LAKE JAMES

NORTH CAROLINA

Palm Sunday + April 1, 2007 + St. Paul’s Church, Lake James

+ In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Each of us is about to be offered an immensely wonderful gift, a gift some will accept with awe, a gift some will not understand and so ignore, and perhaps, in some cases, a gift some will simply reject. That Gift is called Holy Week and includes some of the strangest days in the Church’s liturgical year, days of paradox, even seeming contradiction! For those who intentionally participate in them, the days of Holy Week can be like an emotional roller coaster with moments of great joy, then grief, and then even greater joy! On the other hand, those who don’t make the time to be part of the liturgies, who go right from Palm Sunday to Easter Day, are apt to wonder what all the fuss is about, missing the unusual chance to walk in a special and very personal way with Jesus through the most meaningful events in all of human history. So, I begin this sermon with a question: What will you do with those days?

To better understand Holy Week, we start with today, the Sunday of the Passion, the day known to most of us as “Palm Sunday.” What do you think of when you hear that name? For many of us, our first thought may be of the blessed palms we receive and then take home to put by a cross or holy picture to serve through the rest of the year as a reminder of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Today we sang that wonderful hymn, “All glory, laud, and honor,” a hymn which Christians have sung on this day for over twelve hundred years! The Liturgy of the Palms probably has a lot to do with what we associate with this holy day, but that part of our worship today, the blessing and distribution of palms, with a reading of the Gospel account of Jesus entering Jerusalem on a donkey while crowds shouted “Hosannah!” is really quite brief, and is quickly replaced by a very different theme. The Bible readings at the Eucharist make no mention of palms or the procession into Jerusalem. Instead, we are given a foretaste of the terrible events which will soon follow.

Some of our parishioners are great fans of the North Carolina State basketball team, and those who follow what, to me at least, is the seemingly endless NCAA tournament called “March Madness” know that NC State blazed through round after round of that event before being defeated and sent home. Think of this: the fans of all the teams which were invited to be in the tournament were thrilled when their team was included. Those whose teams survived the first round by winning, had feelings of exultation and hope, but then some experienced the depths of sorrow when their team lost in one of the next rounds. My point is not to minimize or demean the importance of who wins basketball games and the intensity of feelings of sports fans. I simply offer this illustration to you as an example of the way humans can care, can care deeply about events which bring joy and then sorrow, even despair! Today, we are confronted by a far more important event than any basketball victory or defeat. But, like avid sports fans, if we have paid attention to the Palm liturgy and then to the reading of that special part of the Gospel known as “The Passion,” we have somehow shared in the joy of what seemed to be a victory as Jesus was cheered by crowds, only to have that joy quickly replaced by an emotional plunge into the depths. In the Passion we heard the story of our Lord’s suffering and death and, God willing, perhaps realized that Jesus did all that – for us! As that truth hits home, we try to grasp the fact that, unlike the lovely and artistic creations of smooth polished wood or shining metal we are used to seeing, Christ’s Cross was a rough, ugly instrument of torture and painful death. We try to make sense out of the idea that it was and is our sin – yours and mine – which brought the Son of God to his agony and crucifixion. We are used to hearing that teaching – so very used to it, but how seriously, how personally do we take it? After all, it was not just my sin, and it wasn’t just yours but rather the sin of all humankind, wasn’t it? It was the sin of everybody here this morning at Saint Paul’s Church, and it was the sin of those who, for whatever reason did not come to church today. It was the sin of folks down the street at the AME church, and at a Baptist church, those at the Roman Catholic church, those at a synagogue or mosque, and even those non-worshipers who may be relaxing this morning by doing the Sunday New York Times Crossword Puzzle! It was also the sin of people in the 3^rd century and in the 13^th, in the 6^th, and in all other periods of time. That’s all true! But because it is true, because it was and is the sin of all, it can sit so very lightly on our hearts – after all, we’re really no worse than most everybody else, are we?

For many centuries at Passover, the Jewish People have retold the story, the true story, of the freeing of the Hebrews from slavery in Egypt. Part of the ritual for the great Seder meal is for the leader to emphasize that, in a most profound sense, it was not only their ancestors who were freed, but all present at the Seder. God freed them!

Think of this: if you had been wrongfully accused of murder, convicted, and condemned to death, sent to live on death row to count the days until your execution, but then the real murderer was discovered, and you were set free, wouldn’t that make a difference in your life? And wouldn’t you expect it would also make a difference in the lives of your family and friends? It probably would. But it would be harder for the next generation to be as impressed, for them to feel as connected to what happened to you as it was to those involved at the time. And the generation which followed that one would find it even harder. Eventually, it would become just part of the family history, something which happened to great, great grandfather, and the questions would become “yes, it happened, but really, so what? What’s that got to do with me? What’s for lunch?”

How hard it is to communicate the most important realities of one’s life to others! How frustrating to try to explain what a particular personal experience means in ways that others might not only understand, but come to have it be equally important to them.

Do you ever have the feeling that, while you believe the teachings of the Christian religion about Jesus, you wish it meant more to you? That what Jesus did and why had a larger place in your heart and mind?

For many centuries, the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, has had a deep understanding of the human psyche and knows the difficulty people are apt to have in personally identifying with experiences of others, whether it be Hebrews freed from Egyptian slavery or Jesus dying on the Cross for us. That’s why, from earliest times, Christians have celebrated rites which teach what happened to Jesus, but rites which also emphasize the importance of that for us.

This morning, you and I have begun a ceremonial journey to Jerusalem. Tomorrow evening at 7, we will host members of the other parishes at a celebration of the Holy Eucharist and at 7 on Tuesday evening, we are invited to a Mass at St. Stephen’s church where I will celebrate and Father John will preach. St. Mary’s Church will offer the service of Tenebrae Wednesday evening at 7 p.m. Ahead of us on Thursday lies the sharing of a moment of great thanksgiving as we commemorate the gift of the Holy Eucharist, that sacred banquet at which we are fed with the very Body and Blood of Christ, receiving God’s grace to help us be the people we are called by God to be. But that momentary joy is almost immediately followed by a grim reminder of what lies ahead the following day. Following the Eucharist and the dramatic stripping of the Altar, we have the unusual opportunity to respond to Christ’s plea “couldn’t you watch with me for one hour?” by spending an hour with Him at the Altar of Repose which will be in Fitzgerald Hall. On Friday, people from the four Morganton Episcopal churches gather at noon at the mother parish, Grace Church, for the Good Friday liturgy. The familiar spiritual asks “Were you there when they crucified my Lord?” – but it also asks us if we will be there to share with our brothers and sisters in Christ in the commemoration of Our Lord’s suffering and death. Here in Morganton, we are blessed by having a Holy Week which is so full, so complete with opportunities to focus clearly on Jesus, and on our faith. As you think ahead to the coming days, as you decide what kind of time you will make for the worship of God, consider whether what you do will lead to a celebration of Christ’s resurrection at Easter, prepared for by Holy Week, or whether the days between now and next Sunday will just be much the same as any other weekdays in the year. As your parish priest, as your friend, and as your brother in Christ, I pray that this coming week will be really different for you – a week in which you put aside all you can so as to be part of the ancient and dramatic liturgies of the Church, letting them teach you, speak to you, and move you. Come and join with others so that, even more, you can join with Him – Jesus Christ our Lord, our Saviour, the Son of God.

+ In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

The Reverend Alfred T. K. Zadig, Sr.

This page last modified on Friday, April 11, 2008 09:40 PM