On Palm Sunday, we heard Jesus being hailed with “hosannas” at His arrival into Jerusalem, certainly not as a “do nothing” figure, but as the hoped for man of action, “the Messiah”. And why not? Had He not displayed an aura of authority that moved people to follow Him, sometimes in great numbers, throughout the years of His Galilean ministry?

ad He not worked wonders that only a Man of God could do?  If Jesus had been interested in making some sort of a political statement, He had tremendous poll numbers!

The “hour” had come for the annual celebration of that seminal event in Jewish self-identity: the Deliverance, the Passover.   And the people were famished for a deliverer. The hopes of deliverance from Roman power, from foreign oppression, taxation, and degradation filled the air as much as the shouts of “hosanna.”

Circus baron P.T.Barnum once wrote,  “Nothing gathers a crowd like a crowd,” and the throngs who gathered around Jesus had fed on each other’s excitement as would participants at any rally worth its salt.  Surely, they speculated, this would provide a perfect setting for Jesus to deliver His speech that would ignite God’s people to overthrow their oppressors…. 

They reasoned that God Almighty would certainly  come again to  rescue  the Elect, the chosen people, just as God had done in Egypt and at the Red Sea and in the wilderness with their ancestors—setting at liberty the oppressed, and dismantling their oppressors.

 But Jesus, in contrast to the expectations of the people, must have worn a painful smile as He rode into the Holy City.  He must have offered some reluctant waves to the cheering masses, as He recalled the other times that He had disappointed them when they sought Him out to be their king, or when the disciples blanched at His being a Suffering Servant.  This time would be no different except in the degree of anguish He would face and the depths of  disappointment His followers would endure.

From John Sanford’s work “The Kingdom Within” the author delves into the difficulty that Jesus faced (and we all face for that matter) in leaving “tribal consciousness” to follow God’s Will for our lives.

Sanford writes: (and I quote) “By instinct, man is a group animal.  For hundreds of thousands  of years he has existed through the group, and the individual has found his identity and meaning by virtue of his inclusion in the tribe, clan, or nation.  But the Kingdom of God calls us to go beyond this ancient herd  instinct and to establish an individual consciousness of oneself and of God.  Being a disciple means following the call in the individual way, and inevitably this will mean the separating out of oneself from the collective psychology of the group.” (end of quote)

You see, remembering that Jesus was totally human, perhaps the greatest temptation for Jesus—from the forty days and nights in the desert…… to the days in Galilee,…… to the entry into Jerusalem—has been to be primarily a “political” Messiah for the masses….for the crowd.   And perhaps the temptation  comes to its crescendo at the Last Supper.  Rather than a meal—somber  and sedate, hushed and moody with anticipated loss……………. Let us imagine a different scenario:

 Let us suppose the crowds have tracked down Jesus to force His hand.  Outside the upper room, they are exhilarated with the possibility of God’s deliverer being among them. The hour has come. The more zealous felt that Jesus simply needs to be spurred into action.  Rallied to relevance.  Cheered and catapulted to victory.

Now, just suppose that the scene in the upper room is far from serene, but that it is “electric”, but it is bristling with  energy, and focused on every little move that Jesus makes.

 Our Gospel, this evening, is the only Gospel to capture in clear terms the effect that this political zealotry had on the disciples: After Jesus instituted the sacrament of bread and wine at the Passover meal telling them to “do this in remembrance of Me”, what occurred? Well, Luke told us:

“And there was also a strife among them, which of them that should be accounted the greatest. But, Jesus said  that he that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger; and he that is chief, as he that doth serve. For whether is greater, he that sitteth at meat, or he that serveth? Is not he that sitteth at meat? But I am among you as he that serveth”

Perhaps in the sequence of events that we will never fully know, Jesus, in order not only to tell but to show the disciples what He means by the supremacy  of servant love ( the other three Gospel accounts tell us that)  He got up from the table.  He takes off His outer robe, ties a towed around Himself, pours water in a basin, and begins to wash His disciples feet—to the amazement of some and to the horror of Peter.

If there was a crowd outside the upper room, they would not have any comprehension of what is happening, or what this “enacted parable” of servant love is about.

So what starts out on Palm Sunday as a vibrant rally fizzles.  Jesus does not come out on the porch and make a statement to the adoring mob.

To the contrary, what becomes clear to them is simply that Jesus is not this type of leader.  The disillusionment sets in.  In effect, He has gone from being an authoritative man of action to a man who talks of love and servanthood.

He does not exercise power over anyone which His followers wanted Him to do as this would fulfilled their stereotype of a messiah. Actually, His followers will be humiliated and shamed beyond anything they can imagine, and left to be the laughingstock of Jerusalem.

The crowd, of course, will turn mean and hostile. The crowd does find it’s identity as a mob as they vacillate from adoration to condemnation. We have a 180 degree turn! The next day they will call for the release of Barabbas, a known entity, and for the crucifixion of Jesus.  And the cynics will conclude, “That’s politics” as they go along with the crowd.

The disciples of Jesus, on the other hand, as we heard, will be given a meal of bread and wine that embodies the presence of the body and blood of Jesus Christ, the Son of God! This is a meal that they and their followers ( that’s you and me, of course ) will relive again and again for the centuries….and……. They ( and we ) will have a model of love that is as strange as it is everlasting……. as it is true: that is, the ministry of the towel……foot-washing …...servanthood!.

 I have a story of a modern day disciple:  This is a true story of a white South African judge named Jan Christian Oliver.  A black invited him to attend his church on Maundy Thursday.   This was back in the times of apartheit; [ ah part’ tight ] so given this fact, the judge was risking his career if he went, but meaning to be a good man, he accepted the invitation.

He learned on his arrival, that it was a service of foot-washing, and he was urged to participate.  He was called forward to wash the feet of a woman named Martha Fortuin, who as it happened, had been a servant in his own house……….in the judge’s house…… for thirty years.

Kneeling at her feet, he was struck by how weary those feet looked from so many years of serving him.  Greatly moved, he held her feet with gentle hands and kissed them.  Martha fell to weeping, as did many others in the church.  The newspapers got word of it, and Oliver lost his political career. Yes, he lost his career, but he surely empowered his soul! 

Our South African judge kissed the feet of a former servant.  Without saying a word, the Gospel was proclaimed.  The prophetic drama of Jesus Love was reenacted. 

As you and I share this whole Gospel drama in our lives, as we partake of the Body and Blood of Christ this evening, may we too seek to be Christ-like in our servanthood!