Writings: Welcoming Salvation

By: Dr. Gregory S. Neal

The next day the great crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. 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!" (John 12:12-13)

It’s time to tell another story on myself. This one comes from my very young years – I must have been about five or six, though it’s hard to say, exactly; my Mom remembers the event, and it did happen at Walnut Hill UMC in Dallas, but she can’t remember the year. However, it was Palm Sunday, complete with a great big procession of kids into the Sanctuary carrying palm branches. The older kids were directed to cry out “Hosanna!” while the rest of us “little-ones” were to carry our branches and wave them in the air as we marched down to the front, the church’s pastors following us. It was pageantry, it was fun, and I was having a ball. Now, I always wanted to be like one of the bigger kids – like my brother, who got to cry out “Hosanna!” as he marched – and for some reason Hosanna sound like Susanna to me. And, so, as we marched down to the front I was shouting out: “O Susanna! O Susanna!”

It gets better. Once we got down to the front, and as the music stopped, everybody could hear me shout out one last time, not: “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!,” but, rather, I was singing:

“O Susanna, don’t you cry for me!
I come from Alabama with a banjo on my knee”

With that, my brother leaned way over from where he was standing and punched me on the arm, so I turned to him and hit him on the head with my palm branch. Oh, well, I tried!

Palm Sunday is always fun: it’s fun for kids and for pastors, alike. It’s a strange mixture of celebration with a painful recognition that this joy at Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem would, in less than a week, end in disaster. There will be a betrayal, an arrest, an unjust and illegal trial before the Sanhedrin, and another problematic trial before Pontius Pilate; Jesus will be cruelly and unnecessary whipped, the people will cry out for the release of Barabbas and for Jesus’ execution, the Roman governor will order that execution, and the Roman Soldiers will carry it out. It’s a very tragic story, and one that is at the heart of our faith as Christians.

This man, who all these people were greeting on Sunday with Palm branches and accolades of “Hosanna!” – which means: “Savior! Save us!” This very man, who the people were following and proclaiming the Son of David, the anointed one, the Messiah. This very man, who had taught the people so much about God’s love, forgiveness, and the way God wants us to live. This very man, who had healed the sick, caused the blind to see, fed the hungry masses, calmed the stormy sea, walked on water, and had even raised the dead. This very same man, who they praised on Sunday ... this same people, come Friday, would cry out “crucify him!”

How did they go from: “Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! The King of Israel!” to: “Give us Barabbas!” and “Crucify Him”?

Indeed, how did we get there? For, to put this bluntly, we are there, too. In the Gospels, and especially in John’s Gospel, the various characters are often stand-ins for us. As we read the stories, if we’re paying attention, we can see ourselves, repeatedly: in the persona of the various Disciples and in the people who encounter Jesus throughout his ministry. Indeed, the reader or hearer is supposed to see themselves in these characters: in their good responses, in their poor responses, in being healed, in being challenged, in being forgiven, in being corrected, in all of this we are there. When Jesus heals a sick person, teaches the crowd, feeds the five thousand, calms the stormy sea; in each and every story, the reader is invited to enter into it as one of the characters so as to personally experience Jesus. That’s what I mean when I say that the Disciples, and all the rest, are stand-ins for us. We can see ourselves in these stories. Indeed, it’s one of the reasons why the Gospels were written the way they were; it’s also among the reasons why these stories have been so powerful throughout the centuries: in so many ways, they become personal to us. Well ... here’s one of those stories, and through its pageantry we place ourselves into it, welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem with cries of “Hosannah!” - “Savior, Save us!” And, like that crowd, we are also among those who will later cried “crucify him!”

Why? Why do we welcome salvation on one day, only to seemingly reject it on another day? That is what we’re doing. It’s what we do when we sin and turn away from Christ’s example of grace: when we refuse to forgive and when we refuse to give a cup of water in Jesus’ name. It’s what we do when we are self-centered rather than outwardly turned, when we are so focused on doing things our own way that we fail to consider God’s Way. Every time we fail, every time we sin, we are crying “Crucify him!” Why do we do that? That’s a serious question.

Back at the beginning of Lent I invited you to join me in a spiritual discipline: I asked you to gaze at yourself in your mirror at night – look yourself right in the eyes – and identify just one thing you did during the day that you needed to confess to God, and for which to ask for forgiveness. Now that we’re at the start of Holy Week, I want to challenge you to either keep doing this, or to begin doing it now. Tonight, tomorrow night, Tuesday night, Wednesday night, Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night: when you’re getting ready for bed, I want you to stop for a moment and stare at yourself in the mirror for several seconds – for as long as you can stand it – and be brutally honest with yourself. I want you to ask yourself the question:

“How have my actions or inactions, today, been an example of me crying out: “Crucify him!”?

When you’ve done that – and there’s no need to linger or beat up on yourself about it – I want you to ask both for forgiveness, and for the guidance and strength to do what comes next. There may need to be some action to take to fix what you did, and if that’s the case then you’re lucky, because often times there’s nothing you can do about it ... the damage is done, and you can’t fix it. But if there is something you can do, then do it ... right then, or the next day, or as soon as you possibly can. The amazing truth of the Gospel is that God’s grace is available to us to change, if only we’ll accept it.
I challenge all of us to do this because, yes, the crowds in Jerusalem went from “Hosanna!” to “Crucify him!” And so do we ... with every sin. With the crowds, we welcomed our salvation with the arrival of Jesus, and then we discovered our need of a savior with our shouts of “crucify!” It’s time to stop shouting and start asking for forgiveness. It’s time to stop shouting, and start changing.

© 2021 Dr. Gregory S. Neal
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