Palm Sunday – April 13, 2025

Podcast

Welcome and prayer: Jim Calhoun

Come, Lord, and join us here today

We are full of gratitude that 

You sought us

Found us

Brought us close 

Made us new

And loved us like Your children

We have been so fortunate to live our days with You

To know Your presence

Your loving care

To hear Your voice

Even when quiet and gentle

And this love You have poured into us,

Is the love we want to pour into others

And it makes our hearts glad

Though sometimes—often times—

Life, people (ourselves included),

Are messy

Needy 

Wounded or broken

and life is hard

Loving is hard

Despite our best intentions

Our best efforts

Our determined sacrifices

And things fall apart

Come, Lord, and bind up the disappointed 

Tend their wounds

Chase away their self-doubt

Their self-loathing

And any inclination to condemn themselves

Remind us that You are sovereign

You are making all things new

All people whole

That a dreary, ugly episode for us

Can nevertheless be transformed

That more is happening than we know

That loving others is still our calling

Even when things don’t work out as we hoped

Grant us the grace to continue to love

Just as You have loved us

Morning talk: chuck smith, jr.

“Six days before the Passover, Jesus therefore came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. So they gave a dinner for him there. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those reclining with him at table. Mary therefore took a pound of expensive oil made from [an exquisite plant], and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of the disciples (he who was about to betray him), said, ‘Why was this ointment not sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor?’ He said this, not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it. Jesus said, ‘Leave her alone, so she may keep it for the day of my burial. For the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me.’” John 12:1-8

INTRO: I know this is Palm Sunday and I read the wrong story

However, this is like an introduction to this big occasion, because 

  Jesus came to stay in the home of his friends the day before his grand entrance

   – by the time he reached Bethany, his ministry was winding down

    ~ when we read to the end of this chapter, 

         We come to the end of Jesus’ service to the crowds (in John’s Gospel)

    ~ they will hear nothing more from him, personally

  – in fact, this important detail of limited opportunity is highlighted in this chapter

I wonder how long Mary had been wanting to bless Jesus in this way

  – she not have been sure she’d ever have the opportunity

    ~ but here he was, right there in her home

         if she chickened out now, would she have a second chance?

    ~ turns out, she wouldn’t! it was now or never

  – later on, Jesus will talk about missed opportunities — vv. 35-36 & 46

    ~ when he said, “While you have the light,” that space of time was narrow

Mary must have felt some measure of excitement

  – we bring gifts to people because we love them

     ~ we want to bring joy to their hearts

     ~ but we also worry— What if they don’t like my gift

  – did Mary nervously try to slip into the room without being noticed?

     ~ did she fumble with the stopper in the small clay jar?

or feel embarrassment in front of the disciples?

The times we visited orphans in Russia,

A few of the children gave us gifts

  – something small and worn out that they had held onto for a long time,

     ~ because they had nothing else

had the trinket had been anything of much value,

  the older, bigger orphans would have already taken it from them

    ~ the child bringing the gift would approach one of us with a big smile,

holding tightly to the little treasure in their hands

One boy, maybe seven years old—

    (it was difficult to guess their ages, 

because on their slender diets they did not develop normally)

    ~ with bright eyes, handed me an old fountain pen —out of ink

maybe thrown away or handed to him by another visitor,

  because it was worthless — but not to him

     ~ he had hidden it and hung onto to until then, when he gave it to me

I’ve kept it

The first time I was in Russia, at one of the most impoverished orphanages,

  – a small girl took my hand as we walked from a river back to their dormitory

     ~ and she didn’t let go of my hand until dinner, 

then she grabbed it again until it was time for her to turn in

     ~ ever since then, she has held onto my heart

she wrote a poem and gave it to me just before we drove away

  I’ve held onto that too — in fact, I have it right here . . .

     written in Russian and translated by one of our interpreters

If you sometimes skim through biblical passage, don’t overlook this line:

“The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.”

  – I’m certain that John is suggesting something, like a hidden meaning

  – entering a person’s home, we often notice the fragrance of it

     ~ in some cases, the aroma was prepared for our visit

     ~ others times the residents scented their home for their own enjoyment

whenever we went to my grandmother’s home,

  it always smelled like chocolate chip cookies

Some people bring a pleasant fragrance into every encounter,

  – but it has nothing to do with our olfactory sense other than by analogy 

“thanks be to God,” St. Paul wrote, “who . . . through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing” (2 Cor. 2:15-16)

How was it, that Mary’s devotion to Jesus became a problem for someone else?

