The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
Mark 11:1 And as they approached Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, He sent two of His disciples, 2 and said to them, “Go into the village opposite you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, on which no one yet has ever sat; untie it and bring it here. 3 “And if anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ you say, ‘The Lord has need of it’; and immediately he will send it back here.” 4 And they went away and found a colt tied at the door outside in the street; and they untied it. 5 And some of the bystanders were saying to them, “What are you doing, untying the colt?” 6 And they spoke to them just as Jesus had told them, and they gave them permission. 7 And they brought the colt to Jesus and put their garments on it; and He sat upon it. 8 And many spread their garments in the road, and others spread leafy branches which they had cut from the fields. 9 And those who went before, and those who followed after, were crying out, “Hosanna! BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD; 10 Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David; Hosanna in the highest!” (NASB)
Even though the ride into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday has been the traditional reading for the First Sunday in Advent for centuries, it seems like a strange reading for the 1st Sunday in Advent. While we’re moving toward Christmas, this Gospel lesson transports us back to beginning of Holy Week.
The word “advent” means “coming” or “arrival” and the Season of Advent is a season dedicated to preparing the faithful for the coming of the Christ and one of the most visible examples of the arrival of Christ in the New Testament is His triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Thus the Gospel lesson this morning makes complete theological sense for a many reasons.
Now most church going people who know something of Advent think that Advent as only a “pre-Christmas season.” For them, Advent focuses exclusively the coming of the Son of God as the Babe of Bethlehem Who was born of the Virgin Mary bring peace between God and sinner.
Now the coming of the Son of God in the flesh for the purpose of dying for the sins of the world is central to Advent. This focus on the reason why the Second Person of the Holy Trinity took on flesh is why the fathers of the Early Church appointed Jesus’s entry into Jerusalem as the first lesson of the Advent Season.
Unlike the church and Christians today, the pastors and laity of the Early Church didn’t allow the world to determine the worship life and agenda of the church on Sunday morning. They were intent on making sure everyone understood that the incarnation, birth, and life of Jesus Christ, God’s only begotten Son, were all about the cross and its meaning for the life of the world and the life of the Christian.
Christianity is all about the cross. Christ’s crucifixion is what your life, hope, peace, and joy is about. This was why Jesus was conceived and born in the first place.
The church fathers made it clear that the manger was just the first step in that long and purposeful procession to Calvary; and Calvary to the resurrection; and the resurrection to the ascension; and the ascension to Christ’s Second Coming and the new heaven and new earth.
This is why we set aside a little time, just a couple of weeks before Christmas to consider how it is that Christ comes to us and how we ought to respond.
Inside this Nave and Sanctuary we are not yet singing joyous Christmas carols. It’s not time yet. This is the time for sober reflection. This is the time set aside for us to acknowledge just how sinful and wayward we are. All we like sheep have gone astray.
This is the purpose of the Old Testament lesson this morning. Isaiah 64:4 “Behold, You were angry, for we sinned, We continued in them a long time; And shall we be saved? 6 For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment.”
While the false Christians and the rest of the world use this time of year to prove to themselves and others that they are good people, generous and kind, full of the so-called “Christmas spirit,” Advent reminds the contrite that 6 “all of us wither like a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. 7 There is no one who calls on Your [God’s] name, Who arouses himself to take hold of You [God].”
Advent is a mini Lent. In fact, that Advent has also been called, Christmas Lent and Winter Lent. For the next four weeks we are to examine ourselves in light of the Ten Commandments and to hear the message that the Son of God has and is coming to our rescue.
Advent teaches us what kind of King God is. By the word’s standards Jesus didn’t look like much of king. On Palm Sunday He wasn’t dressed like a king. He didn’t ride in a royal chariot or on the back of a noble steed like kings were accustom to do. The people who lined the streets and put palm branches before Him didn’t look like an army either. As for the outcome of His ride into Jerusalem, it did not turn out as Jesus’s disciples had hoped, with Jesus hanging on a cross with a sign above His head that read, “The King of the Jews.”
