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Learning for Life: Cultivating a Student Spirituality
Week 22
Ed Laarman, University of Iowa
The Way of the Donkey
22.1 Palm Sunday
“’See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey…’” Matthew 21:5, NIV
I realize that this was before the age of tanks and armored vehicles. Still, there is something absurd about “king” Jesus riding into the capital city on a donkey.
Have you ever seen a donkey up close? They are timid. They look kind of foolish. They are small. Jesus’ feet must have been practically dragging on the ground as he rode!
We traditionally call this event “the triumphal entry” as Jesus rides over the hill and descends toward the holy city of Jerusalem. Jerusalem…the center of many ancient prophecies about how the Lord would renew His people, raise up a great king, defeat all Israel’s enemies, establish justice and peace, instruct the nations in His Law. Jerusalem, long under the thumb of that idolatrous superpower, Rome.
The people pinned their hopes on Jesus to fulfill the prophecies. So they surged around him, shouted their homage, waved palm branches, laid their cloaks in his path. They expected Jesus to claim the throne, raise an army, fight “the war to end all wars,” defeat the Romans, throw out the collaborators, and bring glory to the nation.
They didn’t understand the donkey. Matthew says Jesus was fulfilling the prophecy of Zechariah: “See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey.…” Not riding on a war horse, not even seeking to ride a wave of popular support. Just preaching, teaching, healing, and finally dying. What an absurd way to inaugurate a kingdom!
For over twenty years I have served as a pastor, first in the local church and now on campus. Sometimes the whole enterprise seems absurd. A little preaching, a Bible study group, a service project, a meal, a speaker we’ve brought to campus, a cup of coffee with a professor…What is that compared to the massive influence of, say, peer pressure in the dorms or at a dinner party, messages embedded in FaceBook or The New York Times, the ability to pass or fail a student or to hire or fire an employee?
Such weakness, it seems, against such power. Yet that’s the way of Jesus, the way of the kingdom of God. The way of the donkey.
Prayer: Lord, teach me to trust your way. Amen.
Quote: “It belongs to the nature of the new order that, though it condemns and displaces the old, it does not do so with the arms of the old.”
John Howard Yoder, The Politics of Jesus, p. 52
22.2 A King’s Welcome
“Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, rebuke your disciples!’ ‘I tell you,’ he replied, ‘if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.’” Luke 19:39-40, NIV
The crowd that welcomed Jesus to Jerusalem on “Palm Sunday” may not have understood the way of the kingdom of God, but they got one thing right: Jesus was the promised king. So they gave him a king’s welcome, shouting out cheers like, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!”
This was too much for some of the Pharisees: “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!” They probably objected to the cheers for two reasons. First, they thought these claims about Jesus were simply false. Though they admitted he was a “teacher,” many Pharisees would not accept him as a prophet (see Luke 7:39), much less the Christ/King, and certainly not the Son of God (see Luke 22:66-71). They thought the crowd of ignorant folk was getting totally carried away in their enthusiasm for Jesus.
Secondly, these Pharisees feared—correctly—that the noisy demonstration was dangerous. The Roman occupiers were always nervously on the alert for Jewish messianic movements, and ready to clamp down as brutally as necessary if one erupted. The Pharisees had worked out a kind of “separation of church and state,” whereby Rome would give them freedom to follow their religious practices, as long as they didn’t challenge Rome’s authority.
So they demanded that Jesus tone down the (false) rhetoric and the (dangerous) noise of his followers. That demand is still being made on our campuses and throughout our culture. “Jesus as a teacher? Fine. But don’t claim that he is the unique Son of God, or the only savior of the world. How intolerant! And don’t make so much noise about your faith, claiming in public that Jesus is Lord. That might upset all the other rulers of this world. Keep your religion private!”
I have often acted like a Pharisee. I want to be accepted, so I keep quiet. True, sometimes I think those Christians who make the most noise don’t have the right theology or the right methods. But I have to stand, and even shout, with them. If we are silent, the very stones will cry out!
