Sermon Text - March 16, 2008
"Out of the Mouths of Babes: Parades and Prayers"
Matthew 21:1-17
Rev. David Kratz
Now we know that this is just the beginning of this week called Holy Week and after Palm Sunday Jesus argues with the religious leaders during the week in the temple, that is in a place like this (in a church). And on Thursday night he gathers his disciples together for an intimate meal, the celebration of the Passover, which everybody was doing and that’s, in fact, why so many people were coming to town was to celebrate the Passover in Jerusalem.
At the end of the Passover service by the way, if you’ve ever been to a Jewish home, they say at the end of each of the meals, “next year in Jerusalem.” And so it became a kind of idea or an impulse to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem at Passover time.
In any case, Jesus had another inside job like that first Palm Sunday and there was somebody that arranged for a place for them to have this meal together and then he took the main elements of the meal, the bread and the juice, and he interpreted them in terms of his own life and the giving of life. Then he was arrested, you know that story, and along the way all of his disciples left him, one betrayed him, and in the middle of the night, all of them left him. He was arrested and put in jail, they had a kangaroo court and he was convicted of blasphemy. He was hung on a tree – was crucified on a tree, which was not a religious symbol in those days but it was the form of execution that the Romans used to humiliate their enemies. We call that day Good Friday. But after the parade, the story actually of Palm Sunday is not done and I want to read what happened then. Instead of going and having a press conference, Jesus goes into the temple and this is what happens.
When Jesus entered the temple and drove out all those who were selling and buying in the temple and he overturned the tables of the money changers and seats of those who sold doves or pigeons, He said to them “It is written my house shall be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a den of robbers.” The blind and the lame came to Jesus and the temple and he cured them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the amazing things that he did and heard the children crying out in the temple “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they became angry. The religious leaders became angry and they said, “Do you hear what they're saying?” And Jesus said to them “Yes, have you never read ‘out of the mouths of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise for yourself that is God’” and he left them and went to the city of Bethany and spent the night there.
Well, it seemed to me there is a lot of stuff going on in this story, and a lot of it has to do with preparation. You know there was a lot of preparation before the parade. Jesus intentionally goes into this temple to make a public statement about who he is and what he's come to do. And then during all the other events, although they often seem chaotic and out-of-control, Jesus himself always seems in control. And this story always reminds me of the political campaigns, especially now that we’re running for president for two years, I’ve wondered what a campaign consultant would say to Jesus’ followers. And if they had cell phones in those days, can you imagine a cell phone conversation between a campaign consultant and maybe part of Jesus' entourage. Let’s see if we can imagine how that might happen.
Come on, come on, don’t those people out there have the phone . . . hello, hello, yes, yes, this is David Snorts from Imagine That Productions, yeah is Jesus of Nazareth there? No, he’s out praying? Oh that’s a nice touch. Oh no, nothing, never mind . . . .
Is there somebody that I can talk to who is in charge? Of course he's in charge, but is there someone there I can talk to about this campaign you're going to run? John? Okay, John listen, I'm with a thing called Imagine That Productions, and we do a lot of political consulting, we provide strategies and press releases and we help candidates to develop messages, and actually we’ve had some quite good success with the religious and political Messiah events, prophets, those kind of things.
Yeah, I think you can call several references, we can give you several references and we've had a lot of success. Well no, we are better known in urban areas I'm sure.
Yeah well our motto is “More exposure, more impact, more results.” We offer a wider range of services actually . . . yes, of course we know that Jesus really is the one to save the world (they all say that) yes, yes, it sounds like he has a good the following already. No, no we wouldn't put words in his mouth. Oh no no no, we just want to help him package it a little bit better so he gets maximum advantage, you know, more exposure, more impact.
It’s a busy time, people are busy, they don't have time, they have lots of things to do, you know, Passover things, you only have a little bit of time, to get into their brains and you need a package things for maximum effect.
Yes, you’ve got a good thing going for you now, you picked the right time to come, Passover, lots of people coming, it’s got problems, but anyway there's a lot of expectations in that area.
