OUR MAN IN JERUSALEM

Mark 11:1-11

Well, as I begin this morning, I'd like to invite you to play a little game, to entertain a sort of fantasy--to engage your imagination for a moment. Imagine that human life is this: it consists of sitting in a dark theater, in a very comfortable seat. In fact, we're strapped into the seat, though we're not aware of it. And we're watching a movie--a very good movie. In fact, it's so good, we confuse the movie for reality. The movie encompasses all of our senses, all of our experience, completely, so we have the illusion that what we are seeing is real life.

Now imagine that someone in that dark theater, among all the people there, somehow realizes the situation: realizes that he or she is actually strapped to a seat, is sitting in a dark theater. Imagine that this person is somehow able to break the chains, and actually to escape the theater and to go outside, where there is the sun. We might imagine that at first, the sun would sting the eyes; it would blind that person, whose eyes would be so used to the dark theater. But eventually, we can imagine that his or her eyes adjust, and can see reality as it really is--can see things as they really are.

And we might ask at this point, would that person go back into the dark theater, out of concern for those still inside, to try to free them from their chains--having emerged from it to see things in the sunlight of reality?

Well, assuming that he or she, moved by compassion, would indeed go back into that dark theater, we might then ask the question: what would they do to that person? Those of you who may be familiar with classical literature and philosophy might recognize that story; I certainly didn't make it up. It's a story that Plato wrote, in The Republic, thousands of years ago--the allegory of the cave. The original version is a little different; in his version, people are in a dark cave, and there's a fire behind them and shadows on the wall and so forth, but it's essentially the same story. And so, this is his question then: what if someone, like Socrates, escaped the cave to see things as they really are? And what if someone, like Socrates, came back, to help people escape their chains? What would the people do to him?

And the answer is: they would kill him. Like they killed Socrates. Socrates was forced to drink hemlock by his fellow Athenian citizens.

Here's another similar story, this one written by Fyodor Dostoevsky. It's a story from his novel The Brother's Karamazov, an allegory within that novel that is told by Ivan to his brother Alyosha. It's an allegory called "The Grand Inquisitor." And in the story, which takes place during the Spanish Inquisition, everyone is beckoning Jesus to come back, to return to earth; they are eagerly longing for him, even as they burn the heretics at the stake. And Jesus does, in fact, return. They know it is him, because he performs the miracle of raising a little girl from the dead, just as he had done in the gospels. So, they know it's him, come back. And at that moment, when they realize it, the Grand Inquisitor points a bony finger, and the crowd of people parts as his minions arrest him. And The Grand Inquisitor sentences him death as a heretic: "Tomorrow, Thou shalt see that obedient flock which at one simple motion of my hand will rush to add burning coals to Thy stake, on which I will burn thee for having dared to come and trouble us in our work."

This is a Sunday, Palm Sunday, that really does invite us to think about, you know, that question that those bracelets used to remind us of: "WWJD". "What would Jesus do?" But not in some abstract sense, not as some abstract question. What would happen if Jesus came back, right here and right now? What would he do? If Jesus marched into our town, our reality, and we knew--it's really him. Marching into town on Main Street. What would it be like if Jesus marched a whole crowd into Washington DC? What would be our expectation, as we stood there and cheered? What do we think he would do?

If it really were the Messiah. If we really knew--it's him. How would you feel? What would you expect? Because, you see, that's the kind of mentality we need to have to understand what's going on in the story this Sunday. The sense that people were welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem thinking: it's really him. The Messiah. Thousands of years of expectation, and it's happening right now.

Mark is very intent on showing that the way in which Jesus is entering Jerusalem--this need for a certain donkey, and going a certain route--all that was to fulfill what the prophets foretold about how the Messiah would march into town.

And you see, this is what people were expecting the Messiah would do: to establish Israel as a free and independent state. He would be the kind of King who would finally get the job done, and make the real Israel come into being. They came expecting that Jesus was going to be Our Man in Jerusalem; he's going to come in here and kick some butt. (Can I say that from the pulpit? Guess I just did.)

And they are shouting: "Hosanna, Hosanna." It's a military phrase, a sort of political rallying cry; we can imagine them saying something like, "hey hey, ho ho, the Romans have got to go." And placards in the crowd: "A free and Independent Israel", "Down with Roman gods".

Can we imagine being there, in that crowd? At the rally--whatever it's for--swept up in the hoopla of the moment, the whoop of the crowd?

What if you were a face in that crowd, today? What would you want Jesus to do for you, for us? What would the crowd be shouting? Health Care Reform? Property Tax Relief? Would he be electable? Would he run for President?

Would it be Jerry Falwell's Jesus, who would wipe out all the gay and lesbian people, and ACLU lawyers and abortionists with his Pentecostal flame-thrower?

Or would it be the Jesus of those of a more progressive ilk, who would set up a socialist democracy, and write a clear systematic theology? (I suppose that would be closer to my own crowd...).

But, do we not stand in the crowd, and think that Jesus is on our side; my agenda is God's agenda?

