Teach Us How to Take On the Giants

Transcription

1 Teach Us How to Take On the Giants Dr. Stephen D. Jones, preaching Palm Sunday, April 13, 2014 Text: Luke 19:37-46 First Baptist Church, Kansas City, Missouri Let us set the stage. The Jewish ruling class in Jerusalem was terribly compromised. The only way they could stay in power was to cooperate with the Romans and do the Caesar s bidding. Under the Herodians and Romans, high priests were chosen from four main (Jewish) families, and were appointed and fired almost like servants. (Crossen, p. 53, Who Killed Jesus?) These wealthy upper crust families occupied the seats on the Sanhedrin though they only held power by their deft ability to please the Roman governors. They would do anything to maintain their privilege. There were an estimated two million Jews living outside of Jerusalem all over the Roman world in every major city. And on the three principal Jewish holidays, many Jews would migrate back to Jerusalem to pray in the Temple, make sacrifices, and pay their temple tax. It was expected that every male Jew would pay an annual half-shekel tax to the upkeep of the Temple. It was a huge money-maker because Jews from all over the world would come to Jerusalem to pay it themselves or through a surrogate. The aristocracy of Jerusalem profited greatly from the temple tax. It not only maintained the Temple, which occupied 25% of the land area of Jerusalem, but it also kept these few families in wealth and privilege. But there was a double-bind in the tax. The Jewish Talmud required that the Temple tax be paid in coins with a high purity of silver, and the only coins that the Jewish leaders would accept was the Tyrian shekel, which had a high degree of silver and was minted in the city of Tyre. Later, in Jesus day, it was minted in Jerusalem. On one side of the Tyrian coin was the head of Baal, chief deity of the Phoenicians and on the other side, the Roman eagle. Thus, the coins were a terrible, distasteful compromise for the Jews. Worse, Jews were not allowed to carry graven images of false gods, so, to pay the Temple tax, they would bring coins from around the world, and money-changers in the Temple would exchange their coins for the Tyrian coins. I can imagine that faithful Jews would not be required to handle the pagan coins the moneychangers in the Temple would do that for them for a fee. This shows the extent of the compromise. It is hard to imagine how distasteful it must have been for Jews on a spiritual pilgrimage to have to pay their Temple tax with a coin minted with a graven, pagan image. And into the Holy City of Jerusalem Jesus rides on a donkey, reminiscent of Isaiah s prophesy, Pass through, pass through the gates. Clear a way for my people! Level up, level

2 up the highway, remove the stones! Hoist a signal to the peoples!... Say to the daughter of Zion, Look, your salvation is coming.. (Isaiah 62:10-11) Jesus rides into the Holy City reminiscent of Zechariah s prophesy: Rejoice, heart and soul, daughter of Zion! Shout for joy, daughter of Jerusalem! Look, your king is approaching, he is vindicated and victorious, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey He will proclaim peace to the nations, his empire will stretch from sea to sea, from the River to the limits of the earth. (9:9-10) When King David s life was coming to an end, he surprised his elder son, Adonijah, who had already self-anointed himself as the next king, by instead instructing that his other son, Solomon, ride with the royal guard to Gihon on the king s mule, and there be anointed the king of Israel, and then Solomon was to ride the mule back into Jerusalem in royal procession and occupy the throne of Israel. (I Kings 1:31-34) It is reminiscent of the Psalmist who cried out, Blessed in the name of Yahweh is he who is coming! (118:26) Israel s kingly hope involved the future king riding on a mule, or the foal of a donkey, into the Holy City of Jerusalem. There actually were two processions into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. The population of Jerusalem swelled from a normal 40,000 to 200,000 religious pilgrims. From the West, Pontius Pilate was entering Jerusalem. He didn t typically live in Jerusalem, but he came to the city when the Jewish population swelled in order to keep the peace. And the purpose of Passover was to celebrate the Jews liberation from bondage in Egypt so this was the holiday for Rome to display its imperial might. Pilate was entering Jerusalem in a grand procession meant to remind all Jews of the devastating military might of Roman Imperial Power. His procession included cavalry on horses, foot soldiers, leather armor, helmets, weapons, banners, golden eagles glistening in the sun mounted on poles. (Crossen) And Pilate s procession headed straight for Antonia Fortress, adjacent to and overlooking the Temple so Pilate could keep a close eye on the comings and goings of the Jewish pilgrims. Any disturbance anything out of the ordinary would have caught his keen eye. From the West, entering Jerusalem, was Pilate s Imperial Procession. On the same day, from the North, entering Jerusalem, was Jesus Triumphal Entry, reminiscent of Israel s kingly and prophetic heritage. Two processions into the Holy city, from two directions, headed for the same place: the Temple, in Jesus procession and the adjoining Fortress, in Pilate s procession. Talk about taking on the giants of his day! And it would have been enough just to stage a competing procession, with so many Jewish pilgrims crying out Hosanna! Blessed be the one who comes in the name of the Lord. But, as we know, Jesus didn t stop his procession at the temple gates. No, he strode into the temple with his noisy procession and he went to the money-changers with their pagan coins, collecting the lucrative tax on behalf of the aristocracy of Jerusalem and he pushed over the tables used for the currency exchange. And he stopped all traffic through the

