Who Am I? | Ashes to Asses, April 5, 2020

If we leave the story at “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven” we miss the abruptness with which Lent draws to a close, the closing is not drawn out, and the quickness with which Holy Week moves. Jesus entered the Holy City and before a week goes by, he will have been crucified. He will be dead. In less than a week the man who entered the city peacefully, with no show military force, will tell his disciples to put away their swords as he was taken from a garden, arrested and then killed. The quickness with which we move into Holy Week, beginning with this procession, is a shock we experience year after year. Rev. Fleming Rutledge describes the movement as beginning with “triumph” and ending in “catastrophe.”

The “turmoil” Jesus caused as he entered the Holy City stirred up such alarm among the religious and political leaders that the only thing left to do to this peaceful prophet was to kill him. And in a moment of brief clarity the religious leadership of Jerusalem and the political leadership of Rome, two groups who did not always see eye-to-eye, found a common enemy they could focus their attention on.

We cannot, as Fleming puts it, pass “from Palm Sunday to Easter without Good Friday.”