“Your King is Coming” (Matthew 21:1-11)

The ancient world out of which our Scriptures arose was a succession of mighty empires that swept across the Middle East. There had been the Egyptian Empire (1560-1069 bc), followed by the Assyrian Empire (1300-612 bc), after which came the Persian Empire (550-330 bc). But by far the greatest of them all was the Macedonian Empire (338-136 bc). This vast domain covered a swath of land occupying over five million square kilometers. It stretched from modern-day Greece eastwards through what are now Bulgaria and Romania, Turkey and Armenia, Iraq and Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, southwards through Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Israel, and across northern Africa through Egypt and Libya to the fringes of the Sahara Desert. It would not be exceeded in area even by the mighty Roman empire at its peak five centuries later. And all of this was the doing of one man: Alexander the Great, unquestionably one of the mightiest conquerors in all of history.

Now come to the city of Jerusalem in the year 331 bc. A message has arrived that Alexander himself would be paying a visit. To understand what this meant, you need to know that Jerusalem had refused to ally with Alexander as his armies battled against the Persian empire. So when they were brought the news that Alexander himself was coming to their city, its leading citizens began to spin into a frenzy, fearing the worst. They were certainly in no position to defend themselves, so they went to extravagant lengths to try to wow him and head off disaster.

Four centuries later the story was still being told. Here is what Jewish historian Josephus would write of that visit:

Jaddus the high priest, when he heard [the news of Alexander’s planned visit], was in an agony, and under terror, as not knowing how he should meet the Macedonians, since the king was displeased at his foregoing disobedience. He therefore ordained that the people should make supplications, and should join with him in offering sacrifice to God, whom he besought to protect that nation, and to deliver them from the perils that were coming upon them. Whereupon God warned him in a dream … that he should take courage, and adorn the city, and open the gates; that the rest should appear in white garments, but that he and the priests should meet the king in the habits proper to their order…

Josephus continues:

Alexander was not far from the city [when Jaddus the high priest] went out in procession, with the priests and the multitude of the citizens… When Alexander saw the multitude at a distance, in white garments, while the priests stood clothed with fine linen, and the high priest in purple and scarlet clothing, with his mitre on his head … he approached by himself … and saluted the high priest. The Jews also did all together, with one voice, salute Alexander, and encompass him about…

Just try to picture the scene in all its grandeur: Standing at the gate, the high priest and his entourage robed in their finest ceremonial attire. Behind them stretches a numberless crowd all clothed in white. Even for a great conqueror such as Alexander it must have been an impressive sight.

Applauded

Now let’s move ahead three and a half centuries. Jerusalem is bustling with pilgrims from every corner of the known world, all preparing for the feast of Passover. It is likely that its population of less than 100,000 swelled to twice that amount on those occasions, so you can just imagine the chaos: narrow streets swarming with pilgrims, and having to elbow and jostle your way even to make the least progress to get anywhere.

At this point Jesus and the disciples are just outside the city proper, standing on the Mount of Olives. The Mount of Olives rises about three hundred feet above Jerusalem itself (about twice the height of Citadel Hill) so you can imagine the panoramic view they had of the city across the Kidron Valley. It was from there that Jesus gave instructions to two of his followers to bring him a donkey with her colt. And so, as the next scene unfolds, you can picture Jesus riding slowly down the hill towards the city gate.

Perhaps some people had already seen him coming from across the valley and begun to tell others. Soon what started out as a quiet entry into the city became a royal procession, as onlookers began to spread their cloaks along the dusty road, while others took branches they had cut from the trees and laid them on the ground. All the while people were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!”

It is amazing, even without social media like Facebook and Instagram and WhatsApp, how widely and rapidly news could travel in the ancient world. Maybe there were some who had heard of Jesus’ miracles along their way to the Passover festival. Perhaps others had even witnessed them themselves—the healing of ten lepers, the restoring of sight to a blind man, the astonishing change of heart to Zacchaeus the tax collector… Perhaps still others had heard his arresting parables about the lost sheep, or the prodigal son, or the rich man and the beggar Lazarus, or the Pharisee and the tax collector… And, while this would have aroused the animosity of some, there would have been more than a few who had found themselves being irresistibly attracted to this remarkable man.

