Katniss Everdeen volunteering as tribute (image source). |
March 29, 2015 - Palm Sunday
“Rebel with a Cause: A Threatening Hosanna”
John 12:9-19
9 When
the great crowd of the Jews learned that Jesus was there, they came not only
because of Jesus but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. 10 So the chief
priests planned to put Lazarus to death as well, 11 since it was on account of him that many
of the Jews were deserting and were believing in Jesus.
12 The
next day the great crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was
coming to Jerusalem. 13 So
they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, shouting,
“Hosanna!
Blessed
is the one who comes in the name of the Lord—
the King of
Israel!”
14 Jesus
found a young donkey and sat on it; as it is written:
15 “Do
not be afraid, daughter of Zion.
Look, your king is coming, sitting on a
donkey’s colt!”
16 His
disciples did not understand these things at first; but when Jesus was
glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written of him and
had been done to him.
17 So
the crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and
raised him from the dead continued to testify. 18 It was also because they heard that he
had performed this sign that the crowd went to meet him. 19 The Pharisees
then said to one another, “You see, you can do nothing. Look, the world has
gone after him!”
Sermon: “Rebel
with a Cause: A Threatening Hosanna”
There
is a powerful book and movie series that’s been sweeping through our country
with ever-growing popularity. It’s
called The Hunger Games. Have you heard
of it? I realize it sounds like the
lunch rush on Sundays at Valentis, but it’s a very different story than
that. The Hunger Games is partly popular
because of its unarguable star: Jennifer Lawrence, whose attitude, intensity
and just plain awkwardness has seemed to charm everyone. But the story itself is captivating and
deeply, deeply disturbing.
The
Hunger Games is the futuristic dystopia set in the post-apocalyptic nation of
Panem. In this country, the gap between
the have’s and the have-not’s is extreme, as all of the wealth is gathered in
The Capitol, while workers toil in other districts to furnish such a lavish
lifestyle. There was, at some point, a
rebellion against the state, and so every year, The Capitol has what are called
The Hunger Games, in which a male and female “tribute” child are taken from
each district. “Games” is a ridiculous
name for it; what ensues is a battle to the death between these children, all
televised, all in an effort to show the poor districts the cost of their
rebellion, and to show everyone the power of The Capitol.
The
main protagonist is Katniss Everdeen, played by Jennifer Lawrence, who comes
from district 12, what is meant to be Appalachia (and was filmed in the
mountains of NC). When her younger
sister is selected to fight in the Hunger Games, Katniss volunteers herself in
her place, and into the Games she goes.
She resists the demand to kill her other competitors as much as
possible. The Capitol continues to make
preserving life more and more difficult.
Finally,
she and another tribute, Peeta, emerge as the winners because, instead of
killing one another, they are prepared to both die willingly. It is a horrific story, and shows how the
threat of death can often be used to pacify entire peoples. Again and again, Katniss resists that system,
though. When touring as the “victors” of The
Hunger Games (though clearly this is a game no one really wins) she visits the
district of a dear friend, a young girl who was killed in the games.
Instead
of sticking to her Capitol-faithful script, she names the reality: this young
girl died. She shouldn’t have. She will not be forgotten. The crowd responds to this act of honesty by
showing their support for her with a simple symbol – perhaps as symbolic as
waving palm branches –, and the Capitol officers swoop in and take control,
bringing even more death. You see, for
The Capitol, there is absolutely nothing as threatening as a hero who faces and
overcomes death. The world follows after
a hero like that.
This
story came to mind as I pondered our Palm Sunday narrative. They are not named “The Capitol”, but the
Pharisees and chief priests behave in the same sort of way. They’ve heard of a hero among the Jews named
Jesus who has been drawing lots of attention and, it makes them nervous. Especially so when they hear that he raised a
man – Lazarus – from the dead. There is
nothing more threatening than a hero who faces and overcomes death. They planned to put Lazarus to death as well
as Jesus because they thought killing was the key to maintaining power – it
wasn’t. We’ll talk more about that next
Sunday.