Really, no kidding? He said unless you're a child you can't come into his kingdom? Now that’s a good line John, we can use that one. Everybody loves a candidate has rapport with kids. You don’t want them getting in the way, but we could really use a photo-op with Jesus sitting around with lots of different children sitting on his lap. Yeah, that would be good . . .
He wanted children to lead the parade? Here's the thing, I was thinking more of a brass band. I’ve got an in with a 75 piece brass band, they do make a lot of noise and people pay attention . . . oh, children.
Spontaneity is okay, but . . .. God will provide . . . I don't think I’d leave such a big thing to chance actually, but . . . .well okay.
So here’s the other thing John, if you don’t want to do the band, how about horses? My brother-in-law does a lot of things with the Romans with horses - some great stallions, big, yeah, white, and you know purple saddles, you know it’s nice. You’re not into horses? I could get a trainer for you. No.
Well what you have in mind? A donkey?!
Have you thought that one through John? Have you ever heard a donkey bray? And have you though of this John? You know they’re very uncooperative. Yeah, I can sort of imagine one of those stupid animals just stopping the parade all at once and there would be Jesus sitting there with his feet hanging over there and he would look kind of stupid sort of like a donkey. And the headlines would read something like “Jackass Stops Traffic in Jerusalem For Two Hours” – bad publicity John! It’s not the right image. Ok, well, alright, it’s just a thought John, I know the prophet said it and all. It does sound like he does put a lot of stock in the Bible.
Here’s another thought for you, there’s a lot of religious leaders in town this week and my wife's brother-in-law is the right-hand man of Caiaphas the chief head priest and he owes me a couple favors, you know, now maybe we could get a photo-op with him. Yeah, well it wouldn’t be a big deal, you know he's a busy man, but I think we could maybe get him shaking hands and a smile, it would be good. You know a lot of people don’t know Jesus yet and this would build name familiarity and trust you know - not everybody knows Jesus.
You said he’s planned to clean out the temple? He’s going to turn over the money changers’ tables? He’s going to send out the pigeons?
You know, people get sensitive when you start throwing out money. I don’t think it’s the kind of thing you want to do in church. You know people get upset when you do that stuff in church. And you know the pigeon business is really, you know, the rock-bottom thing of the religious establishment.
Well John, I don't know where he’s going to get financial support if he doesn’t get it from religious people. . . .well you know with that and about three bucks for a latte. . . . .okay so I see that your candidate is a little bit different John . . .
How about this? We just developed a commercial for an insurance company that says, “We’re like everybody else, just a little different” – we think we can work with this John. It just needs to be packaged.
Maybe a little humor would help. I have an in with Jay Leno and Jon Stewart and maybe what we can do is have a little celebrity roast for Passover – a little Passover bash with . . .
Mary and Martha are hosting it? Who’s Mary and Martha? I'm sure they’re good women and great cooks, but, it just doesn’t have the pizzazz . . .
Okay John. I’m not sure you’re working the angles here John. It doesn't sound like Jesus is going to get elected. He’s not going to get elected? You don’t want him to get elected? You don’t want to sell anything?
Well what do you want? Give God’s love away, well okay, and how do you propose to do that?
Die? John, you know I’ve done some good things with heroic kinda deaths. You know, “I regret that I have but one life to give for my country” is a good line but . . .
He’s not trying to sell that either. Okay well, has he thought about a last line?
“My God my God, why have you forsaken me?”
John, you know, I don't think that's going to sell in Peoria either. And I’m not sure that I really want to be associated with a failure like this. What is he going to call this thing?
The Passion. Is that where Mary and Martha come in? That was a joke . . . .okay, compassion, it’s like passion and company . . . I understand.
Okay well I don’t think we have anymore business to do here John. We’ll just have to see how it turns out – I'm sure that God will be there too, but I don’t know that anybody’s going to recognize it, do you?
Geez, he just hung up – I think he might have been crying?!”