Palm Sunday, Year A

Jesus does not wait for us to become pure.  Jesus does not wait for us to become righteous.  Jesus deals with us as we are, and Jesus deals with our neighbors as they are.  We experience vividly in today’s Palm Sunday reading how common our sins are.  We see today the sins of the religious leaders and the soldiers; the political leaders and the rabble; Jesus’ worst enemies and Jesus’ closest friends.  And if we are inclined to think to ourselves that those other people are capable of sinning that way but I am not, today’s gospel shows us that’s exactly what the disciples and Peter said about themselves, “Not I!  I’m not like that.” right up until they too fled, right up until the cock crowed.

The theme of blood comes up repeatedly in this passage.  Jesus at the last supper tells his disciples, “This is my blood.”  Judas says, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.” Pilate washes his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.” Then the people as a whole answer, “His blood be on us and on our children!”  The question came up at our Inquirers’ class, “How does the Anglican Church view the Eucharist?” Part of the answer is that we see it in the context of these verses about blood, and betrayal, and claiming innocence even in guilt, and the people calling for someone’s blood.  It is a feast, and it is also an act of violence.  It is our contact with what is holy, and it is our contact with our own sins.

We might wish that our neighbors were better.  We might wish that we ourselves were better.   But the people that Jesus loves are not these figments of our imagination about who we think we ought to be, or who we think our neighbors ought to be.  The people Jesus loves are who we are.  It is love that comes through pain, the emotional pain of betrayal and humiliation, the physical pain of violence and death, the spiritual pain of a sense of forsakenness.  Jesus offers his blood for us not because we are righteous people who deserve it, but because we are all sinners who need it.  Jesus offers his love for us not because we are righteous people who deserve it, but because we are all sinners who need Jesus’ love.