Added to that was the fact that there was a widespread expectation of a coming Messiah. Peter and the other disciples had long arrived at the firm conclusion that this was indeed who Jesus was. And by this time there were others who were beginning to ask themselves the question if this Jesus might not himself be the long promised Saviour-King (John 7:40-41).

So it is that we are confronted with the narrow streets of Jerusalem crowded with people cheering with Hosannas and waving their branches of palm. Excitement filled the air. The sense of anticipation was palpable. As we look back upon the scene, I wonder if this ought not to be our model, not just for Palm Sunday, but for every Sunday as we gather to celebrate the King of kings. It is a tragedy when worship becomes a routine for us—or even worse for some, a chore.

In my Anglican tradition, early in the service the worship leader would greet the congregation with the exhortation, “Praise ye the Lord!”. To which the congregation would reply, “The Lord’s name be praised!” Being Anglo-Saxons, that response was often rather muted, dare I say half-hearted? But let’s all stand up and imagine for a moment that we are on one of the streets of Jerusalem and Jesus is passing by…

Hosanna to the Son of David!
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!
Hosanna in the highest!

Abandoned

But we move on now to another location, once again a short distance outside the walls of Jerusalem—but this time not the picturesque Mount of Olives, rather what was known as the Place of the Skull, Golgotha, the execution ground. It is five days later. Gone is the excitement of Palm Sunday. The cheers of “Hosanna!” are not even a faint echo anymore. Only days later they had given way to angry calls of “Crucify him!” Now even those shouts have faded into the eerie quietness of Calvary. Gone are the crowds, their places taken by a small cohort of Roman guards, a few of the religious officials and the occasional passerby. Not far away a few women and a teenage boy stand in grief-stricken silence.

For the Romans crucifixion was a favourite means of punishment, combining both sadistic, drawn-out torture and execution, and standing as a public warning to any who dared to join in opposition against the imperial régime. A hundred years before Jesus’ crucifixion, after a lengthy slaves’ revolt, six thousand crosses had lined the Appian Way.

In the end, though, it would not be the waving palms and the shouts of “Hosanna!” that would endure. No, it would be the cross of Calvary and the parched cry that continues to echo down the centuries: “Father, forgive them…”

A generation later a former persecutor of Jesus’ followers would write, “[Some] demand signs and [others] seek wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called … Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:22-24) And again, “Far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” (Galatians 6:14)

“There is … no Christianity without the cross,” wrote Bible teacher and author John Stott. “If the cross is not central to our religion, ours is not the religion of Jesus.”[1]

Every time we look at the cross, [he wrote elsewhere] Christ seems to say to us, ‘I am here because of you. It is your sin I am bearing, your curse I am suffering, your debt I am paying, your death I am dying.’ Nothing in history or in the universe cuts us down to size like the cross. All of us have inflated views of ourselves, especially in self-righteousness, until we have visited a place called Calvary. It is there, at the foot of the cross, that we shrink to our true size.[2]

And I would want to add, it is there, at the cross, that we also discover that you and I, flawed and wayward sinners though we be, are of infinite worth to our Father God.

Acclaimed

Which brings us to a third scene—and it is another palm procession, not on the dusty streets inside the gates of Jerusalem, but on the streets of gold in the holy city of God. It comes to us in the Book of Revelation:

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” And all the angels were standing round the throne and round the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshipped God, saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honour and power and might be to our God for ever and ever! Amen.”

Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?” I said to him, “Sir, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

“Therefore they are before the throne of God,
     and serve him day and night in his temple;
     and he who sits on the throne
              will shelter them with his presence.
They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore;
     the sun shall not strike them,
     nor any scorching heat.
For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd,
     and he will guide them to springs of living water,
and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

 (Revelation 7:15-17)

It is a remarkable scene, that stretches beyond the limits even of the wildest imagination. It sends chills down my spine every time I read it. It reveals to us that the celebration of that first Palm Sunday and our celebration today are but a preview, a rehearsal if you will, of the surpassing joy that awaits us, when we put our trust in Christ and in what he has won for us by his death on the cross.

