Here we are on Palm Sunday, the "gateway to Holy Week," and the liturgy of the Mass seems strange or jarring. One minute we're hailing Jesus as the Messiah while singing All Glory Laud and Honour and the next shouting out Crucify Him!, as we hear the Passion. It's as though we've been catapulted, in mood, from Easter to Good Friday. But of course we understand the connection.
Christ's kingship as the anointed holy one of God rests upon the Cross, his throne from which he establishes sovereignty over sin and death. He could, in that week leading up to his death, have chosen worldly power; the temptations in the wilderness surely returned with demonic intensity.
Stones to bread? Yes indeed, literal bread for himself and the world, to say nothing of spiritual bread in the form of the righteous wisdom he could have given from the gleaming, thunderstruck fastness of Mount Zion.
Instead of being scourged and nailed to a cross by Roman soldiers he could have ordered the angelic host to his defense, lest he dash his foot against a stone. And the kingdoms of the world? His for the asking, with all the glories therein.
Christ says no to this and by extension to the Devil himself. He follows a different path, the way of the Cross. What qualities took him there? Humility, for sure. He emptied himself, taking the form of a servant or slave, even to an agonizing, shameful death. Likewise obedience.
Recall the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus prays that the chalice of suffering and death would be taken from him, but he continues, "My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass away from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou willest." (Matt. 26:39) This utterly faithful submission to the Father's will takes him to Golgotha, where he lays down his life in a perfect act of love for the forgiveness of our sin.
Humble, obedient, loving faith. The way of the Cross and the way to the empty tomb and everlasting life. It comes at a cost, obviously, but consider the reward, the green pastures of paradise.
I pray we're given the courage, by the grace of God, to acknowledge Christ as our King and follow him through the "grave and gate of death" to eternal life.
God Bless,
LSP
