Tag Archives: cross

The Lord Has Need of It

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A Sermon for the Locust Grove United Church of Christ, York, PA

by Rev. James Eaton, Pastor © 2025

Palm Sunday/C • April 13, 2025

Luke 19:28-40

Notice the breath. Buddhist teaching begins with this simple suggestion: notice the breath. A yoga instructor says it over and over: notice the breath. It’s repeated because one of the hardest things is to see what’s really there. We get used to a room, and don’t see it’s color; we get used to a person and forget why they interested us. We hear a story and when it’s repeated, assume we know the details already and fill them in. Maybe you grew up like I did, in a church where Palm Sunday was one of the most fun times in the year. It didn’t have presents like Christmas but it did have palms and it was one Sunday when children were not only invited into the sanctuary but allowed to be a little rowdy. Who would have thought our Sunday School class would have to be told to be louder when we shouted Hosanna? 

So we come to Palm Sunday, perhaps with that vision in mind;. We’ve heard this story. We know how it goes: Jesus, palms, crowds, yay yay, hosanna, done;  moving on. But to truly hear Luke’s version of this story, the one we read today, begin by noticing what isn’t there: no palms, no children, no hosanna. Perhaps if we notice what isn’t there and clear it away, we will be ready to see what is there. Notice the breath. That’s our job today: see what Luke shows us, understand what God means, consider what to do about it.

Jesus has been on the way to Jerusalem for a long time. Along the way, he told his friends that it would mean a cross, death, suffering, but that they should believe as he did in God’s power to give life, in God’s love beyond life and death. Everything in the gospels says they didn’t believe him. When he first tells them, Peter himself didn’t believe it and argued with Jesus. James and John are arguing about the power structure of the new administration of King Jesus right up to the very end, to the point where he has to tell them to stop. 

Now they approach Jerusalem itself,. Herod—remember Herod? He was the king when Jesus was born, he was the king who killed John the Baptist, he’s the king that threatened Jesus. Herod had rebuilt the Temple and parts of the city. The temple had so much white marble and gold trim it was said a person could hardly look at it in the harsh mid-day sun. It lasted less than 50 years. 

Jerusalem is on top of a small mountain, Mount Zion The road up to it is windy and switches back and forth. At Passover, people came from all over to the city, so it would have been crowded; imagine driving to Harrisburg for the Thanksgiving parade  Jesus and his disciples and followers are peasants and so are most of the people around them. They don’t have special clothes for this special time; peasants wore a sort of undergarment and a cloak. The cloak was valuable enough to pawn for a day’s food, important enough that there was a law that the pawnbroker couldn’t keep the cloak overnight. They’re often pictured marching like a military unit, lined up behind Jesus with crowds on either side but that’s a mistake. Jesus and his friends are part of a larger procession of pilgrims to the city. Surely they would have spread out as much as possible; think of a crowd moving along Among them may have been a Roman military unit, sent to reinforce the garrison at a time when trouble was expected. That would have meant soldiers in metal breastplates with swords and a commander mounted on a horse leading them. 

Now they come to the Mount of Olives. It’s where Jesus will go after the last supper, where he will pray, where he will be arrested. There are really two processions going on here. One is Jesus, who is walking toward the cross, marching toward heavenly glory; the other is everyone else, walking toward victory, marching toward worldly success. 

As they move along, Jesus sends some disciples off to acquire a colt. And he gives them a coded phrase: “The Lord has need of it.” Now the word ‘Lord’ has a double meaning. It could mean the owner of the donkey but it’s also the word most often used to describe Jesus. The way he instructs them is strange: “If someone asks why you are untying it…” It’s as if you saw a stranger in front of your house getting into a neighbor’s car.. “Just say, ‘the Lord has need of it’” In the event, when they untie the colt, it’s the owner himself who confronts them. Sometimes when this is preached, explanations are created about how Jesus had prearranged for the colt. We don’t really know, but if he had done so, why are the owners asking what they’re doing? “The Lord has need of it,” they say. This time ‘Lord’ clearly means Jesus. The owner must have faced a difficult choice. A colt is valuable, like a car. We’re all used to the church asking for funds but then we decide what to give. Here, he’s confronted with a choice; what would you do? “The Lord has need of it.” 