3 Temple declaring, You have turned this house of prayer for all nations into a hideout for crooks, a den of thieves! And when the chief priests heard this they tried to find a way to destroy him (Mk 11:18) Finally, someone was taking on the giants finally someone was confronting the truth this entire temple tax was fraudulent, dealing with graven images of foreign gods right in the heart of the Temple! And Pilate would have been standing on the courtyard of Antonia Fortress, watching the entire spectacle, sending in his spies to tell him who was causing this disturbance. You cut off the funds to the privileged class and someone will have to pay. You disrupt the flow of money during the highly lucrative Passover Festival and someone will be held accountable. You cause a major disturbance re-enacting a kingly procession under the nose of the Roman Army already on high alert for any signs of insurrection and it is little wonder what happened later that week. Jesus took on the giants on Palm Sunday and while he faced the consequences for it five days later, it was only a temporary defeat, for his death was decidedly not God s final word. What about us? Are we as bold? Are there not giants among us today systems of injustice, of greed, of oppression? The giants of modern-day slavery and bondage are everywhere around us. There are giants around us that want to take away the power of the common people and consolidate wealth and power in the hands of a few. And there are giants of addiction that overwhelm so many families. And giants of domestic violence, abuse and neglect that maim so many children and families. There are voices of exclusion, bigotry and hate that are heard all too often, sometimes on the fringes of our society, but too often in the centers of power. There is the giant homicide rate in our city that has destroyed neighborhoods, making them unsafe, and torn the hearts out of grieving families. There are giants wanting to limit access to healthcare for the poorest of the poor as well as for the working poor. As a society, we worship giants of wealth and materialism. There are giants all around us. But, I ve been thinking a lot about these giants this week, and it occurred to me that the Giant that Jesus was really addressing was, ironically, small vision. What Jesus was embodying as he entered Jerusalem in his Palm Sunday procession was a godly vision of giant proportion. He was announcing God s coming reign: he was announcing the reason why he came into the world. And when he attacked those money-changers, he was attacking those who had dumbed down or downsized God s Vision! His vision was of a Temple that was a house of prayer for all nations. And then I thought about us: the greatest temptation for the church today is to represent a dumbed down or downsized vision. If we simply come together as a church to go through the routines, to keep the machinery of the church well-oiled, then we are no different from that wealthy, aristocratic class in Jerusalem or their money-changers.

4 Little Suzie, a six-year-old, complained, Mommy, I ve got a stomach-ache. And her mother replied, That s because your stomach is empty. You ll feel better if you had something in it. That afternoon, the pastor came calling, and in conversation with her mother, he remarked that he had been suffering with a headache. Little Suzie perked right up and suggested to him, That s because it s empty; you ll feel better if you had something in it! How important it is not to be empty-headed, but our minds and hearts full of godly vision. Without this, God s people cannot possibly live into the Grand Prophetic Vision that Jesus was embodying on Palm Sunday. Too many churches today compromise Jesus vision for the world. So-called successful churches tend to market a gospel with a downsized vision. God doesn t call us to be a successful or huge. God calls us to be faithful to listen for godly vision in our lives, in our families, in our vocations, and in our church and to enact that vision today just as Jesus did on Palm Sunday. If you are living your life without godly vision, you are missing out on a fruitful, abundant life. If your family isn t based on a godly vision, your family is missing the abundant life. If our church isn t following a godly vision, our church will not be what God calls us to be. Do I know what this godly vision is for our church? Of course, I don t. But I can help listen for the Spirit nudging us in that direction. One friend of ours, a quasi-retired American Baptist pastor, has throughout his ministry felt God s call to sell crafts from Third World mission stations, with the profit returned to native artisans. Last year, Bob Southard opened up his Unique Finds Gift Shop in downtown Overland Park, a godly vision to help others. One friend of ours recently retired from a management position and when I saw her last week, she said that she was joining a friend in the start-up of a new program in Kansas City public schools to help children struggling with dyslexia. That s a godly vision. In his own personal ministry, Ken Fast orders Fair Trade chocolates and coffees to assist Third World farmers. That s a godly vision. Paul Sinkiewicz works near the Bethel Neighborhood Center and dropped by one afternoon to see if he could help. Now, he drives the van taking after-school care children home. Victor Velez is here to help breathe new life into our youth and young adult ministries. That s a godly vision. Lynette Atkins work is with young children in the inner city in an after-school program stretching their life experience and academic skills. Today, six young people were baptized because they heard God calling them. A godly vision is a right-sized vision for you, for me, and for us. Like a hand fitting in a glove, a godly vision is the vision that is right for us. Whatever vision God has in mind for our church, it will surely have something to do with the announcement of Palm Sunday: the coming of God s reign. It will be a reign of hope, a reign of righteousness, a reign of justice and peace. It will be a reign of egalitarian equality the very kind that Rabbi Jesus introduced in his life and for which he died on the cross. It will be the kind of vision in which the first shall be last and the last shall be first. John Dominic Crossen writes, The sayings and parables of the historical Jesus often describe a

5 world of radical egalitarianism in which discrimination and hierarchy, exploitation and oppression should no longer exist. (P. 48 Crossen, Who Killed Jesus?) It may be a dangerous vision. It may be a radical vision. It will be nothing less than a Giant Vision, reflecting Jesus Palm Sunday Procession and worthy of our high calling. Please repeat with me: Jesus, our Lenten Teacher, Teach us how to be bold As we take on the giants! Amen.