(Palm) Sunday
Easter musings, part 1
Every year, I like to share some thoughts I’ve had over the years, regarding this most important Christian holiday. If you prefer to listen to them, click here.
If you’d prefer to read instead of listen, here you go!
This was the day everything was perfect.
This was the day it all came together: the crowds, the praise, the celebration of his presence.
This was the day that infuriated the Pharisees, enraged the Sadducees, and sealed his doom with them.
This was the day that delighted his followers; the day they had dreamt of for centuries; the day that promised imminent deliverance.
They sang his praises, shouted his name to the heavens, saw in him the fulfillment of their dreams and hopes, without really understanding his actual purpose or the words he’d shared.
This was the day of triumph, they thought, not knowing the real triumph was still to come.
This day that we have celebrated for two millennia is often seen as the day it began. But it began long before then, even before that perfect garden that most see as the beginning.
This day began before time; was decreed by the Father before Eden’s fall, as were the days that followed.
In a way, this day was a beginning -- the beginning of the culmination of a plan laid before the foundations of the earth.
For us, it’s the beginning of a week spent pondering the last week of His life on earth; a week spent pondering ourselves and our perceptions of Him.
Are we:
the adoring crowd,
the furious Pharisees,
the enraged Sadducees,
or even the hopeful disciples wondering which of them would be His right-hand man after the deliverance?
And even now, over 2000 years later, do we really understand all that he tried to teach us?