And yet, here we are: we know the story, we hear the parade, the clanging calliope music playing as Jesus enters, and we realize: he didn't fulfill anyone's expectation. If Messiah were an elected office, he would have been impeached. He wasn't for anyone's agenda, save, I suppose, for God's. And the crowd that praises him today, is the same crowd that went along with killing him a few days later. The valence of the crowd changes from adulation to blood thirst. It's the same folks a few days later shouting, "Crucify him! Crucify him!"

Most of us don't want to see ourselves in that crowd; most of us in fact skip Good Friday, don't pass go, and head right to Easter--we don't want to see our connection to it all. But on some level, we realize...we see our face in that crowd. "Were you there when they crucified my Lord?" Yes. Yes indeed. We were. We were there...we are there, in the crowd.

Now, the irony that I think of whenever we sing that hymn, the question I find myself pondering is...the next hymn that hasn't been written is--what did you do? You were there--so what did you do while they were crucifying my Lord? Remain there, anonymous, comfortable in the crowd? What are you doing, when they crucify?

Because Palm Sunday (which is also Passion Sunday, the day to tell the story of Jesus' death) is a day to make us aware of the tremendously corrosive spiritual power of the crowd. Of the crucifying crowd.

And I suppose it all starts innocently enough. I remember when I was 8 or 9 years old, with some friends and we found some dirt balls, they were doing construction next to Bristol Street right next to my house, and we were throwing dirt balls across Bristol Street, and it was so fun, so funny, and we knew it was wrong, but we were all doing it--he was doing it, Jimmy, and Stan, and so it was OK. Until the policeman came, in his squad car. And took us to our parents.

And then perhaps we find ourselves on a lacrosse team, at a party. Now I should say here that I will not use the Duke lacrosse team, and the allegations about what they might have done, for my own rhetorical purposes. We do not know what happened, and so we cannot judge--in whatever case, we cannot be judgmental. But, we do know that such things happen--men at a party, a woman abused. And it causes us to think about how such things happen. How young men, young men who might have gone to a church like this one--not just that men do such things as we fear might have happened there at Duke; but we wonder how it is that so many look on, when they know such a thing is happening. How is it that so many people can look on, feel OK, do nothing. Justify it all. Because they are in a crowd?

"Crucify him." Insert whatever way we might justify standing by while the Inquisitor does his work.

This past Friday, I had the pleasure of eating dinner with one of our fellowship groups. And after dinner, we watched a movie called Wetback. It's a documentary about immigration--I think a very fair one; it gives a sort of slice of life, showing why it is that people, not just from Mexico, but Honduras and Guatemala and throughout Central America, risk their lives and undergo incredible odds to come to this country...shows the poverty they are fleeing. And it shows the people on the other side, seeking to keep the integrity of the borders of the United States. It just shows things the way they are, why people are doing what they're doing, amidst so much suffering and tragedy. But it all made me so sad. And, whatever you might think of the issue--and I'm not trying to take a political position on it here; it's such a complex issue. But it made me think: how convenient that others do the dirty work of keeping people out of this country, to preserve our prosperity and security. And how odd to watch all this happen from my comfortable theater of that dark room. It made me think: what am I doing about all that suffering?

Were you there? Yes--we are. The question is: what did you do? What are you doing?

Because you see, truth is a great idea in principle, until it threatens our security, the comfortable dark theater of your life. We are all too happy to go along with those leaders, those contemporary Grand Inquisitors, who do the messy job of crucifixion, to keep us happy.

BUT, FOR THOSE OF US WHO KNOW THE STORY, and we have come here because we know the story--about what happened on Friday, and what happened on the Sunday after Friday--for us the question for today is: how do we break away from, how do we rise above (to use a cliche) the crucifying crowd?

I'm in a way tempted to leave you with that question, as we head into Friday--as we hear the tinny music of this parade slowly die. Let us feel the full weight of this coming Friday.

But, here's a hint. Here's a hope as we head toward that darkness: it is to say that I can rise above this crucifying crowd, not by myself, but by following.

We rise above by following, by following the one crucified; by living in the truth of a love willing to suffer and die.

OK, so...what does that look like for an individual life?

For me, I think it comes from our committing our life to Christ.

It comes when I realize--and I do realize--that I need to follow someone else who will lead me out of my darkness. I am not capable of doing it myself.

I realize that I need Jesus, because I don't have the corner on truth; but I trust that I'm following the one who is the way, the truth, and the life.

Ask someone who is an alcoholic in recovery--can they lead themselves out of their own darkness? The answer he or she will give you is no. One needs something, someone else, some higher power, when the voice of temptation comes, when you hear the voice of the crowd--have a drink? For me it is Jesus Christ.

It's ironic that the way to leave the crowd means following. Means committing ourselves to that truth that leads us out of the crowd, out of the prison of the self, to live for something greater, something higher.

But, it means that we will have to deal with some discomfort. We will have to deal with reality, which means risking the ridicule of those who mistake the movie for what's real.

We will have to avoid the cynicism that says we can't do anything about this business of crucifixion, the habit of the crowd; it's just a part of life. We must not believe that we can't do anything about the world's suffering masses knocking at our door. We will have to give our lives to some greater cause than comfort and stability and safety.

We will have to believe that we rise above the crucifying crowd, by following.

Amen.

 

April 9, 2006

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