To all appearances Jesus’s ride into His kingdom was hardly worth all the hoopla both then and now. But then He is not your normal earthly king and the members of the church not an earthly army.
The Prophet Zechariah prophesied of that first Palm Sunday, “Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is He, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” Our King did not come proud and mighty. He came humble and riding on a beast of burden, a poor man’s means of transportation.
Christ’s humble entry into Jerusalem should not surprise us given is personal history of arrivals. Phil. 2:6 “though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”
He who existed from eternity, the Son of God was born King of kings, but His entry into this world didn’t surround Himself in the normal kingly amenities. He was the God-King, but born to a young from Nazareth who was no queen. His royal crib was an animal trough in a place where a donkey could be found.
As for the place of His birth, the Jewish kings usually hailed from Jerusalem and even though the Old Testament prophesied that the Messiah would be born in the City of David, most expected their promised king to hail from Jerusalem. Instead, He came from Bethlehem, which wasn’t any bigger or better than Nazareth.
In days gone by (even still in some places) today when the queen went into labor adoring crowds waited outside the palace walls for the news of the birth. But the Christ Child came into the world to be greet by just a few lowly shepherds who were sent to the manger by a angelic choir. Jesus did not look or act like a king, not at birth, not when He grew up as a carpenter’s son, not when He showed upon in the temple to hold theological conversations with the teachers of Jerusalem, not when He showed up at the river Jordan and was baptized by John, not when He traveled around as the teacher from Nazareth for three years, and not when He rode into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday,
Yet, everyone knew that Jesus was the King. From the moment of His birth to the moment of His death, it was always about His kingship. When He was born the wise men came from the east looking for the King of the Jews. King Herod tried to kill the toddler Jesus because Herod didn’t want another king around. Throughout His three and a half years of His earthly ministry, Jesus constantly preached about His kingdom.
By the time Jesus is riding into Jerusalem, everyone believed that Jesus was all about ascending to the throne in Jerusalem. The religious leaders stood before Pilate and said of Jesus, (and in certain sense, rightly so) had made Himself out to be a king.
Kings don’t stand before governors to be sentenced to death on the cross as a common criminal. Kings are men who judge and condemn to death their enemies. Kings don’t die for their people. Soldiers and citizens are expected to die for the king.
Yet, our King is the kind of king that did the things that normal kings don’t do. “Our King is coming!” is the message of Advent. That is the message of Palm Sunday too.
On December 25th we are celebrating the fact the God the Father gave us His Son to die for our sins. As we have already celebrated in the Last Sunday of the Church Year, the King of kings and Lord of lords, has promised to come again to judge the living and the dead and to bring sins reign and effects to an end.
As He was about to ascend, Jesus said, (Matthew 28:19-20) “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
There is the third coming of Christ. There is His arrival in the manager in Bethlehem and His promised return on the last day. But there is also His coming in the Word and Sacrament ministry. Jesus just came to Creigthon Allen Burrell in the waters of Holy Baptism. He will come again and again each time Creigthon hears the Word, and each time he attends a Christian worship service, each time he communes. Christ comes to us whenever His Word is spoken, read, and heard.
Nothing has really changed. Jesus still comes to us in lowly, humble, and unassuming means: Word, Water, Bread, Wine. His coming just isn’t an Advent or Christmas thing. He comes to us whenever two or three gather in His name. (Matthew 18:20).
Today is the first Sunday of the Church year. It is a new year and it is time to prepare for the coming of our King. It is time to heed the words of Isaiah, 64:6 “For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; . . . 8 But now, O Lord, You are our Father . . 9 Do not be angry beyond measure, O Lord, Nor remember iniquity forever; Behold, look now, all of us are Your people.”
Thus begins our preparation to meet Christ the King, the Babe of Bethlehem, the Word of God spoken and the Word hidden in the waters of Holy Baptism, and the Lord’s Supper. This is the One Who comes to you now in the Word and sacrament ministry. This is the one Who will come again. Christ is among us.
Amen
May the peace that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.