A Holy Week remembered

Easter 1993 I was privileged (the right word) to lead a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.  Being shuttered in now gives time to remember and even find my notebook from those days!  We arrived in Jerusalem on the Monday but as soon as day dawned on Tuesday we retrod the steps Jesus took from Bethany over the Mount of Olives to look down on the ancient city walls of Jerusalem and remember...here, here, Jesus rode the donkey down to his death.  Some of you will have experienced the sheer force of biblical reality being there.

My notes show how I reflected with the group on the kind of King Jesus we follow. The unequaled nature of the pilgrimage that lay before us that week.  I read part of 1 Chron. 11 and 2 Samuel 5. which tell how King David took the city in a staggering success story with skilled generals leading to decisive victory.  The Jebusites regarded Jerusalem as so impregnable that they claimed the lame and the blind could keep it safe.  But David triumphed brilliantly and it became the centre of his kingdom for 33 years.  But looking downhill in the footsteps of another king....what a contrast of kingship!

David took Jerusalem by force with his army.
Jesus comes alone, weeping and going to his certain death.
David is king by force, organization, the shedding of other people's blood;
Jesus is king by consent, by obedience to his Father, by love, by shedding his own blood
David has a throne in a palace
Jesus reigns from a cross in a kingdom of eternity.
David left the city with no choice.  Jesus does.

Palm Sunday upends our understanding of reality, what really counts in living as King Jesus lives, loves, obeys in ways that this world had never seen before or since.  Deliberately choosing the path of such suffering for us.