Sermon for Passion Sunday
For Us All
By The Rev. Eric Christopher Shafer -
The Sunday before Easter, the Last Sunday in Lent, this Sunday, today is known as both Palm Sunday and Passion Sunday.
Most years here at Mt. Olive we emphasize the Palm Sunday side of this day – Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem with a parade and shouts of Hosanna and so much more. And we plan to celebrate Palm Sunday this evening at our monthly live congregational gathering via Zoom. We even have Palm leaves drawn by our preschool children. I hope those of you viewing this service before 6pm on this Sunday can join us.
However, this year we decided to emphasize the Passion Sunday side of this day for our pre-recorded worship service.
You have just heard read the story of Christ’s Passion, Christ’s suffering and death, as St. Mark tells it.
And, what a story it is – a woman anointing Jesus with a costly ointment, Judas’ betrayal of Jesus, Jesus’ Passover meal with his disciples which we call his “Last Supper,” Jesus praying at Gethsemane, Jesus’ arrest by the Roman soldiers, Jesus before Pilate and religious leaders, Peter’s betrayal of Jesus, the release of Barabbas, and, finally, Jesus’ crucifixion and death on the cross, followed by his burial. And I probably missed a few important points.
What we just heard read, in all of is gory detail, is everything St. Mark remembered and wrote down about Jesus after Jesus’ Palm Sunday entry into Jerusalem and before Jesus’ Easter Sunday morning resurrection. As one of my seminary professors once said, “everything seemed to go downhill that week.”
Everything seemed to go downhill that week for Jesus.
For me, one thing stands out above all others in this story: all that is said and done in this dark and difficult story is done for us. For you and for me.
All that is said and done in this dark and difficult story is done for us. For you and me.
Jesus willingly embraces his destiny. Jesus’ life is not torn from him. From the beginning of this narrative until the end, Jesus participates willingly in what is to happen, refusing rescue and escape and not resorting to violence.
Jesus’ death is in so many ways tragic, but it is no accident. Jesus follows this road to express God’s complete solidarity with us in all things, including even the fear and experience of death. Jesus does so to demonstrate that God’s love is stronger than hate and God’s life is stronger than death.
In other words, Jesus does not die to make it possible for God to forgive us, Jesus dies to show us that God already has forgiven us because God loves us.
And that is the story of this day and this and every Holy Week: Jesus embraces his fate to demonstrate God’s profound and life-giving love for us all. On Maundy Thursday we remember that Jesus’ command to love others is rooted in and made possible by Jesus’ profound love for us all. And on Good Friday we see how many times Jesus could have avoided or changed his fate but chose not to do so, but instead embraced the cross while shouting his victory cry to the heavens.
All that is necessary has been accomplished by Jesus this week. God has once again rescued God’s people, this time not merely from oppression in Egypt, no, this time God has rescued God’s people, God has rescued us all from death itself.
All that is said and done in this dark and difficult story was one, is done for us. For you and for me. Jesus dies to show us that God already has forgiven us because God loves us.
Through Jesus’ Passion and death, God has rescued us all from death itself.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
(With thanks to the Rev. Dr. David Lose for “just one thing.”)
The Rev. Eric Christopher Shafer
Senior Pastor - Mt. Olive Lutheran Church
Santa Monica, California
Sermon for:
March 28, 2021
