Palm Sunday / Sunday of the Passion (April 1, 2012) – Philippians 2:5-11; Mark 11:1-11, 14:1-15:47
Philippians 2:5-11; Mark 11:1-11, 14:1-15:47
In the Face of the Impossible Doing What’s Possible
Palm Sunday/Sunday of the Passion – April 1, 2012
First Lutheran Church – Winnipeg, MB
Paul sets the stage for us this morning with his great hymn in Philippians.
He reminds us that we are here today to worship Jesus and nothing and no one else.
He reminds us why Jesus alone is worthy of worship.
Because he didn’t regard his divine status with God as something to benefit himself.
Out of love he laid it aside in order to be with us.
In order to live with us. In order to suffer with us. In order to die with us.
As the writer Sara Miles says,
He turns his back on claims to power,
Humbles himself to serve the undeserving,
Empties himself so we can experience God’s fullness,
And dies so we can live. (http://www.journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20120326JJ.shtml)
That’s why we worship Jesus.
Jesus is not a person who started with nothing and worked his way up so that he had everything.
On the contrary, Jesus started out with everything and gave it all up for love.
That is the good news this morning.
This is the measure of love. And it’s real. He lives.
And continues to humble himself and serve us by coming to us in one another’s broken bodies,
in these few halting words, in homemade bread, in hand-made wine.
That’s why we don’t worship the rags to riches Oprah Winfrey.
We worship the riches to rags Jesus of Nazareth.
But Paul says something else this morning.
He doesn’t just tell us why Jesus is worthy of worship.
He invites us to let the same mind be in us that was in Jesus.
Emulate him. Walk in a manner worthy of the gospel.
This day, this week, cannot be about something that happened 2000 years ago.
We enter into this week – and I urge you to participate in all the liturgies this week –
because they form us now, they change our lives now,
they shape the decisions we make now, and make them more divine.
A single human being takes on the violence and corruption of an empire,
faces the greed and thirst for power of those who collude with it . . . with what?
With a refusal to use power, a refusal to use vengeance.
With forgiveness. With compassion. With service.
And he changes those around him, he shapes them and their lives and their choices.
The disciples, of course, mostly do not come off well in this account by Mark.
But what about the woman who anoints Jesus in the beginning of the Passion account?
The guests who object to what the woman does miss the point when they say that
the oil should have been sold and given to the poor: Jesus is the poor.
Jesus is the poorest person in that house.
And what they want to do for him, they should do for the poor.
Jesus has shaped her and changed her life and her decisions.
And what about Joseph of Arimathea at the end of the Passion account?
Joseph surely puts himself at risk of losing – or should we say of emptying himself? – of
all he has when he seeks to grant Jesus this last deed of mercy.
It’s a brave thing to do in the face of a brutal man like Pilate.
Yet his merciful and brave action has been shaped by Jesus.
Jesus is the poor, and Joseph is honouring him by respectfully treating his body and
giving him his tomb.
In the face of the impossible, Jesus, Joseph, and the unnamed woman do what’s possible.
And ultimately, in light of Easter, so will the disciples.
I spoke with one of you this week about your work in health care in Northern communities.
It’s a daunting task because of lack of funds, physical remoteness, systemic problems,
Racism, misunderstanding, the expense of healthy food in the north, and some really
Astonishing and disgraceful statistics:
121 reserves in Canada are without adequate drinking water.
And yet, and yet, Jesus has shaped us in order to do what’s possible in the face of the impossible.
A man seeks to change the world with forgiveness, inclusion, and grace.
A woman honours the poorest man in the house by anointing him with a lavish gift.
A man considers the mercy of honouring his deceased friends body more important than
his safety or position.
A woman perseveres in a job that seeks to restore and build healthy communities despite
some pretty daunting statistics and some pretty difficult circumstances.
In the face of the impossible, God invites us to simply do what’s possible.
In this neighbourhood, as a congregation,
let us continue to do what’s possible in the face of the impossible.
For shaped by our worship of Jesus, God invites us to share the same mind that was in him.
This week, Sara Miles makes this invitation to you:
See the crowds, see the disciples, see Jesus: riding the colt into Jerusalem, eating supper with friends, stumbling up the hill. And if you let your mind be made in the mind of Christ Jesus, you will stay beside him the whole way, because you see where all this is going. It is going toward love. It is going toward life. And it cannot be stopped. (Ibid.)
So together let us say, “Amen.”
Pastor Michael Kurtz
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