The Palm Sunday story features in all four Gospels. A crowd of strangers in the city for the Passover, explode in spontaneous celebration: a first Century flash mob. The language they use is Messianic, the symbolism apocalyptic. Something big is happening, and though they are not sure what it might be, it centres on this rabbi riding a borrowed donkey. Fearing a Roman crack-down, the Pharisees tell Jesus to silence his fans: doesn’t he know that the city is on a knife edge? Isn’t he aware of the anti-terrorism laws, the banning of public assembly? His response tells us everything we need to know about this event: 'If they kept quiet the stones along the road would burst into cheers.' (Luke 19:41, NLT)
Why does he say this? For two reasons. Firstly, these people were not expressing a thought-through religious or political agenda. This was a visceral reaction, a gut-level cry for liberation. So acute was their longing for hope that the mere sight of a rabbi on a donkey pushed them into hysteria. The Pharisees accused Jesus of not understanding, but it is they who missed the point. There was a hunger for freedom, for justice, for a different future and it was going to express itself, whether they liked it or not.
Secondly, the planet itself was waiting for its Messiah. The events about to unfold were not for the Jews alone - they are cosmic. Freedom was coming to the very ground they stand on. Paul will later write that all creation ‘groans as in childbirth’ waiting for the freedom God has for his children. (Romans 8:21-22)
The cry for justice goes deeper than Jerusalem; deeper than Rome, it is the cry of the earth beneath our feet. This Palm Sunday, can you hear the clamour for freedom in your world? Are your prayers shaped by the Earth’s cry for liberation? 'Open our ears God, to freedom’s cry. May those who long for liberation sing at the sight of their Messiah. May we your people hear the groaning of the world we walk in.'
