Son, like Solomon of old, anointed Prophet and Priest, the King, riding the borrowed donkey.
He calls you to follow after Him, to hasten to His train. To lay down not only your palms branches and cloaks, but your very lives. Christ Jesus is calling you to be like Himself. That doesn’t mean being a sissy or a weakling, but showing honor to others ahead of yourself, or as St Paul puts it in today’s Epistle, all the commandments are summed up in this one saying, Love your neighbor as yourself.
And it is precisely our failure to do that, our failure to love God or our neighbor as ourselves, that made His first coming necessary. In today’s collect we called on Christ to come to us now with His grace. “Stir up Your power, O Lord, and come.” We need Him to come. In a power shown in mercy. Because of what that same prayer calls “the threatening perils of our sins.” Our sins put us in danger; danger of falling away. The Word of God is filled with admonitions about the dangers of continuing to sin. St Paul writes to the Corinthians, Let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed let he fall (1 Cor 10:12). And to the Romans, Do not become proud, but fear (11:20). And St Peter says, You, therefore, beloved, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability (2 Pt 3:17). To the Hebrews, Consider Him who endured from sinners such hostility against Himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted (12:3). The sins that we keep on committing, keep coming back to like a dog to its vomit, put us in danger. They are “threatening perils.”
And that, dear daughter of Zion, is the beautiful comfort of this Gospel message the Church in her wisdom has appointed for you to hear not only at the beginning of Holy Week, but now, first thing in this new Church Year. St Matthew tells us what Jesus did in order to fulfill the words of the prophet Zechariah for you. He also records the words of Psalm 118 in mouth of the crowds. But again, not all of it. We’re meant to look it up. To chase down Christ through the Scriptures.
The last of the Hallel Psalms begins, Oh give thanks uno the LORD, for He is good; for His steadfast love endures forever. Right before acclamation of the crowds we hear, The Stone that the builders rejected has become the Cornerstone. This is the LORD’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. And then, immediately after our verse, The LORD is God, and He has made His light to shine upon us. Bind the festal sacrifice with cords, up to the horns of the altar! Jesus cites the verse concerning the Cornerstone later in Holy Week as referring to Himself. Likewise He is the Festal Sacrifice, the Pascal Lamb, the very Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, who allowed Himself to be bound to the Altar of His Cross in salvation for you.
He is the King who comes with justice and righteousness. He comes with salvation. He comes to free you from the threatening perils of your sins! That is why you are told to rejoice and sing, for there is no better news!
Lift up your heads, O gates! And be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The LORD, strong and mighty, the LORD, mighty in battle! Lift up your heads, dear people loved by God. Your heads and hearts and minds. Lift them up unto the Lord. For He has done battle on your behalf. He has defeated death by dying. He has come in the humility of your frail flesh and allowed Satan and the punishment of the Law to do their worst to Him. He is coronated at the place of the Skull, glorified in His Cross, and this King lays down His life for His people.
How do we respond? In the same way the crowd in Jerusalem did when Jesus rode in: Hosanna in the highest! Hosanna is a Hebrew word meaning, “Save us now!” or “Be our Savior!” The liturgy captures this meaning as both a prayer and praise. You sing it every Lord’s Day in the Holy Communion Liturgy. For every Divine Service you are calling on Christ to come and save you, just before you receive your King as He comes to you truly, even bodily, in His Holy Supper. That He who came into Jerusalem on borrowed donkey, comes to you, His New Jerusalem, in bread and wine, His Body and Blood.
Truly our Lord comes in strange, unexpected ways. Water and Word, bread and wine. But the strangest thing is that He would do it for us, unworthy sinners who fail Him time and time again. Because we are such failures, because we have nothing in ourselves on which to rely, and because we can even start to doubt that God’s love, forgiveness, kindness, mercy, and peace is for us, His Word, which endures forever, emphasizes that all this is for you.
Jesus is your King, who comes to you. Everything rests on those little words, “your,” and “you.” So when the night of affliction and temptation, of sorrow and despair comes upon you, when sin crouches at your door, rejoice and give thanks that Jesus is your King, your Savior. His death is for you. His resurrection is for you. His first Advent in the flesh is for you. His present Advent, His coming in Word and Spirit, is for you. His final Advent, in His self-same resurrected flesh, is for you, to bring you a new and glorified body out of your grave and give to you and all believers in Christ, eternal life.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Our Lord has a strange way of acting. He shows His power in mercy. He demonstrates His glory in humility. His crown is made of thorns. His throne is a place of execution. His priests kill Him.
Our Lord has always acted in way that are the opposite of what anyone would expect. He makes the slave Joseph ruler in Egypt. He uses a homicidal, inarticulate shepherd to free His people from slavery. He takes the shepherd boy David from the fields to be king. He visits an obscure young virgin in some backwater town and makes her the Mother of God. He uses plain water and His Word to rescue from everlasting death and give enteral life to a young man.
Today, as we begin a new Church Year, we see again how God acts in strange, paradoxical ways. His ways are not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts. His timing is different and always better than our own. Hear, O daughter of Zion, the watchmen are calling on the heights, the night is flying, your Bridegroom comes. His Advent is nigh. But you nor I would stage a grand entrance into the capital city in the manner that Jesus enters Jerusalem. We would bring out the ceremonial military marching bands and honor guard. The parade would not be lead by children. The attendants of our new leader would not be bedraggled fisherman and itinerant preachers. For a vehicle, we would demand an armored, black Cadillac Escalade, or whatever equivalent kind of chariot Cadillac was making back then for Roman Emperors.