Today, on this Palm Sunday, we look ahead not only to the events of Good Friday and Easter. We look beyond them to when you and I will gather with countless myriads of God’s people from every continent and century to rejoice before the throne of our crucified, risen, ascended and glorified Saviour. But that can happen only as we can speak with the Apostle Paul of the Saviour “who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). Those words are reflected so beautifully in the song,

It was for me he cried, for me he died,
For me he shed his blood upon a tree.
It was for me he came, for me his shame;
For me, oh praise his name, it was for me.[3]

And so let me ask: Have you stood at the foot of the cross? Have you looked up at the one hanging there and recognized that it was for you he suffered and bled and died—that it was your sins, your guilt, your death he took upon himself there?

Let’s take a moment to pray in silence, and use the opportunity to offer ourselves to Jesus, our glorious King, who is worthy of all praise, and who gave himself once and for all for you and for me and for our salvation on the cross…

---

[1]     The Cross of Christ, 68

[2]     The Message of Galatians, 179

[3]     Dave Bolling, “It was for me”

“If Stones Could Shout” (Luke 19:28-40)

For the next few moments I want you to try to imagine what it must have been like to be among those who stood on the streets of Jerusalem on the first Palm Sunday. (I’ll even let you close your eyes if you like, as long as you promise not to go to sleep!)

The city would have been bustling with people, as worshippers from all over Palestine and many from considerably farther afield—from as far away as the distant corners of the vast Roman Empire—had begun to gather in preparation for the annual Passover celebration.

For centuries there had been a tradition that, as they made their way towards the holy city, travellers would recite what are known as the Psalms of Ascents, the fifteen psalms beginning with Psalm 120. Many of those psalms remain familiar to us today, as they have become entrenched in our Christian worship: “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?” “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go the house of the Lord.’” “Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved…” “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream…” “Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain…”

So it was that there was literally music in the air as Jesus and his followers made their way towards Jerusalem. Our Bible reading this morning opens with them looking across at the city from the top of the slope that separates it from the Mount of Olives—and I find myself hearing the distant echoes of those psalms being sung in the background.

As they made their way along the twisting road that led down into the valley and then up towards the city, Jesus knew what awaited him there. Indeed, he had been warning his followers about it for some months: “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. For he will be delivered over to the Gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. And after flogging him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise.” (Luke 19:31-33)

The Disciples

In fact, Jesus had warned them on at least three separate occasions what was going to happen to him. However, the disciples, really hadn’t paid very much attention at the time. Plus, I suspect that by this time they were so caught up in the excitement of the coming Passover celebration that those words of foreboding had faded almost entirely from their minds. They would have had no idea of the darkness that was to engulf them over the coming days.

It was in that context that Jesus came to them with a request: “Go into the village ahead of you. There on entering you will find a colt tied, on which no one has ever yet sat. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ say this: ‘The Lord has need of it.’”

The instructions seem strange to me—almost like something out of a James Bond movie. However, the disciples seemed to think nothing of it and went on their way unquestioningly, following Jesus’ directions to the letter. And as it turned out, everything was exactly as he had told them. Little did they know that they were embarking on a trajectory that would lead to treachery, betrayal, torture and execution.

Now they were happy to obey Jesus and to carry out his instructions. But in a few days’ time they would see this same Jesus, whom they had come to love and adore, roughly arrested, unjustly tried, brutally tortured, and nailed to a cross to die a slow, agonizing death. And they would find themselves cowering behind locked doors in fear for their lives. Piece by piece, everything that they had come to believe in and to hold dear over the previous three years would be turned on its head.

The Multitude

The next scene takes us to the gates of Jerusalem. Located atop Mount Zion and surrounded by thick stone walls, the city would have made an impressive site, especially for those who came from the towns and villages of the countryside.