The
crowds that filled the streets of Jerusalem – the Capitol of power for
political and religious leaders – did so because they had heard this Jesus had
defeated death.
As
the Roman army advanced through the city bringing order from the West, this
Jesus processed in from the East. It was
Passover, and the city was packed. The
Roman army was a mighty show of authority and control with one clear message:
resistance is futile. Might is
king.
Jesus
put on a very different show: riding in on a humble and rather silly donkey,
with palm branches instead of weapons, and children instead of armies
surrounding him. And Jesus too,
proclaimed one clear message: a new king is in town, and the world will follow
after him.
What
good was a mighty army when walking among Jesus’ followers was a person he
raised from the dead? Jesus resisted the
death-dealing ways of the empire, again and again. He broke all of their rules – even the very
rules of life and death itself. His
resistance did not take the form the Roman army and chief priests might have
liked. It was not a battle of weapons. He did not fight back against that Westward
expanding Roman army in Jerusalem with stones or sticks or hateful speech. He defeated them with a single word,
“Hosanna!”
It
means, “Save us, we pray!” The entirety
of that mighty army, the fabric of that whole oppressive society, the structure
of that entire legalistic religion, was brought to its knees all because of one
word: “Hosanna.” Save us.
Why
is that hosanna so threatening? I’m glad
you asked. Here’s why: if that rapidly growing crowd was asking
Jesus to save them, it means they weren’t expecting salvation anywhere
else.
They
no longer trusted the State to save them from poverty, injustice and
powerlessness, because it couldn’t.
They
no longer trusted the religious leaders to save them from damnation, isolation
and faithlessness, because they couldn’t.
Only
Jesus could save that crowd. And if
salvation wasn’t something to be bought and sold with guilt and fear, then the
state and the religious elite had nothing whatsoever to do with it. That is why that one word so threatened the
religious and political elite, enough that they would kill whoever it took to
silence it.
Save
us. In the story of The Hunger Games,
those who were fortunate enough to live in the Capitol of wealth and power
expected that privilege to save them.
They even made a massive sporting event out of the horrifying Hunger
Games to pretend it was all necessary to “be saved” from disorder and
chaos. With their fancy parties and avid
watching and blind eye to the violence of the system, those residents of The
Capitol cried, “Hosanna: Save us” to the very thing that was destroying them.
I
wonder who we cry Hosanna to. Do we also
ask salvation of what can never bring it?
Do we cry “save us” to the bottom of a glass of wine, or a robust bank
account, or a politician with whom we agree?
Do we cry “save us” to bad habits, or deluding distractions, or the next
popular self-help model? Do we cry “save
us” to our own independence, or a close friend, or even our religious
practices?
These
things cannot bring us salvation. The
One whom we call Christ can. It is not
enough to proclaim that Jesus brings salvation.
We must also proclaim what does not bring salvation. Like Katniss Everdeen resisting the empire
that used poverty and violence as a tool for subjugation, we must cry out that
we do not look to the powerful to save us, even when we count ourselves among
the powerful.
We
must let go of our ego and need to be right enough to be different from the
chief priests, and admit that institutional religion won’t bring
salvation.
Conservative
or liberal political lobbying won’t bring salvation.
Our deep-thinking minds and
spiritually-engaged hearts won’t bring salvation.
Jesus
Christ will bring salvation. He is the
only one we who follow him cry Hosanna to.
But,
remember there is a threat in that hosanna.
If Jesus can bring salvation through defeating death once and for all,
then nothing is beyond his reach. That
salvation then seeps into all of those other places: into organized religion,
into the political realm, into our minds and hearts, into communities plagued
by injustice and communities benefitting from it. That Hosanna threatens it all, not with
weapons, and not with hateful speech, but with love that death can’t begin to
defeat, or even understand.
Who
are we crying Hosanna to?
And, just as
importantly, who should we stop crying Hosanna to? Amen.