Last Sunday we moved swiftly in worship from waving Palms and shouting Hosannas to the “king who comes in the name of the Lord,” to shouting, “Crucify!  Crucify him!”  In my sermon I tried to juxtapose our desire for winners over losers in contemporary America, with the reversal of the people in Jesus’ day who turned on their hoped for Messiah, when he didn’t match up with their expectations of a “winning” Messiah.  The following scriptures highlight the juxtapostion…

Palm Sunday – “As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen, saying, ‘Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!  Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!’” – Luke 19: 37-38

Passion Sunday – “Then they all shouted together, ‘Away with this fellow!  Release Barabass for us!’ (This was a man who had been put in prison for an insurrection that had taken place in the city, and for murder.)  Pilate, wanting to releace Jesus, addressed them again; but they kept shouting, ‘Crucify, crucify him!‘” – Luke 23: 18-20

I still struggle with the paradoxical nature of following a “loser,” who showed us that the only way to truly “win” in the Kingdom of God, is to die to yourself, take up your cross and follow Him.   It means loving not only those who love you, but those who hate you as well.  I much more prefer the Golden Rule, “love your neighbor as yourself” (as long as I get to choose my neighbors), to Jesus’ New Commandment (coming your way this Maundy Thursday!), to “love one another as I have loved you” (John 15: 12).  But I believe, as  Dietrich Bonhoeffer did, that when Jesus says, “Follow me,” that means we are called to die just like Jesus did.  Die to our old self, our false self, and rise to the new self, the True Self revealed in Jesus Christ.  God’s love revealed to us through Jesus’ death and resurrection was more costly than we can comprehend.  Yet, this Holy Week, we are invited to reflect again on God’s love revealed to us in the Cross of Christ, that we may be drawn more deeply into the life of faith, hope, and love now revealed in us through compassionate service and a life of forgiveness.