Passion Sunday

Today is Passion Sunday, The beginning of Holy week. The plan of God begun with the covenant with Abraham, for the salvation of man in the Old Testament is coming to a climax in the events of this week. God had previously made a covenant with Adam and Eve and with Noah. And both were broken. God finally made a covenant with Moses and gave him the Ten Commandments and pledged to be with the people in their journey from slavery to their occupation of the Promised Land, to be with them in the cloud by day and in the fire at night. The ark was built in which was placed the law and the manna which they carried with them for 300 years until they settled in Jerusalem under the kings David and Solomon.

David kept the ark on the hill of Zion until it was placed in the temple by King Solomon, David’s son. The ark, with the law and the manna remained in the temple in the tabernacle below the mercy seat.

The temple was destroyed during the Babylonian exile about 600 B.C. The ark was taken and never restored, even though the temple was rebuilt.

The 6th century B.C. prophets Malachi, Zephaniah and Zechariah wrote and prophesied about the restoration of Israel and the coming of the Messiah and we hear today in the first Gospel from Matthew, “Say to daughter Zion behold your king comes to you, meek and riding on an ass…” from Zechariah 9:9

Daughter Zion is the Earlier city of David where the ark was kept which they long for. Matthews Gospel speaks of the coming into Jerusalem in the name of the Lord, Jews the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee.

The assembly today is not aware that the ark and its contents are in their midst. Daughter Zion is Mary who is the ark restored and the prophet riding on an ass and the colt. The foal of a beast of burden in truth is the Son of God who was with the people in the cloud and in the fire from the beginning, who made the covenants that were broken and who this week will make a new and everlasting covenant that will also be disregarded by many through time.

We have read the Passion together this morning and see that everything was foretold in the Old Testament, starting with the Messianic Prophet Isaiah what Christ suffered from the scourging by the solders. The passage is the 3rd suffering servant song Chapter 50 of Isaiah. Jesus said: “I have come to serve not to be served.” The responsorial is from Psalm 22 “The prayer of an innocent person”. The passage from Philippians tells us that Jesus forfeited everything that was his by right in not only his human condition but in his divinity. He did not consider equality with God, something to be grasped but rather emptied himself taking the form of a slave.”

In the days of Lent we have heard the Scriptures that lead us up to our presence here today with Jesus at Jerusalem. And the crowds who shout “Hosanna, Son of David” are they who quite\ soon will shout crucify him.

Jesus told us that he came to fulfill the law and the prophets. Today he is coming into his own city from outside. The words of John’s prologue to his Gospel resound this week “He came unto his own and his own received him not.” This week Jerusalemites’ will have their way with him and the people will remain silent.

At the end the Lord of Heaven and Earth will be cast outside the city wall.

Daughter Jerusalem, your king comes to you riding on an ass. Jesus said to Pilate, “I am a king. But my kingdom is not of this world.” Jesus is God who through seeming contradiction will bring us to Himself. He said:”When the Son of Man is lifted up, He will draw all things to Himself.” The holy cross is the tree of life and in Him we are a new creation.

St. Paul in Gal 6:14 says, “But as for me, God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world.” And again in Gal 2:20 “With Christ I am nailed to the cross. It is no longer I that live, but Christ lives in me. And the life that I now live in the flesh I live in the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself up for me.”

The last days of this Holy Week end with Christ’s, and our victory, over death in His resurrection. We give Him thanks with all we have and are for the gift of this new creation-- This new life.