I am reminded of one of my visits to New York City. I was with a friend and we were walking through the streets of Manhattan, when a stranger came up to us and said, “You’re visitors here, aren’t you?” When we asked him what gave us away, he replied, “It’s because you’re looking up, not ahead.” All our attention had been riveted on the enormous skyscrapers that towered above us, to the point where we weren’t paying any attention to where we were going!

I can imagine a similar dynamic taking place with many of the pilgrims from the tiny hamlets of Palestine—among them Jesus’ disciples. There were the more than a quarter of a million of them jostling along through its narrow streets. And everything about the city would have prompted oohs and ahs.

At the centre of it all was the magnificent Temple occupying thirty-six acres of land. Its fifty-foot-high gates flanked by enormous columns, its gold glistening in the hot Near Eastern sun, it would have been an impressive sight even to modern eyes. Already more than forty-six years in the making, it would not be fully completed for another four decades.

Now add to that the excitement and anticipation over the coming celebration of Passover. Then into this scene there enters a strange sight—a man riding on a donkey, with other men going before him and spreading their cloaks along his path as though he were a king or some kind of royalty. This leads to what seems to have been a spontaneous outburst of excitement, as some join in and spread their garments on the road, while still others cut down palm branches and lay them along the cobblestones. Meanwhile, all of this is accompanied by joyful shouts of “Hosanna!” and “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!”

Of course, we all know that within the space of a few short days the jubilant cheers of the multitude would turn to shouts of “Crucify!” Among them there might even have been some of those who passed by him as he hung naked on the cross, who jeered at him and mocked him with the words, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself…”

The Stones

Then there were the religious authorities, who would have none of this spontaneous celebration. “Teacher,” they snapped, “rebuke your disciples.” To which Jesus replied, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.”

My suspicion is that the stones that Jesus was referring to may have been the enormous megaliths that formed the base of the Temple. Some of them weighed as much as five hundred tonnes. You may recall that on a previous visit to Jerusalem one of Jesus’ disciples had drawn attention to them. “Look,” he said (and I can imagine the wonderment in his voice). “What massive stones! And what enormous buildings!” (Mark 13:1)

Now let me ask: Can you think of anything more inanimate than a stone—particularly a stone of that magnitude? Yet Jesus says, “If [the human voices] were silent, the very stones would cry out.” What did he mean? Was he just being poetic? Was he using exaggeration to get his point across?

Maybe. But I think there was more. And my reason is this: It is because at the cross everything would change—and I mean everything. It was not just a matter of closing the gap that separates you and me from God on account of our sin. What was happening on the cross would radically affect the whole created order in its entirety—even the rocks! For it was on the cross that Jesus would defeat once and for ever the cosmic powers of sin and evil and death—all that is wrong and sinful and out of step with God’s will in the universe.

We get a glimpse of what was happening in Matthew’s remarkable account of what took place in Jerusalem at the moment when Jesus gave up his spirit:

And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And the earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many. (Matthew 27:51-53)

So it is that when we get to the Book of Revelation, we find the aged John peering through his astonished eyes not just to catch a dream of things made better, but to be captured by a vision of the whole of creation transformed. What he gazed upon was a new heaven and a new earth. “For,” he says, “the first heaven and the first earth had passed away.” (Revelation 21:1)

The apostle Paul expressed the same kind of understanding in his letter to the Romans, when he wrote:

I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. The creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. (Romans 8:18-23)

So as we move through this Holy Week towards the observance of Good Friday and Easter, if I leave you with anything, I want to leave you with a cosmic vision of what was taking place as our Lord and his disciples made their way into the holy city.

When Jesus was to utter those words from the cross, “It is finished,” he was not just saying that his life was coming to an end. He was doing away once and for all with sin and evil and death. He was ushering in a whole new creation, made perfect in accordance with the will and pleasure of his Father.

