Cross Makers

Luke 23: 1-49

March 20, 2005 - Palm Sunday

Cross Makers

This morning we fold a palm leaf into a palm cross with words that signify each fold. It is something I've done for several years and it continues to be for me a meaningful experience as the Lenten season comes to its climax in Holy Week. It is meaningful for two reasons.

The first is that the folded palm cross is a visual representation of the uniqueness, and even oddity, of this Sunday in the church year. There is something of a schizophrenic personality about today that its very name points out. (As noted on your bulletin cover) it is the Sunday of the Passion and Palm Sunday. It is Palm Sunday when we watch the public high point of Jesus' ministry as he enters Jerusalem amongst shouts of "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord" which we read from Luke 19. And it is Passion Sunday that details the last hours of Jesus' life; Jesus crucified and laid in a tomb as Luke 23 ends. The highest point in Holy Week, and its lowest, are compressed this morning into one short hour. The palm leaf folded into a cross connects what happened on the Sunday of Holy Week with what happened on Good Friday of Holy Week.

The second reason that we fold a palm leaf into a palm cross is that it connects the people and events of that first Holy Week with us today. There were a number of players in these events of 2000 years ago who contributed to making the cross upon which Jesus would die. Some were wicked, some were weak, some were vacillating, some were cunning, some were desperate, and some were innocent victims caught up by accident in this divine drama. Nonetheless, they all in their own way contributed to the misunderstanding, the misrepresentation, the misjudgment, and the malicious mistreatment that crucified Jesus. Just as one fold of a palm leaf does not a palm cross make, so also not one person or group of persons was solely responsible for the cross to which Jesus would be nailed.

Nor, and here's the point, does the blame for the crucifixion rest solely with those who took part that first Holy Week. This morning we make a cross, too. The sins, for which Jesus died, the sins that drove him to the cross, live in us, too. Each fold of the palm cross will not only identify a person or group who contributed to the making of Jesus' cross, our making that fold will remind us that were we there we would have done no different.

(If you get lost along the way, there are written directions to plaiting a cross on the table in the narthex.)

The Palm Sunday crowd makes the first fold. Just as this fold causes the leaf to reverse upon itself, so did the Palm Sunday crowd reverse itself. They shouted "Hosanna" on Palm Sunday, and "Crucify him" on Good Friday. They praised his name when they thought Jesus would be a political or military leader who would deliver them from Roman domination, who would win for them political independence. But when Jesus failed to act as they thought he should act, they turned against him and called for his execution.

And what about us? Are there not litmus test issues in life that, if Jesus were not to perform as we pray, would cause our love for him to change? There are many vows made in times of medical crisis. "O Lord, if you cure me (my loved one) from this grave illness, I will (fill in the blank). But what if, for example, that person remains ill or that person's loved one dies? What happens then? Does the promised love and increased devotion turn to anger and resentment? Here is the first fold leading to a cross for which we too are guilty.

The next step in cross making is a diagonal fold and wrap around (2 '/z times). I don't believe everyone who shouted "Hosanna" on Palm Sunday cried, "Crucify him" on Good Friday. The problem here is that they didn't say anything. They may have believed in Jesus, even loved Jesus, but when others yelled, "Crucify him" they remained silent. They were so wrapped up in their own timidity and fear, so self-absorbed in self-preservation that they silently assented to the will of others and unwittingly added their part to making Jesus' cross.

Silence of believers is as much cross making today as are the attacks by non-believers. Who of us has not been silent when a Christian word was required, because we were too intimidated by the crowd, too influenced by peers, too embarrassed to speak out? And our cross making continues.

The fact that the cross has two arms is a reminder that it took both church and state to get this job done. As we fold the right arm of the cross we consider Pilate's part in making Jesus' cross. Here was an ambitious politician, but also a coward. Had he followed his own inclinations he would have released Jesus. He said as much. But the crowd threatened to inform the emperor in Rome that Pilate wasn't doing his duty. Pilate would be at risk of losing not only his present position but also the chance for any future political appointments. Pilate had to choose between what was right and what was politically expedient. He chose what was politically expedient.

When ambition comes before faith, when expedience comes before obedience, and when cowardice comes before Christian commitment, we take Pilate's place today making a cross for Christ.

The high priest Caiaphas, representing the religious establishment, folds the left arm of the cross. Here was a cunning professional of an organized religion that structured faith to serve its own ends. For Caiaphas Jesus was a threat, a rebel whose teachings would free people from the religious rules and regulations that secured power for the religious elite. Caiaphas, no doubt, considered it his religious duty to stir the Jewish crowd into an angry mob who would scream for Jesus' death.

Is there any of a Caiaphas in us? How many of us are more concerned with good order in the church and good deeds done in public than we are with the inner goodness of our hearts? How many strive today to obey the morality of a cold law code but ignore the sacrificial service required of warm-bodied people? And look, the cross takes shape.

Then comes Barabbas whom Mark tells us was arrested for murder during the insurrection. That would make Barabbas a Zealot, a Jewish revolutionary, whose actions were born out of blind, unbending nationalism. No crime, neither murder nor terrorism, was evil or wrong if it served the survival of the nation.

Certainly we are innocent of this. We condemn terrorism. True, but what motivated Barabbas was an unbending nationalism of which we are not so innocent. How often do we support policies that protect our nation's extravagances while ignoring other nations' needs? Nationalism, America first, charity begins at home... and another step in the cross is completed.

The final fold transforming a palm leaf into a palm cross was completed at the hands of the soldiers who carried out Pilate's order. It wasn't that they were just following orders. They took far too much delight in it for that excuse. They were ordered to scourge Jesus. Instead they added mockery to the sentence. Making sport of Jesus they placed a red robe on his back, a crown of thorns on his brow, a pretend scepter in his hand, and knelt before him in mock homage. Then they crucified him.

There is something of the soldier in us today, sometimes performing shameful acts that might not be so obvious but with the same net effect. When we speak Jesus' name with our lips but our hearts remain cold, our lives mock the lordship of Jesus.

If you've followed the steps as I've described, you've successfully transformed a palm leaf into a palm cross. Congratulations. But it isn't something for which we should take pride. It reminds us that we are not innocent spectators in the events we follow this week, but are, sadly, active participants in them. We cannot sit in smug self-righteousness this week, pointing in derision at those whose actions contributed to Jesus' cross, because in them we se too much of ourselves. It is unspeakable, but probably true, that had Jesus come in our day, we would have made for him the same cross. Amen.

May the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in and through Christ Jesus. Amen.

(For illustrated direction for folding a palm leaf into a cross please send your request to: Pastor Dan Mangler, P. O. Box 4399, Estes Park, CO 80517)