What we call the Palm Procession really begins with this colt. When they bring it back, they throw their cloaks, their valuable cloaks, on it to make a saddle and it says “…they put Jesus on it.” Notice the breath: notice the detail. He doesn’t climb on, he doesn’t mount up. Like the Spirit whooshing him off to the wilderness at the beginning of his ministry, his friends put him up on that colt and suddenly people must have looked and suddenly he’s become a symbol and suddenly he’s mocking all the panoply and pageantry of the marching Romans and soldiers, coming to Jerusalem, as they are, coming mounted, as they are, but on a colt. People must have noticed and remembered that the prophet Zechariah had said,

9Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. [Zechariah 9:9]

There are two processions here. One is Jesus, who is walking toward the cross, marching toward heavenly glory; the other is everyone else, walking toward victory, marching toward worldly success. One is led by people proud of their power; one by a man rocking humbly on a colt. One is led by people determined to deal death to make power; one is led by someone who believes life can overcome death. 

The crowd notices; people are inspired. Inspired—meaning filled with Spirit: notice the breath, the Spirit. They take off their cloaks and throw them down. We call it Palm Sunday but there are no cheap palms, no branches cut from trees someone else owns here. The cloaks they are throwing down are for some their most valuable possession. Like the owners of the colt, they have heard, “The Lord has need of it”, and give more than what they have—they give what they are. It’s dangerous to celebrate this prophet. This is exactly the kind of demonstration those soldiers are meant to stop. Just as some Pharisees had warned Jesus that Herod was trying to kill him, now they warn him to make his followers be quiet, to stop this dangerous demonstration. Jesus simply says it can’t be stopped: if they stop, creation itself will take up the cry. 

What is it they are shouting? We all grew up shouting hosanna, which means “Save us”. I’ve led countless services over the years where we had people shout, where we waved palms, I’ve done it here. But notice the details in this account, because each account has something to say. And in this one, it’s not Hosanna they shout, it’s “Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!” Now we’ve heard that, or something very much like that before, haven’t we? It’s like the lines to an old song, the kind that can drive you crazy trying to remember. Where did we hear it? What’s the title? Who’s the singer? We heard it on Christmas Eve. Its title is the Advent, the birth, of Christ. It’s the song of the angels. We have circled back to Christmas; we have circled back to Jesus.

This is Palm Sunday and it’s about a procession but there are really two processions. One is Jesus, who is on his way to the cross, marching toward heavily glory; the other is everyone else, walking toward victory, marching toward worldly success. Jesus doesn’t live alone. He consciously builds a community. In Luke we hear not only about the 12 disciples but about 70 people he sends out. In this story, it’s the people around him who move the story forward: the owner of the colt, who gives it when the Lord has need of it, the friends who make a saddle of their cloaks, because the Lord has need of them, the people who don’t even know Jesus yet lay down their cloaks because somehow they too sense the Lord has need of them. 

What are we to do about all this? Every one of us eventually faces a moment when we sense the Lord has need of something. We’ve been talking throughout Lent about moving from fear to faith. Perhaps the greatest need of all is for us simply to believe Jesus, listen to him, and build our life together around what he says instead of what we think. Who we are is God’s children; who we are is people meant to sing songs of praise like the ones around Jesus. What the Lord needs isn’t just what we have: it’s who we are. If we don’t sing the song of salvation, it’s left to the stones. God will make a way, God is making a way, and we are meant to be that way.

