St. John’s United Church of Christ

March 16, 2008

A Sermon by the Rev. John Krueger

A Counter Intuitive Gospel                                                Philippians 2:5-11

Palm Sunday seems to be a day that doesn’t fit in Holy Week.  This is Parade Day, and usually parades are happy occasions.  Children wave palm branches, people shout Hosanna, but what are we thinking when we know a cross is just five days away?

That first Palm Sunday was clearly a matter of mistaken identity.  Jesus comes into Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover and people misunderstand what this means.  It looks like some sort of popular demonstration with people being carried away with their emotions.

No doubt some who joined that crowd were hoping Jesus would lead an uprising against the Romans.  Enough of their groveling under the heel of those Roman legions, and enough of those foreigners flaunting their power.  Rome was a long way away, and they wanted the Roman soldiers and diplomats to be there, not here.  Not here, lording it over them when they were the direct descendants of King David and the glory years of the Hebrews.

Obvious they didn’t know this Jesus very well and obviously they had little first hand knowledge of the preacher and teacher who spent most of his ministry in the countryside.  But when you are desperate you may be willing to take a fling on a relative unknown.  So wave those palm branches, shout those hosannas and see if this will spark a revolution to restore the freedom and autonomy we deserve.

No doubt some of the same people who waved those palms on Sunday by Thursday said they preferred a man in jail, Barabbas, a real insurrectionist, to Jesus.  Set Barabbas free, someone who maybe could really do us some good.  As for this Jesus, well, he had his chance and blew it, and now it is time to move on.

They should have known better, would have known better, if they had been following Jesus for very long and if they had paid attention to what he was saying.  Jesus kept talking about being a servant, about loving the neighbor, about turning the other cheek and forgiving the enemy.  That is not usual revolutionary rhetoric.  Most people would prefer someone with more back bone, someone who could stand up to authority, spit in the face of the occupiers if necessary, and throw off the shackles that bind us.

But the Early Christian Church got it exactly right when they sang a hymn preserved for us in Paul’s letter to the Philippians.

“Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

Who, though he was in the form of God

Did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited,

But emptied himself, taking the form of a slave,

Being born in human likeness.

And being found in human form,

He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death –

Even death on a cross.

Therefore God also highly exalted him

And gave him the name that is above every name,

So that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend,

In heaven and on earth and under the earth,

And every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,

To the glory of God the Father.”

This majestic hymn points to a Counter Intuitive Gospel.  The central point is that Jesus emptied himself of the privilege and status and honor that would be his as the Son of God.  The Greek work for “emptied” is “kenosis,” to empty, to give up.  In order to reveal the true face of God to us humans, God chose to come as one of us, as a human being, putting in jeopardy God-ness for the sake of human-ness.  That’s the lesson God wants us to get, to learn to live a life in which we empty ourselves for the sake of others, to take the role of a servant for the sake of others.  And this is a lesson we utterly resist.

The world we live in honors stuff, plenty, possessions, the usual symbols of success.  How could we measure a person’s worth and importance if we don’t use the pile of our toys, the size of our homes, the balance in our financial accounts, the pedigree of our cars or the titles we so dearly love?  That’s why the Gospel of Jesus Christ is Counter Intuitive.  It rubs against what the culture seeks to teach us every day.  Servant hood, chosen servant hood, just doesn’t fit as others measure our lives against the usual norms to determine success.

If you look up the origin of our English word, “empty,” you will find it derives from an Old English root that means “to find rest, or leisure.”  I think that is very interesting that in our frantic, hectic, fast-paced world.  I think it is ironic that the avenue to leisure and rest is the discipline of emptying ourselves, to lighten the load we carry, to jettison all that burdens us and weighs us down as we seek to simplify our crowded and busy lives.

It is not surprising to me that only about 40% of the people around us have any meaningful relationship with a Christian Church.  Perhaps some of that 60% have been turned off by some of the shenanigans of church people, clergy and lay, obnoxious and even harmful behaviors.  But maybe some of the 60% have taken this Jesus seriously and found that following him would be too difficult.

I think that the prayerful decision to follow Jesus will prove to be the most demanding decision a person can make.  It will mean doing what doesn’t come naturally and challenging much of the common wisdom of our day.  It will mean resisting the consumerism that we are told is necessary to keep our country financially strong, for how we do like being consumers.  It will mean resisting the tendency to measure a person’s value by things and stuff instead of by character and soul.  It will mean owning things instead of things owning us.  It will mean being a faithful steward of this world’s blessings in order to pass on to our children and grandchildren a world that can sustain them as well.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ at its best is not a Prosperity Gospel of getting and having more but the Counter Intuitive Gospel of being emptied so we can find rest and leisure in God and not in our materialism.  The Gospel is not the short cut to prosperity and status and fame.  It is a long, tough road that goes through a cross to an empty tomb, and while we like the empty tomb we would rather skip the cross.

So enjoy the palm branches today, and even join the crowds who think that Jesus is such a nice friend to have for all occasions.  Beware the dark days ahead of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday when the powers of this world seem to prevail and carry the day.  Come back next week when we celebrate an Empty Tomb and the wonder of life being more powerful than death.

But remember that to follow this Jesus will label you as one who lives a distinctive life and one who hears and marches to a different drummer.  We live in this world as aliens, suspicious of all human conventions, for all fall short of the glory of God.  We are in this world, to be sure, but as disciples of Jesus Christ we owe our allegiance to the One who shows us the way to live.  We will be a peculiar and distinctive servant people, lovers of God, and lovers of neighbor, and lovers of self.