Prayer: Lord, give me the courage to publicly acknowledge you as the Christ of God. Amen
22.3 Jesus Weeps Over Jerusalem
“As [Jesus] approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, if you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.” Luke 19:41-44, NIV
As Jesus crested the Mount of Olives, he saw the Jerusalem spread out before him, and he began to weep. For he had a vision of what was to come: An enemy army surrounding the city, breaking through, killing the people, dashing the children to the ground, utterly destroying the city, temple and all.
Why? Would God abandon his holy city and his people? No! God was coming to them
--that very day—in the person of Jesus himself. God was coming to them through his Son, the Messiah/Christ/King, the promised Prince of Peace. He came riding the donkey of peace, preaching and practicing the way of peace, the way of sacrificial love, love extended to the neighbor, the stranger, even to the enemy.
But most of the people would have none of it: “The sword is the only thing our enemies understand.” Forty years later they would mount a major rebellion against the occupying Romans, and the Romans would utterly destroy the city and devastate the Jewish people. That was what Jesus saw in his prophetic vision.
So Jesus wept over Jerusalem. He still does.
And he weeps over Baghdad, and over every city that is being or will be destroyed by violence. He weeps because the world, for the most part, has not recognized the time of God’s coming in the lowly Messiah who rode into Jerusalem on a donkey. I believe he weeps especially over Christians who believe it their duty to take up swords and guns instead of their crosses, as Jesus taught.
When will we learn to know what—and Who—brings us peace?
Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, fill me with compassion for a world wracked with violence. Teach us to follow you in the way of peace. Amen.
22.4 Lift Up Your Heads
“There will be signs in the sun, moon, and stars. On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea. Men will faint from terror, apprehensive of what is coming on the world, for the heavenly bodies will be shaken. At that time they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Luke 21:25-28, NIV
A while back on one of the major television networks there was a show that was called, if I remember correctly, “How Will the World End by 2020?” Not, “Will the World End by 2020?” but, “How Will the World End by 2020?” The show then went through the top ten candidates for ending the world as we know it: A giant meteorite that would hit the earth, a devastating outbreak of “bird flu,” a nuclear war started by accident, and so on. The “winner”? Global warming, since it is already happening and is bound to get worse.
That show was sensationalism at its worst, exploiting both people’s fear of the future and their fascination with the future. But, as a matter of fact, there are some horrendous things that have happened, are happening, and could happen. Some threats, like nuclear war, are new to the human race. Most, like earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes, killer epidemics, genocides, and many more, have long been with us.
Jesus doesn’t calm our fears by saying, “There, there, everything will be all right.” No, he foresees that fearful things will happen. What’s more, he sees these things as part of God’s judgment on the earth. The kinds of suffering that will happen to Jerusalem when it rejects King Jesus and his way of peace will happen to the whole world when it rejects King Jesus and his way of peace.
But Jesus doesn’t leave us to drop our heads in despair when terrible things are on the horizon. Rather, he tells us to lift up our heads in hope, because our redemption is drawing near. Jesus himself will come from beyond the horizon, in all his heavenly glory, to rescue his people and to rescue this world that he loves so much.
Prayer: Christ Jesus: Help me to live now as a hopeful citizen of your coming kingdom.
22.5 Jesus’ Longing
“When the hour came, Jesus and his apostles reclined at the table. And he said to them, ‘I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God.’” Luke 22:14-16, NIV
I can’t quite put my finger on it, but for some reason I am deeply moved by this passage. I guess it’s because Jesus here opens his heart to his friends, and he seems so…human.
Jesus is human in his need. After three years of exhausting ministry, after all the challenges of his critics, after all the plots of his enemies, he longs for a few quiet hours with his friends before he goes to the cross. He says to them, “You are the ones who have stood by me in my trials,” (v. 28). You can almost hear the gratitude in his voice.
Jesus is also human in his affection. He genuinely loves these men gathered around the table with him. And at this Passover meal, celebrating God’s great act of liberation in the Exodus from Egypt, he is eager to explain that he is about to sacrifice himself for them:“This is my body given for you.”