In the words of the apostle Paul, “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” (Colossians 1:19-20)

When New Testament scholar N.T. Wright wrote his book about the meaning of Jesus’ crucifixion six years ago, he chose the dramatic title The Day the Revolution Began. In his conclusion to this massive 400-page-plus study, he wrote this (and please forgive me for quoting it at length!):

With all this we lift up our eyes and realize that [we] have been so concerned with getting to heaven, with sin as the problem blocking the way, … that [we have] forgotten that the gospels give us [the atonement] not as a neat little system, but as a powerful, many-sided, richly revelatory narrative in which we are invited to find ourselves, or rather to lose ourselves and to be found again on the other side. We have gone wading in the shallow and stagnant waters of medieval questions and answers … when only a few yards away is the vast and dangerous ocean of the gospel story, inviting us to plunge in and let the waves of dark glory wash over us, wash us through and through, and land us on the shores of God’s new creation.[1]

The obedience of the disciples would quickly turn to fear. The shouts of “Hosanna!” that rang through the streets of Jerusalem would soon be no more than an echo. But the day is coming when even the stones will not be silent, but will resound with the joyful chorus of all the redeemed:

Worthy is the Lamb who was slain,
to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might
and honour and glory and blessing!
(Revelation 5:12)

Let’s be sure that you and I are part of the crowd!

---

[1]       The Day the Revolution Began, 415-416

Bible portraits: Palm Sunday (Part 4)

It seemed to be no time at all before we were on our way down the slope of Mount of Olives, with the massive sun-bleached walls of the holy city facing us just across the valley. To our surprise there were people there to meet us. Some of them spread their cloaks out on the road for the donkey to walk on. Others had palm branches in their hands and were waving them wildly. There were exuberant shouts of “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Hosanna to the Son of David!” “Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”

Now it was all coming clear. The colt, the cloaks, the palm branches, the shouts of “Hosanna!” It was finally happening. The Lord was going to set himself up as ruler of Israel. There had been attempts before to proclaim Jesus as king—I remember it had happened by the Sea of Galilee just after he had fed that hungry crowd of more than five thousand people. But he had always resisted them in the past. He had often talked about waiting for the right time. Perhaps now this was it. One of us (I don’t remember now who it was) reached up into one of the palm trees by the side of the road and tore off some branches. In a moment we too were waving palms and shouting along with the crowd, “Hosanna to the king!” It was a glorious moment.

In the midst of the crowd we could make out some whose somber expressions indicated that they were not prepared to take part in the celebration. Leaning forward from the crowd they tugged at Jesus’ cloak to divert his attention. “Teacher,” they protested. “Make this nonsense stop! If this continues into the city and the authorities see us, it will be the death of us. They won’t tolerate anything that bears even a hint of rebellion.”

But the Lord was not to be put off course. “I tell you,” he said—I haven’t forgotten the words—“I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will take up the chorus.” So it was that, laughing and cheering we continued our way down the steep slope of the Kidron Valley.

It was the happiest, most exultant of occasions, and we were foolish enough to think that it would never end. Of course it did. Within days those glad shouts of “Hosanna!” had turned to angry screams of “Crucify!” The bright sun of that Sunday morning gave way to the darkened skies which clung to Golgotha like a pall as the Lord hung dying on a cross. What shall I say about that day? How weak and short-lived is the voice of human praise! How shallow and fickle is our faith in the one we once hailed as our King!

We thought we had him figured out. Again and again we imagined that we knew his mind. Yet right to the last it was only he who really was aware of what was taking place, only he who knew that what he was riding to was not a throne of gold but a cross of wood. How far beyond our human reason is that love which led him to ride triumphantly to his own death! How inscrutable his compassion to offer up his life for one such as me! The praises we shouted on that day are but a faint echo of the joy which now rings in heaven and through eternity:

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain
to receive power and wealth
and wisdom and strength
and honor and glory and praise!”

“To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb
be praise and honor and glory and power
for ever and ever!”
Amen.

Bible portraits: Palm Sunday (Part 2)

Just down the road, not far inside the gates of Jericho itself, another surprise awaited us. Suddenly, for no reason that any of us could think of, the Lord stopped again. We were under a huge sycomore-fig tree which had obviously stood in its place for many long years. He just stood there, staring up into its vast, spreading branches. It was far too early in the season for there to be any fruit on it, so what was the point of looking for any? Then we began to see what he saw. There was one branch of the tree where all the leaves were shaking. When we peered in a little harder, we could just make out someone sitting in the crook, just where the branch joined the trunk. It was a grown man!

