Jesus’ Revolution
Elaine Poproski Download: Audio
Sunday Scripture Reading: Mark 11:1-10 (NRSV)
1 When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples 2 and said to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. Read more…
Looking to Sunday: Preparing to Hear from God
by Elaine Poproski
Sunday is Palm Sunday. It’s the day we remember Jesus’ last journey into Jerusalem – the holy city of His day. It was a day of celebration. It was a day of hope and promise and imagination. Not so long before, Jesus had performed the miracle of all miracles when He rose Lazarus from the dead. The peopleknew Jesus would free them from Roman oppression. They knew He would make Israel great again. They knew He was the answer to every longing they and their ancestors had experienced for the last 600 years.
We celebrate Palm Sunday, not because Israel’s hopes were realized that day, but because it foreshadows a reality beyond the scope of their and our imaginations. Whatever we might hope for, the reality is better. Whatever promises we might hold to, the reality is much more. Palm Sunday led to Jesus’ crucifixion and death. It led to a day of darkness and sorrow – the kind of sorrow that rips out your guts and makes you believe the sun will never shine gain. But out of that darkness rose eternal light and life. Death could not hold Jesus and because of Him death cannot hold us.
As we head into Palm Sunday and the week that follows, the danger is that we will move too quickly. The danger is that we will not pause along the way but rush to the resurrection because that’s the best part of the story; it’s the fun/good/wonderful part of the story. So as you prepare for this Sunday, I invite you to stop there for a little while. Take some time to engage your imagination – What would it have been like to be part of the crowd that welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem that day? What do you imagine it will be like when Jesus comes back? What do you imagine Jesus’ presence today means for your life, for the lives of those you love, and for your church? What do you imagine Jesus is inviting you to be part of in the here and now?
And then… when you’ve done all that imagining… pause and remember this: our imagination is nothing compared to God’s imagination. On the most creative day of the most creative person in our world, we are but a pale shadow of God who imagined and created the entire universe.
What is the best you can imagine for your life? God imagines something we can’t possibly envision on our own.
What is the best you can imagine for our church? God imagines something beyond our ability to dream up in our power.
The people that first Palm Sunday were filled with imagination. They spent hundreds of years imagining this day. And in the end, they couldn’t even begin to conceive of what God was actually up to.
So, as you prepare for Sunday, spend some time imagining. And then take all that imagining and hand it to God so there’s room for His imagination and His dreams to be realized.