  – nevertheless, this happens all the time

      ~ a Judas who never felt an overwhelming attraction to Jesus,

who has no idea what it means to be in love with Jesus,

who joins the followers of the Lord, not for the Lord but their own benefit,

     ~ sees another follower offer themselves completely to God,

worship him without restraint,

give him the most lavish offering of praise and worship,

    with their entire spirit, mind and body,

and scoff, or criticize, or find fault with them

  – King David’s wife saw him worshipping God 

as the Ark of the Covenant was carried into the city,

“leaping and dancing before the LORD, and she despised him in her heart” (2 Sam. 6:16)

     ~ so he arrived home to her bitter insults and insinuations,

but in his own defense, he said, “It was before the LORD”

     ~ he justified his complete abandon 

as an extravagant expression of his adoration of God

the Lord was his audience — she was just a spectator

These harsh critics are skillful in the way they can conceal their contempt

beneath a veneer of piety and sensible decorum

“Why didn’t she sell that expensive perfume and give the proceeds to the poor?”

  – that kind of logic can infect the minds of others,

who may be truly caring followers of Jesus

      ~ John is the only writer who pins this this complaint on Judas

Matthew implicates all the disciples 

  and Mark said there were “others” who shared those sentiments

     ~ and of course — it sounded good — benevolent — generous

“Leave her alone!” Jesus said — he was immediately her hero, her protector

“Back off Judas! You have enough of your own problems,

and you cannot blame them on her.

If you really care about the poor, you always have them around you,

but you do not always have me.”

  – there it is again — that limitation —

the time will run out, the opportunity will pass

     ~ the day will end and then night will descend

NOW we can celebrate Palm Sunday 

“The next day the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming for the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!’ And Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, just as it is written,

‘Fear not, daughter of Zion;

behold, your king is coming,

  sitting on a donkey’s colt!’” (Jn. 12:12-15)

Wait! Was that it? John gives the most condensed account of this event

  – Matthew tells us how the entire city of Jerusalem was stirred up,

and even some time later children were still singing in the temple,

“Hosanna to the Son of David”

     ~ Mark is more subdued, but not as much as John

However it is Luke who tells us, that if the crowd had been silent,

“the very stones would cry out”

     ~ perhaps John felt his readers were already aware of those other accounts

We have sometimes heard

  – that the crowd who welcomed Jesus with praises on Palm Sunday

     ~ were shouting “Crucify him” on Good Friday

but according to what John says in verse 12, 

  the crowd on Palm Sunday were out-of-towners

the locals had to ask “Who is this?” (Matthew 21:10)     

     ~ it was the locals—and especially the religious leaders protecting their interests,

who clamored for Jesus’ execution

  – John does add something else no other Gospel reported

“Now among those who went up to worship at the feast were some Greeks. So these came to Philip who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’ Philip went and told Andrew; Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus” (Jn. 12:20-22)

     ~ at the beginning of this Gospel, one of the first disciples to follow Jesus was Andrew

he went and found his brother Peter and brought him to Jesus

     ~ another first disciple was Philip,

who went and found Nathanael and brought him to Jesus

     ~ the first two disciples were already bringing others to Jesus

now, at the end of Jesus’ ministry, they’re still bringing people to Jesus

  only this time there is a radical difference: these men are not Jewish

  – neither were the Samaritans Jewish,

     ~ but they shared a distant identity with Israel and belief in their same God

     ~ the Greeks were from a different part of the world and a very different culture

it looks like a new stage in the spread of the Lord’s work

  so it seems odd to me, but John says nothing more about them

What happens next: Jesus just starts talking

And it’s as if he is saying whatever pops into his mind

  – he announces that his hour has finally arrived,

     ~ but he isn’t specific regarding what that means

he uses a figure of speech, that at least WE can understand refers to his death

  then he says those who follow him must walk the same path

     ~ before that can settle in, Jesus reveals something very personal

“Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me fro this hour? But for this purpose have I come to this hour” (v. 27) 

  – I feel the tension in his voice, 

torn between his mission and his natural inclination to avoid suffering and death

     ~ he didn’t judge himself for having these feelings

     ~ he faced them, acknowledged them, and transcended them

For the third time in John’s Gospel, Jesus talks about being “lifted up from the earth”

  – Jesus was not going to be doing the lifting

     ~ this was going to happen to him

     ~ he was going to be doing something else — a drawing

“And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (v. 22)

  – in this chapter we’ve seen how people were drawn to Jesus

      ~ Mary, drawn by love

      ~ people drawn to her home drawn by the miracle of Lazarus raised from death

      ~ the crowd as he descended the Mount of Olives, 

drawn by all the wonderful works they had seen

      ~ and then the Greeks, who were drawn to him by who-knows-what or why

  – but when he’s lifted up, all people everywhere are drawn to him.

There’s another meaning to being “lifted up,” 

  – which means exalted, honored, raised to prominence or positive recognition

        ~ humans lifted Jesus up on a cross—his Father lifted up to glory

CONCLUSION: Before we lay down our palm branches,

Quiet our kids, collect our things, and leave the parade down the Mount of Olives

  – there is something Jesus said I want to take with me

“If anyone serves me, they must follow me; and where I am, my servant will be also” (c. 26)

When I pray, I frequently ask Jesus to be with me

His presence holds me together, when everything else is falling apart

But the verse reminds me, that when I’m praying, “O Lord, be with me,”

Jesus is telling me, “Follow Me, and you will be with Me”