Rev. David Boyd

It's important sometimes to get out of your comfort zone. That's the truism for the day. We are creatures of habit and comfort and we don't like to do things that will jolt us out of our areas of comfort. Like movement. We're good United Church folk who want a little movement, but not too much. Standing and sitting is OK. Coming forward for communion is OK. But don't ask us to do too much movement. And yet, here we were going around half of the block this morning in a Palm Sunday processional. What was that like?

Pilgrimage is an important part of our Christian tradition; people have gone on pilgrimages in Europe for centuries. The El Camino de Santiago de Compostela, translates as St. James' Way, is a popular modern pilgrimage site in Spain. The Celts of Scotland, Ireland and Wales went on pilgrimages to holy sites. The mother of Constantine, the Roman Emperor of the 4th Century, made Jerusalem a site of pilgrimage. In a very real way, when we go away on holiday to Mexico or Hawaii, or wherever we might go, it is a form of pilgrimage. Most religions have some form of pilgrimage as part of the religious discipline. It is about the journey and the people and experiences on the road as well as the destination. It is about intentionally embarking on a journey that has some parallels to our spiritual and soul-filled journeys. And of course, pilgrimage is part of our Jewish ancestry; ancient Jews were expected to go to Jerusalem for Passover once or twice in their lifetime. And this was what Jesus was doing when he entered Jerusalem to the cries of Hosanna.

What made this particular pilgrimage a little different from most is that Jesus planned the end of the pilgrimage quite carefully. Jesus planned his entry into Jerusalem to make a very particular point about God and about Roman imperial designs and the arrogance of many Jewish and Temple leaders. Jesus sent his followers ahead to arrange for a colt, complete with what to say if they were stopped. He started from the Mount of Olives, from where tradition dictated that the final battle for Jerusalem's liberation would come. He went into Jerusalem as the conquering warrior, as it were, riding a colt ahead of a throng of people caught up in the events of the day. Ched Myers and Charles Campbell both believe that what Jesus was doing was street theatre. He was mocking the militaristic ways of Rome and some of the Jewish leaders. He was the "warrior"who was entering Jerusalem riding on a colt instead of a white horse, carrying arms of love rather than arms for war, bringing a message of peace rather than a message of domination. He was lampooning the ways of the Romans with their precise military parades and the leaders who wanted protocol to be followed when entering a city to display as much might, pomp and circumstance as possible.

Flash ahead 2000 years to the G-20 meeting in London. The G-20 leaders gathered complete with proper protocols and diplomatic undertakings. There was a bit of "hoo-hah"made by the media when Michelle Obama touched the Queen. Everything is done to a kind ritual that seems to many of us average people as rather meaningless and empty. Who sits where and who stands in relation to whom? I remember reading an article some years ago by a psychologist with expertise on power dynamics in relationships. He said that you need to watch how leaders shake hands. If it is a straight hand shake, right hand to right hand, then it is between equals. But when you start to grab the wrist or the upper arm with your left hand while you are shaking hands, it is about power. The higher you get on the arm, the more you want to exert power over the other. And if you pull someone into a half-embrace, well that is saying something like, "you are mine; I've got you." It was a very interesting article and very telling when I watched leaders meet together.

What would Jesus have made of the G-20 meetings or the NATO Summit and where would he have been? Would he have made a dramatic, street-theatreish entry into London or Strasbourg? Would he have been permitted to do so? Probably not. And it is unfortunate that the media outlets only broadcast the negative protest of the G-20 or NATO Summit. There are whole lot of peaceful groups who were in London and Strasbourg trying to get a message of peace and change onto the agenda of the political leaders. But all we hear about are the hooligans and the daredevils. We don't hear about the Iona Community's presence in London. We don't hear about the parallel discussions by the citizens of the world about what might work to turn around our economic downturn or help to bring peace to Afghanistan or the Middle East. Would Jesus have been cast as an agitator? Quite likely.

But Jesus was someone who agitated for transformation of systems, for love to be known by all, for all people to experience a living wage and decent living conditions, for the Commonwealth of God to be known in all its fullness by everyone. Jesus agitated not as a victim, but in an intentional way. What I mean by this is that Jesus made decisions all along the way that, in many ways, led him to the cross. He must have known that he was pushing the envelope and that Rome couldn't allow him to push too far. And the consequence of pushing too far was crucifixion.

And really, Paul's hymn in Philippians captures this sense of Jesus' identity. "Jesus, though being the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness." Jesus lived his life this way; he gave of himself to others all his life. He emptied himself of any pretensions and lived as a conduit of God's love and God's radical transformation. In all he did, he emptied himself: his prayers, his healings, his confrontations, his giving, his teaching, his stories, his whole life and even his death he emptied himself of power for the sake of love. And what is remarkable about this is that Jesus did not face his death as a victim. As Paul Duke wrote in Feasting on the Word: "No one emptied him; he emptied himself. No one made him a slave or humbled him; he took the form of a slave and humbled himself. The text does not point to selflessness, but to powerful selfhood entirely choosing to pour itself out, even to the point of crucifixion." (Page 175 of Year B, Volume 2.)

I find this powerful, life-giving stuff. This is the vision that God has for the world. This is the vision that elevates the least and the last. This is the vision that tears down structures and institutions that oppress and enslave. This is the vision that must be part of our economic turn around. This is the vision that is counter to imperial pretensions on the part of all governments. This is the vision that transforms our lives. And it does so precisely because it is about love. God's actions in the world through Jesus and otherwise are about self-emptying love. God's love isn't coercive and all powerful in the macho sense. God's love is with all and in all, gently calling to a new way, gently calling us to new lives, gently calling the world to self-emptying love. And perhaps one might say, sometimes not so gently as with Jesus' entry in Jerusalem. But even though Jesus lampooned the military and imperial leaders of his day, he did so in a way that was non-violent, that modelled the kind of love that he embodied, that we all embody. So, our brief pilgrimage as a way of remembering the Palm Sunday processional of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem is our public witness that we are not victims of the world, that we are not participants in the imperial ways of the world, that we are about love and self-emptying, and that we are about the profound and life-giving hope that is God's Commonwealth for all.

Have a blessed Holy Week. Amen.