Notice the breath. Breath is a basic Bible play on words. Breath: in Greek, pneuma, in Hebrew, reach: both are the words we translate ‘spirit’. Notice the breath: notice the Spirit. This is Palm Sunday and it’s about a procession but there are really two processions. One is Jesus, who is walking toward the cross, marching toward heavenly glory; the other is everyone else, walking toward victory, marching toward worldly success. Which one are you marching in? The answer is the one you give when the moment comes and the Spirit says: “The Lord has need of it.”

Amen.

The Unperishing Spring

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A Sermon for the First Congregational Church of Albany, NY

by Rev. James Eaton, Pastor • © 2020 All Rights Reserved

21st Sunday After Pentecost/A • October 25, 2020

Deuteronomy 34:1-12 • Matthew 22:34-46

“Winter is coming.” That opening theme from the “Game of Thrones” appeared so obvious when I first read it that I was puzzled. I’m a northern boy; I’ve lived through 68 winters and the falls that preceded them. Fall to me means occasional harsh storms like the one that brought down a tree big enough to cover the entire backyard at the parsonage. It meant raking leaves and, when I was growing up, the smell of burning as piles of fire happened throughout my neighborhood. Summer was fun, fall wasn’t fun; it was a depressing end. Then I married Jacquelyn. She didn’t grow up with fall, so to her fall was an ever opening series of wonderful surprises. She loves the changing colors and I introduced her to cider mills and crisp days with a cup of sweet apple and a doughnut. Winter is coming meant something dark to me; to her, it means doughnuts and colors. How do you see winter coming?

A Spiritual Winter

A spiritual winter is coming in the story we read from Matthew about Jesus. The gospels remember that when he began to move toward Jerusalem, it was with the knowledge that there would be an end not only of a journey but of his life. At the beginning of the journey, 

…Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.

Matthew 16:21

Again, along the way,

As they were gathering in Galilee, Jesus said to them, “The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into human hands, 23and they will kill him, and on the third day he will be raised.” And they were greatly distressed.

Matthew 17-21-23

So the journey is a spiritual fall, a time preparing for the spiritual winter of the cross.

The Great Commandment

Today’s reading is part of a series of controversy stories. We read one last week about taxes. Now a group of Pharisees confront him and ask which is the greatest commandment. What do you think? One of the Ten Commandments? A particular rule in Torah? Something your mother told you?. “Which is the greatest commandment?” It’s a preacher’s challenge: summarize all the teaching you’ve brought, Jesus, tell us, what you think. How strange to hear him teach something very old, something from Torah, something they should have known: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind,” Deuteronomy 6:5. And then: Leviticus 18:19: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” There it is, the whole program of Jesus, the whole preaching of Jesus, the whole treasure of Jesus and they had it all along, just as we do: love God, love your neighbor. It’s what has led him to preach, what has led him to heal, what will lead him to the cross.

Do Bad to Do Good?

Winter is coming. We are living through a moment when to many it seems that the only way to do good is to do bad. This summer we watched as protests of police killings left cities on fire. Just recently, we heard how a group of men plotted to kidnap and kill the governor of Michigan and then from Wisconsin the terrible story of a young man, a man too young to vote, who used an assault rifle to shoot protesters. We are on the doorstep of a division elections seem unlikely to dispel; already, hundreds of lawsuits are filed, already there is talk of how to overturn its results. 

This isn’t the first time we’ve been here. I watched a movie the other night that had a profound impact on me because it reminded me of the the late 1960’s. “Chicago 7,” is a movie about the trial of New Left leaders after the police riot in Chicago at the Democratic National Convention in 1968. Some of you will remember that time; for others, it’s vague history. So let me remind you it was a moment of shattering violence. Frustration was leading many to question the strategy of non-violence and democratic change. Over a hundred thousand of our troops were in Vietnam; thousands protested the war at home. Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr., assassinated were assassinated. In the movie, Bobby Seale, national chairman of the Black Panther Party, is leaving to speak in Chicago and A friend reminds him about the power of nonviolence and Martin Luther King; he responds, “Dr. King is dead.” 

