A Parade? At a Time Like This?

Matthew 21:1-11            

Don’t tell me not to live, just sit and putter

Life’s candy and the sun’s a ball of butter

Don’t bring around a cloud to rain on my parade!^[1]

Who doesn’t love a good parade? Certainly not the Dovers. We are a parade people. We will go to just about any parade that we can – the Saint Patrick’s Day parade (except not this year), the Scottish Games Parade, the Greenville Poinsettia Christmas Parade, the Slater-Marietta Christmas Parade, the TR Christmas Parade. One year we went up to Landrum for their Christmas parade and saw a woman punch a horse in the face! (That’s another story for another time.)

For the past several years, our daughter Lennon has been so excited to be in a parade. Technically it’s the Upstate Pride March, but by calling it a “parade” we were able to convince a three (and then four and five) year old to walk the mile-and-a-half route.

And every year, our family gathers around the TV to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade (Suzy’s dream is to go one day), as it kicks off the holiday season.

Yeah, we are parade people.

But I know we’re not the only ones.

William Stringfellow – a theologian and social activist and often-critic of the Church (and yes, all of those things can go together) – he used to say that Christians go to church on Palm Sunday because we love a parade. We call it Jesus’s triumphal entry, but it’s essentially a parade. It happens at the beginning of the Passover festival, and Jerusalem is packed with people. Jesus and his disciples are just outside the city, and he sends two disciples to get two donkeys, “to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet,” the Gospel writer tells us. We read that Jesus rode “them” into the city, giving me the image of a rodeo stuntman with one foot on each animal. People line the streets and lay down a red carpet of sorts – putting green branches they’ve cut and even the cloaks off their own backs on the road.

We read that “the whole city was in turmoil,” which is actually the same Greek word for “earthquake.” So, you might say the city was a-rockin’ when Jesus came a-knockin’. (Or, you might not. Maybe that’s just me.)

As he enters Jerusalem, there are crowds in front of and behind Jesus shouting, “Hosanna in the highest! Blessed is the One who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna!”

And every year on this Sunday (maybe even this Sunday, today) churches try in some way to recreate Jesus’s parade into Jerusalem. At Augusta Heights, we’ve done that by having the children of the church march into the sanctuary at the beginning of the service, waving palms as we sing something like, Hosann-a-a, loud hosa-a-nna…

At Chicago’s Fourth Presbyterian Church a number of years ago, Pastor John Buchanan was gathered outside before the Palm Sunday service, getting ready for a similar procession. The children had filed into place, and they were raising their palms and practicing their lines. He walked through the crowd of kids as they said, “Hosanna!” and, “Hosanna in the highest!” Then he got to one little boy who was enthusiastically shouting, “O, Hosanna!… O, don’t you cry for me, for I come from Alabama with a banjo on my knee.”^[2]

None of us really know what the word “Hosanna” means. Some think it’s a mashup of two Hebrew words that means “Save us!” Others think it’s a nonsensical word of praise, like “Yippee!” or “Yay!” But even though we may not know what the words mean, like that little boy, we all want to shout it out. We all want to be a part of the celebration.

This year, though… It feels different. It is different.

We can’t even gather in the sanctuary to watch the kids walk and wave and sing. In many ways, we’ve taken for granted the simple ability to be together, to celebrate. In fact, Suzy and I have been trying to plan our daughter’s sixth birthday, which is Saturday. And it breaks our hearts. I mean, what do you do? How do you celebrate? No family, no friends can come over. And forget the logistics for a moment: how can you get excited, or be joyful, or feel light-hearted? How do you have a party in a time like this?

Jesus may have been wondering the same thing as he entered Jerusalem. And we might wonder ourselves: a parade? At a time like this?

We love to celebrate this event, this Sunday – with palms and children and pomp and circumstance. And yet, this is the first day of Jesus’s last week. This is the beginning of the end. The betrayal and arrest of Thursday, the trial and crucifixion and death and burial of Friday, the stone-cold silence of Saturday – they cast an ominous shadow over our Palm Sunday celebrations. Because we know what’s coming. We know the road Jesus rides into Jerusalem, in just a few days, will lead him up to Calvary carrying a cross. We know how this week will end. There is a grim and gloomy reality that haunts even this triumphal parade.