Finally, Jesus is human in his impatience. For three years he has walked the dusty roads of Palestine, proclaiming the coming of the kingdom of God. But many have rejected or misunderstood or ignored or forgotten him. The world seems to go on pretty much as before. Jesus longs for the fulfillment of the kingdom of God, when he will appear in his heavenly glory, evil will be abolished, death will be destroyed, the world will be made new, and God will be all in all.
And Jesus longs to host his friends at the great banquet to celebrate this final stage of salvation. You will “eat and drink at my table in my kingdom…” he tells his disciples.
That promise wasn’t just for the twelve, though. It was for all who would remember, believe, and follow him throughout the ages. Don’t you long to eat and drink with Jesus at that great feast?
Prayer: Dear Lord Jesus Christ: I am drawn to you. Please save me a place at the great banquet of the kingdom of God. Amen.
22.6 Jesus Mocked
“The people stood watching, and the rulers even sneered at him. They said, ‘He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Christ of God, the Chosen One.’ The soldiers also came up and mocked him. They offered him wine vinegar and said, ‘If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself.’” Luke 35-37, NIV
Few experiences in life are as emotionally painful as being mocked. I don’t mean the good-natured ribbing of friends, or even the trash talk of opponents on the other team. I mean the vicious way that others can put us down by their words, attitudes, and actions.
I went to a pretty rough country school as a kid. One day after school, when I was in third or fourth grade, some of the boys ganged up on me, held me down, singed my hair with a cigarette lighter, and laughed at me. I think it was the laughter that hurt the most.
Mockers hurt us because they attack our sense of self. They show contempt for our very being, for who we are. They say, “You may think you are somebody, but you are nobody, nothing, of no value. You are a fake and a phony.” That kind of ridicule seeks to destroy us from the inside out as well as from the outside in. It strikes deep, and makes us want to lash out in anger, or withdraw in despair, or both.
It is amazing to me that Jesus was willing to endure the physical pain of the cross for us. But it astounds me even more that Jesus was willing to be mocked for our sake. If I were him, I would have jumped off that cross in a flash of power, made some heads roll, and proved once and for all that I was the Christ of God, the Chosen one, the king of Israel.
But he took it in silence, and even asked forgiveness of his tormentors (v. 34). What tremendous self-confidence, and God-confidence, he had! He knew who he was, and he knew who God was, and no ignorant mockers could shake him.
Sometimes on campus, and in society at large, Christians and the Christian faith are mocked. It makes me want to react with anger, or sometimes even with despair. But Jesus shows us another way.
Prayer: Dear Jesus: Help me to have enough confidence in you and in the Father to love the mockers as you did. Amen.
22.7 Silent Saturday
“The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.” Luke 23:55-56, NIV
Suddenly, the gospel accounts go silent. Day by day and hour by hour they have recounted the words and actions of Jesus during the last week of his life. But after his body is slipped into the tomb in the twilight of Friday evening, the gospel writers have nothing more to say about him. The only thing we are told about Saturday is that a guard was posted at the tomb (Matthew 27:62-66).
Jesus disappears from our sight into the darkness of the tomb, and from our understanding into the mystery of death.
In the meantime, what about his followers? We can imagine their grief and despair. These people had pinned their hopes on Jesus of Nazareth. Many of them had left their homes, their families, their occupations to follow and serve him. They had poured their money into his cause. Some had been healed by him, and all had loved him. He said the kingdom of God was coming, and they thought he was the King, the Christ. Now he was dead and gone. What was left for them to do?
The women, at least, did what they had always done: Obeyed God as best they knew. They obeyed the commandment to keep the Sabbath day. Despite the despair, confusion, grief, maybe even anger, that they felt, they obeyed.
Sometimes that’s the best that we can do. We live post-“holy Saturday,” and post-“Easter Sunday.” Still, I have to admit, there are times when I too struggle with despair, confusion, grief, and even anger at God. Things don’t work out the way I expected. Two thousand years after Jesus’ coming, the Kingdom of God still seems as far away as ever.
What to do then? Obey God as best I know. And wait.
Prayer: Gracious God: Help me to obey you even when I don’t understand what is going on. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Copyright © CRCMA 2008
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