“I’ve Been to the Mountaintop”

Just like Jesus, King was killed for daring to preach this one Great Commandment: “Love God, love your neighbor.” And he did not go blindly to his death. On the last night of his life, he closed his speech with these words.

I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I’m happy, tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

https://www.afscme.org/about/history/mlk/mountaintop

He walked on, he loved on, until he couldn’t walk anymore. But his vision went on and still does today.

That mountain top is just where we found Moses in the portion read today. Winter is coming there too. Think of his story. Rescued as a child, brought up in the luxury and safety of Pharaoh’s household while his people were enslaved and used to build up the wealth and power of others. When he finally found his true identity and became angry, he killed a man and had to run for his life: no more luxury, no more power. A fugitive from justice, he was taken in by another people, made another life with a wife and a family. Called by God, he went back to that same power structure, that same household he had fled, with God’s word that they should let God’s people go. Ten times he watched the plagues of Egypt stun that nation until the Pharaoh agreed to let the Hebrews go.

Moses led them out into the wilderness and then, as power always does, the powerful couldn’t let go, and used violence to enslave. So Moses and God’s people faced the armored might of the greatest military in the world at that time. But God was greater, and God’s people fond a way through the muddy Reed Sea when the wind of God blew the water away for a moment, and the army of Pharaoh perished in the marshes. Moses might have thought they were safe and all was well. 

But when we read the story of the Exodus, all is not well. Time after time, Moses is challenged. People argue, people complain. When he stays on the mountain receiving the commandments of God, his brother and the others build up an idol out of gold so that once again there is a terrible reckoning. For 40 years he leads them through the wilderness. For 40 years he listens to them complain. For 40 years he bears the terrible burden of believing God, of loving God with his whole heart and mind and self. Now, winter is coming; his winter, his death is coming. 

We Have a Destination

So he goes up on a mountain to see the way forward. Now, you know that in the Bible, geography is always theology. So what he sees isn’t just a place, it is God’s performance of a promise. Long ago, Abraham and Sarah were promised a place to live and raise generations of God’s people so they might be a blessing to the whole world. Long ago, Moses set out with God’s people to see this place. Now, he sees it. Like King, he might have said,  “…as a people, will get to the promised land…Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.” For 40 years, we read they wandered in the wilderness. But that’s not right; they didn’t wander, they had a destination.

So do we. Ursula Le Guin wove through many of her stories a theme that speaks to our purpose. She imagined a man who grew up as a person of integrity, strong and intelligent, owning slaves, living in a culture that devalued women. When he is forced to live in a world where the slaves have been freed, where women have become equals, he hates it at first but then falls in love with a woman who teaches him how wonderful sharing with equals can be. He becomes her husband and love animates their life. Learning to love his neighbor, he has learned to love God. When he is near his end, he says, “I have given my love to what is worthy of love.”

The Unperishing Spring

Are you giving your love to what is worthy of love? This is the question of Jesus’ commandment. For surely the ultimate one worthy of love is God. Le Guin goes on to say that this is “the unperishing spring”: to give your love to what is worth of love.

Winter is coming; but so is spring. Good Friday is coming, but so is Easter. Faith is not hoping for some particular election result; faith is giving your love to what is worth of love, faith is loving God with all your heart and mind and soul until finally, in God’s time, you too can say, “I have been to the mountain top.” Faith is what leads to hope and hope leads to the unperishing spring.

Walk on, Love on

I remember the hope of 1969 and how it was dashed in later events. I remember the hope of other times and how they sometimes didn’t come true. But I don’t remember the unperishing spring; I’m living for it, I’m grateful for it, because I have seen the glory of the Lord and I know that no matter how great the armies of the night, God is more powerful; no matter how many times winters comes, there is an unperishing spring. Just wait, just walk on, just love and you will live in the unperishing spring.

Amen.