So, most years, on this Sunday, I would read about the crowds that lined the street and praised Jesus and think, “Oh, if they only knew…” Because they don’t realize what’s going to happen. They have no idea how they will turn on him, turning shouts of “Hosanna!” into calls to “Crucify!” They don’t know just how bad it’s going to get. They just. don’t. get it.

If they did, then obviously they wouldn’t be doing all of this, right? The carpet of cloaks and cut branches, the shouts of praise, the parade, the celebration? Not with the dark clouds of death and despair hanging on the horizon.

Or maybe they would have.

Maybe they should have anyway.

And maybe we should, too.

***

Like them, we don’t know what our future may hold. We don’t know what will happen, or how bad – how difficult, or depressing – our lives may get in the coming weeks. But this week, I’ve been wondering what we might be able to celebrate anyway, how we would and could and should celebrate – even with the ominous shadow of disease and death, and distance and disconnection, and unemployment and furloughs and unknown futures, and anxiety and uncertainty looming over us.

I don’t want to sound too Pollyanna here. Lord knows I’m not a silver- lining, gumdrops-and-rainbows, eternal optimist. I know that what I am asking might be hard for many of us. For some of us, it might feel impossible. I think about people who have lost their jobs and are worried about making next month’s rent. Or people who live alone and were already lonely, and now feel completely cut off and isolated from others. I think about people who have loved ones in the hospital that they can’t even visit, or people whose family members have died, and they can’t go to the funeral – what we often call a “celebration of life.”

I’m not suggesting that we can make these difficulties any different. Our celebrations can’t change the circumstances in which we find ourselves. But they can change us.

In the past, whenever I’ve read this story of Jesus’s triumphal entry, I’ve always pitied the Jerusalem crowd for their ignorance – because they don’t know what’s going to happen in the days ahead, and here they are, rejoicing and praising Jesus and celebrating.

But this year, I’ve come to realize that what’s really pitiable is waiting until we can know what’s going to happen in the days ahead – until everything is absolutely just right and all good – before we give ourselves permission to celebrate anything at all.

I was talking with one of our church members this week, about what we’ve been learning through our experiences over the past few weeks, and what we want to be able to hold on to when all of this is over. He and his wife are social animals, and love to host cookouts and have people over and throw big parties. But what this church member said was that they’ve come to realize that they don’t have to make sure the house is spotless, or that they have a minimum of 20 people come, or that they’ve got the best charcuterie board. In his words, “Everything doesn’t have to be perfect. It doesn’t have to be a big production to celebrate. You just take advantage of the chances you get.”

The people who paraded Jesus into Jerusalem did just that. They took advantage of the opportunity to celebrate, using whatever they had on hand – branches from the bushes around them, even the coats off their backs.

And maybe we can find ways to take advantage of the opportunities we have, too – to look for chances to celebrate; for moments when we can open ourselves to gratitude and praise and joy. Like those days when we can remove our coats and cloaks as the weather grows warmer; or when we see the branches of azaleas and dogwoods around us reminding us that light and life and beauty are coming into the world again, just as they always do every year, even this year.

Or take, for instance, a friend of mine that lives in Greensboro, North Carolina. He and his family are dealing with a lot of the same kinds of things many of us are—the disruption of life, the feelings of distance and disconnection, concerns about public health and people’s lives and livelihoods, the feelings of anxiety and worry about family and friends and the future. And like many of us, they have been trying to get out of the house every day, which, with four children under the age of 10 is an accomplishment in and of itself. So maybe they shouldn’t have been surprised to hear applause as they stepped onto the sidewalk for their family walk last weekend.

Curious, they rounded the corner to see where it was coming from, and as they did, they saw Magnolia Street full of neighbors. The crowd was clustered in their household groups standing in their yards and on sidewalks in front of their homes (all appropriately distanced from one another). They had arms raised, or were applauding, or waving noisemakers, all directed toward the porch of a yellow 1920s bungalow, from which he heard Father Milton’s unmistakable baritone voice, “I now pronounce you…”

“A wedding?” my friend asked some of the neighbors standing in their yard. “Is this a wedding?!”

“Yeah!” they said. And they told him about the groom, who’d grown up in that very house, now standing with his bride on its porch, surrounded by neighbors who’d known him all his life celebrating and shouting “Congratulations!” and “Cheers!” and “Mazel Tov!” 4

They might as well have been shouting, “Hosanna!”

