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Triumphal processions

April 5,  2009  - Dale

Triumphal processions.  Everyone likes them. Think back to January when the President of the United States was inaugurated. The whole world watched, and many more would have loved to have been down on the street amongst the crowds to wave and cheer.

Parades happen everywhere to celebrate victories, to welcome back sporting heroes, to honour soldiers, or to welcome visiting dignitaries.

The Sunday before Jesus death was one of those days. A spontaneous outpouring of popular hope and support. A political campaign in disguise perhaps. People attracted to a man they thought might be able to save them in some way.  No doubt they all had different ideas about what he could do.

What most of them didn’t know was that his method of helping them would be fatal. He had already explained this more than once to his close friends. But they didn’t understand him - although they did have a great sense of foreboding. They knew that his determination to reach Jerusalem was bringing him closer and closer to real danger.

 And so it turned out. The shouting crowds were turned against him. The local legal system washed its hands of him. So far from saving anyone, he couldn’t even get justice for himself. At least not at first.

The very scary thing about what Jesus had told his friends was that if they wanted his help they would have to follow his death. The big parade on the Sunday was marked with palms and tree branches, and even coats and robes, thrown  on the road.

But the parade that saved people happened on Friday. A crowd was present but it wasn’t shouting in the same way. There was a dark sense of fear and disaster. People were crying. Instead of palms to walk on, there was a cross beam of timber to carry.

Jesus had told his friends a number of times how he would rescue them – and how they could be rescued.  Now at last they could see what he meant: here at last was the rescue. A fatal rescue that involved Jesus’ death on the timber cross beam.

But it would prove fatal to them also. That’s what he had already explained, “If you want to be rescued you will have to join the procession. This is a parade we are going on together. It is for people carrying a lump of timber on their shoulders – every day.” First an end to the old life. Then the start of a new life.

Dale