“Zacchæus,” the Lord said to him. (To this day I can’t figure out how he ever knew his name.) “Zacchæus, come down from there right now. I’m planning to spend the afternoon at your house.”

You should have seen the way the little man managed to make his way down the thick trunk and onto the ground. “It would be an honour, sir,” he said, bowing low before the Lord and dusting the bits of leaf and bark off his clothes. “Let me lead the way.”

Around me I could hear mutterings of discontent. This Zacchæus, it seemed, was the local tax collector. He had made most of his wealth by soaking the local people for all they were worth in the name of Rome and then keeping most for himself. If it were not for his squad of Roman guards (or should I say goons?) his life would not have been worth a denarius. What, they asked, was Jesus doing with this turncoat, with this oppressor of the Jewish people? They had heard that he always stood up for common folk. I must admit I shared in their puzzlement and was kind of disappointed that Jesus did not at least take time to explain his interest in this tax collector.

It did not take us long to reach Zacchæus’ house. There we were all treated to a feast fit for a king. From the other end of the table I could see that the Lord had engaged our host in an animated exchange. Over the happy roar of all the other conversations in the room I was unable to catch more than the occasional word or two. Yet I could see on Zacchæus’ face alternating expressions of annoyance, surprise and finally what could not be mistaken for anything but pure, inexpressible joy.

In a moment he was clapping his pudgy little hands. “Quiet, everybody. Quiet, please! I have an announcement to make…” He said some words about what a deeply lonely unhappy a man he had been and about how he had learned what little satisfaction was to be found in money. Then he turned to Jesus and said, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”

You could literally feel the hush that followed. It filled the room. No one knew what to say. People just stared at one another in amazement. It was the Lord himself who broke the silence. “Today,” he said, “salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a child of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to sake and to save what was lost.”

To seek and to save what was lost. That was why he had come. And what we learned that afternoon was that it was just as possible to be rich and lost as it was to be poor and lost. Whether you were a blind beggar sitting by the roadside or the owner of a mountain of cash or somewhere in between, we all need what Jesus came to bring. We had seen it with our own eyes, seen people totally changed, and nothing gives me more joy than to talk about it.

Bible portraits: Palm Sunday (Part 1)

It will forever be etched in my memory, that day when we entered Jerusalem for the last time. The heat of the spring sun beat down upon us as we made our way up and down the slopes along the steep, winding road to Jerusalem. As we approached the great city a sense of anticipation, of exhilaration, surged through our veins.

Looking back on it all, I cannot put my finger now on what we were really expecting. The days past had certainly had their excitements. There had been the blind man just outside Jericho. How will I ever forget his pathetic cry, just barely audible over the stir of the crowd? “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Some folk tried to shut him up, but he refused to pay any attention to their threats. He just cried all the louder, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

I knew what the Lord would do all along. He never was one to pass by a person in need. When he heard the man’s voice he stopped dead in his tracks, and all the crowd with him. “Bring him over here,” he said to us. And so we went over and helped the man to his feet. We could hear his knees crack as they straightened out. With his bony hand he grasped onto my arm and haltingly we half-walked, half-stumbled our way over to where the Lord was. “What do you want me to do for you?” he asked, as he looked deep into the man’s lifeless and impenetrable eyes.

“Lord, that I may receive my sight…”

“Receive your sight,” he said to him in a manner that seemed so matter-of-fact, as though it were nothing unusual. “Your faith has healed you.” Even as the words were still on his lips I could see the opaque dullness of the man’s eyes melt into a sparkle. The look of absolute wonderment spreading across his face was enough to tell us all that a miracle had happened.

The next moment we were all praising God for what had happened to the blind man (or I should say, the man who had up till that time been blind). He himself couldn’t stop jumping up and down and coming up to each of us and staring for a moment or two into our faces as though he had lost hold of his senses.