I can’t help but think about being at the hospital with some of our church members as they grieved yet again the loss of a daughter (and granddaughter) before she even took her first breath. Another church member was there, too. And they were sharing stories from the past, laughing to keep from crying and, at times, crying because they were laughing so hard. In their own way, they were celebrating friendship and family and memories made, even in moments of deep pain and unimaginable grief, even in the almost-literal shadow of death.

As we live in these uncertain, anxiety-inducing, lonely, loss-filled, frustrating, depressing days, it can feel like an ominous cloud is hanging over us – if not of death, then of fear or despair or grief or just some nondescript sense of “ugh.” I’ve felt it. I’m sure you have in one way or another.

But I have found chances to celebrate in a few, small ways…none of them world-changing or life-altering:

• waking up early to have a few moments to myself, and getting to see the sun come up;
• sunny days that we’re able to be outside more;
• having the chance to read more and cook more;
• getting to sit at the dinner table each night;
• realizing how much I miss people, and a deep gratitude for the relationships and love that make me miss people that much;
• seeing and hearing of the compassion of others (and how you are caring for each other!);
• opportunities to continue to connect (even if it is through a screen);
• and…our QT.

I’m not talking about a devotional quiet time, nor the ubiquitous gas stations. I’m talking about what I have affectionately dubbed our “Quarantine Trampoline.” After a few weeks of staying at home, everyone in our family is struggling a bit, including our kids. They’re sad. They miss their friends. They don’t get to see their cousins or their grandparents like they usually would. Lennon won’t get to have a birthday party. They are grieving all they’ve lost, just as we grieve all we have lost.

The trampoline, though, has offered moments of pure joy, as we have intentionally played with our kids in ways that – sadly – we never really had before. We jump and bounce and fall down, laughing the whole time, except when Suzy may have broken her toe. The laughter and shouts of joy are a defiant celebration in the face of despair.

And in a time like this – on the first day of Jesus’s last week – isn’t that what we need? Desperately? Joy. Celebration. Hope.

***

The great preacher and minister at Harvard’s Memorial Church, Peter Gomes, used to talk about Palm Sunday as a “dress rehearsal” for Easter – a celebration, even as suffering and death hang on the horizon, because we know that the end of the week is not the end of the story…because we know that beyond the betrayal and desertion is forgiveness and redemption, and after the cross and the grave is an empty tomb and new life.

In one of my few, necessary trips to the store this past week, I saw they had Easter lilies for sale. And I felt this wave of sadness and frustration wash over me. In that moment I felt the weight of the distancing and our inability to be together. It’s like it hit me right there: we’re not going to have our Palm Sunday processional with the kids, we won’t be able to share communion with each other on Maundy Thursday, we’re not even going to be able to be together on Easter!

I was frustrated, too, that they would even have those for sale this year. I scoffed as I kept shopping, thinking, “Who in their right mind is going to buy those? You can’t give it to anyone. It’s not like it’s going to be the centerpiece for your big Easter Sunday brunch. There’s not even going to be church on Easter. No full pews. No flowering crosses. No lilies in the sanctuary.”

So – of course – when I was checking out, the woman in front of me was buying one. And at first, all of those thoughts rushed back into my mind. But then it struck me: she knew all that. She knew she wouldn’t have church services or family gatherings or flowering crosses. But she was getting one anyway – a defiant celebration, even at a time like this, especially at a time like this.^[3]

So…

Easter lilies and trampolines?

Hospital comedy and front-porch weddings?

Blooming azaleas?

A six-year-old’s birthday?

A Palm Sunday parade?

At a time like this?

Absolutely, faithfully, YES.

Let us pray:

Jesus, rain on our parade–
with a downpour of mercy and a deluge of grace.
Flood our lives with the joy of your presence.

Jesus, rein in our parade…
restraining the anxiety that often runs wild,
and the fear that carries us away from you.

And Jesus, reign over our parade…
rule in our lives as we learn to place our hope and trust in you.

And lead us along the route to the very heart of God,
all the way to the cross…and beyond.

For it is in your name that we live, worship, celebrate, and pray.

Amen.

Greg Dover

Augusta Heights Baptist Church, Greenville, SC