But here comes our Lord on a borrowed donkey! Why? We always see in Jesus the fulfillment of His own preaching. He says to two unnamed disciples, “Go. You will find it this way.” They go. And they found it just as He said. But its more than that. Here Jesus lives out exactly what He said in the Sermon on the Mount: Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Only Jesus doesn’t come meekly because He is weak, but because He depends completely on God His Father for deliverance.
He needs no soldiers, for He does not come to battle against flesh and blood, but with the ancient adversary of man, the devil. He needs no weapons, for He is armed only with the Word of the Lord which endures forever. The Word which the prophets foretold. St Matthew is at pains to point out that Jesus does all things in order to fulfill Old Testament prophecy. But he never quite quotes the whole verse. I think its because he wants us, that is, the Holy Spirit wants us, to look it up. Zechariah was the prophet who spoke concerning the coming King, saying, Say to the daughter of Zion, “Behold, your King is coming to you, humble and mounted on a donkey.” That same prophet went on to say, I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace to the nations (Zech 9:10).
Why does He come this way? He who once in royal David’s city came in a lowly cattle shed, comes now on borrowed donkey to show you that He does not come to destroy you, but to save you. He needs the donkey and her colt, not for Himself, but for you. In order that He might fulfill the prophecy for you. All that Jesus does, He does for you. He comes as great David’s greater Son, like Solomon of old, anointed Prophet and Priest, the King, riding the borrowed donkey.
He calls you to follow after Him, to hasten to His train. To lay down not only your palms branches and cloaks, but your very lives. Christ Jesus is calling you to be like Himself. That doesn’t mean being a sissy or a weakling, but showing honor to others ahead of yourself, or as St Paul puts it in today’s Epistle, all the commandments are summed up in this one saying, Love your neighbor as yourself.
And it is precisely our failure to do that, our failure to love God or our neighbor as ourselves, that made His first coming necessary. In today’s collect we called on Christ to come to us now with His grace. “Stir up Your power, O Lord, and come.” We need Him to come. In a power shown in mercy. Because of what that same prayer calls “the threatening perils of our sins.” Our sins put us in danger; danger of falling away. The Word of God is filled with admonitions about the dangers of continuing to sin. St Paul writes to the Corinthians, Let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed let he fall (1 Cor 10:12). And to the Romans, Do not become proud, but fear (11:20). And St Peter says, You, therefore, beloved, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability (2 Pt 3:17). To the Hebrews, Consider Him who endured from sinners such hostility against Himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted (12:3). The sins that we keep on committing, keep coming back to like a dog to its vomit, put us in danger. They are “threatening perils.”
And that, dear daughter of Zion, is the beautiful comfort of this Gospel message the Church in her wisdom has appointed for you to hear not only at the beginning of Holy Week, but now, first thing in this new Church Year. St Matthew tells us what Jesus did in order to fulfill the words of the prophet Zechariah for you. He also records the words of Psalm 118 in mouth of the crowds. But again, not all of it. We’re meant to look it up. To chase down Christ through the Scriptures.
The last of the Hallel Psalms begins, Oh give thanks uno the LORD, for He is good; for His steadfast love endures forever. Right before acclamation of the crowds we hear, The Stone that the builders rejected has become the Cornerstone. This is the LORD’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. And then, immediately after our verse, The LORD is God, and He has made His light to shine upon us. Bind the festal sacrifice with cords, up to the horns of the altar! Jesus cites the verse concerning the Cornerstone later in Holy Week as referring to Himself. Likewise He is the Festal Sacrifice, the Pascal Lamb, the very Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, who allowed Himself to be bound to the Altar of His Cross in salvation for you.
He is the King who comes with justice and righteousness. He comes with salvation. He comes to free you from the threatening perils of your sins! That is why you are told to rejoice and sing, for there is no better news!
Lift up your heads, O gates! And be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The LORD, strong and mighty, the LORD, mighty in battle! Lift up your heads, dear people loved by God. Your heads and hearts and minds. Lift them up unto the Lord. For He has done battle on your behalf. He has defeated death by dying. He has come in the humility of your frail flesh and allowed Satan and the punishment of the Law to do their worst to Him. He is coronated at the place of the Skull, glorified in His Cross, and this King lays down His life for His people.
How do we respond? In the same way the crowd in Jerusalem did when Jesus rode in: Hosanna in the highest! Hosanna is a Hebrew word meaning, “Save us now!” or “Be our Savior!” The liturgy captures this meaning as both a prayer and praise. You sing it every Lord’s Day in the Holy Communion Liturgy. For every Divine Service you are calling on Christ to come and save you, just before you receive your King as He comes to you truly, even bodily, in His Holy Supper. That He who came into Jerusalem on borrowed donkey, comes to you, His New Jerusalem, in bread and wine, His Body and Blood.
Truly our Lord comes in strange, unexpected ways. Water and Word, bread and wine. But the strangest thing is that He would do it for us, unworthy sinners who fail Him time and time again. Because we are such failures, because we have nothing in ourselves on which to rely, and because we can even start to doubt that God’s love, forgiveness, kindness, mercy, and peace is for us, His Word, which endures forever, emphasizes that all this is for you.
Jesus is your King, who comes to you. Everything rests on those little words, “your,” and “you.” So when the night of affliction and temptation, of sorrow and despair comes upon you, when sin crouches at your door, rejoice and give thanks that Jesus is your King, your Savior. His death is for you. His resurrection is for you. His first Advent in the flesh is for you. His present Advent, His coming in Word and Spirit, is for you. His final Advent, in His self-same resurrected flesh, is for you, to bring you a new and glorified body out of your grave and give to you and all believers in Christ, eternal life.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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