Sermon for Palm Sunday: "The Great Hosanna"

 + Palm Sunday – April 13^th, 2025 +

Series C: John 12:12-19; Deuteronomy 32:36-39; Philippians 2:5-11; John 12:20-43

Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

There are certain words we use that when we say them we know exactly what day it is. Words which mark a momentous occasion. Baseball fans wait all winter to hear those famous words on opening day: play ball! Children go to bed with anticipation and restless energy on Christmas Eve waiting for those magical words the next morning: Merry Christmas! 

 

Palm Sunday is no different. Palm Sunday has a word that marks this momentous and joyous and holy day. It is a prophetic, yet personal word. A word filled with God’s presence and promise. It is a word packed full of salvation, which Jesus comes to bring as he enters Jerusalem. What is the Palm Sunday word? Listen to the crowds.

 

The next day the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. ¹³ So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!” 

 

Hosanna is the Palm Sunday word. On Palm Sunday and every day after, whenever you hear that word – Hosanna – you’re brought back to this day. To the crowds. The cloaks on the road. The palm branches waving. The voices crying out. The Lord, Messiah, King, and Savior Jesus riding on a donkey. The Son of David come to rescue and save the sons of Adam and daughters of Eve. On Palm Sunday, Jesus enters Jerusalem amidst the crowds shouting Hosanna, even as he is the Lord of Hosanna. He is God the Father’s Great Hosanna come to save us.

 

For that is what his name and this word means. Jesus’ name is YHWH saves. Hosanna is another great Hebrew word: save us! Save us now! O Lord, save indeed! It’s a word of prayer and word of praise all at once. A crying out to the Lord to save and a shout of praise to the Lord who saves. It is a divine exclamation mark on everything Jesus has done and is about to do. 

 

Hosanna is also an old, ancient word. The Palm Sunday crowds didn’t just make this up on the spot. No. Hosanna is the word of prayer and praise found in Psalm 118. The very psalm sung by the crowds as Jesus enters Jerusalem. “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!” 

 

Hosanna is a messianic word. Back in Psalm 118 – the whole psalm is about the coming Messiah. The Coming One. Save us, we pray, O Lord!  O Lord, we pray, give us success! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!

 

Save us, Lord. Hosanna. 

 

Psalm 118 was also the psalm sung by pilgrims as they went up to Jerusalem for the feast of booths/tabernacles. During that feast, for seven days they would march around the altar once a day. And guess what word was sung? Hosanna. Lord, save us. And on the 8^th day of the feast they marched around the altar 7 times and 7 times they said the holy word of prayer and praise…Hosanna. Lord, save us. This was known as the “Great Hosanna”. 

 

No wonder the crowds greeted Jesus with these words: “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!” 

 

Here he is at last. The Messiah foretold by the psalms and prophets. The Name of the Lord in human frame. The Lord of all and yet the God-man. David’s Son and David’s Lord. The King of Israel and our Royal Redeemer. Jesus is the Greatest Hosanna for he is the one who enters Jerusalem to do what this word cries out to God to do. Hosanna. Lord, save us. 

 

For the crowds are not the only ones who cry out: Hosanna. Lord, save us. So do we. As we sit in doctors’ offices awaiting uncertain test results, we cry out, Hosanna. As we look at our own families with broken relationships, broken marriages, broken lives…we cry out, Hosanna. Standing by the graveside of a loved one or a close friend, through our tears…we cry out, Hosanna. Weighed down by our guilt and haunted by our shame and finding no help when we look to ourselves…we cry out, Hosanna. Does our Lord hear us, we wonder? Does he care? Will he rescue? Will he save? Will he Hosanna? 

 

Jesus answers the crowds’ cries for rescue and our own Hosannas with another word of prophecy and promise and his peace. 

 

“Fear not, daughter of Zion;
behold, your king is coming,
    sitting on a donkey's colt!”

 

Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem is God’s promise that all our Hosannas do not fall on deaf ears, but rather fall on the ears of him who hears your cries for mercy and rescue and who is himself the answer and deliverance we so desperately need. Fear not. Your King is here. Today on a donkey. And soon, on the cross. Today shouts of Hosanna. Soon, shouts of crucify. Today the palm branches. Soon, the wood of the tree and the hyssop branch and the crown of thorns. Today Hosanna. Soon, the Greatest Hosanna of them all. 

 

For there on the cross God answers all our cries for Hosanna, Lord save us, with his own cry of “it is finished.” 

 

Today we join the Palm Sunday crowds in that word of prayer and praise: Hosanna. Lord, save us. Knowing he has. He does. He will. 

 

Today we join the festive crowds of Psalm 118 as we come around his altar to receive the Great Hosanna – the Lord save us – in his body and blood. Blessed are you who come in the name of the Lord.

 

Today our Lord gives us a word that he keeps and answers without fail. Hosanna. Lord, save us.

 

 

A blessed Palm Sunday to each of you…

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Sermon for Lent 5: "Honor in the Son"

+ 5^th Sunday in Lent – April 6^th, 2025 +

Series C: Isaiah 43:16-21; Philippians 3:8-14; Luke 20:9-20

Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

One of the things you learn when you travel is how different other places are in their cuisine, customs, and culture. Like the time Natasha and I accidentally offended a Canadian customs officer when we told her we weren’t sticking around Victoria for the Canada day fireworks (which we had only just learned about that moment!). No doubt you’ve experienced something similar in your travels. 

 

Now you may not have realized it but whenever you open up the Scriptures you’re traveling across time – no, not in a Delorean or a time machine disguised as a police box – but we’re taken back to a culture that was (and for many parts of the world still is) very different from ours. Many countries in the West – like ours – tend to operate or think in the categories of guilt and innocence, individual rights, a longing for things to be made right, and so on. 

 

But that’s not every culture tends to think in those categories. And that was certainly the case in Jesus’ day. It’s not that guilt and innocence were unimportant – they were and are – but some cultures, like the kind Jesus lives in and we read in the New Testament tend to think along the lines of honor and shame – where respect and reputation and relationships are valued and where disgrace, dishonor, and disrespect hurt not only an individual but the community.

 

Today’s parable in Luke 20 is a good example of the different ways cultures operate or the categories in which they think. A man planted a vineyard and let it out to tenants and then went away to another country for a good long while. When the time came to gather the fruit harvested by the tenants they beat the vineyard owner’s servants, sent them away empty-handed, treated them shamefully, wounded, and threw them out of the vineyard. Then comes the strange part – at least to our ears. The man decides… What shall I do? I will send my beloved son, perhaps they will respect him.

 

This is where we usually scratch our heads or do a face-palm. I mean, really. What did this guy expect? Those tenants are thugs. They’re guilty. We expect the vineyard owner to storm into that vineyard like John Wick or Chuck Norris. But instead he sends his beloved son. And here’s one of those cultural differences and why it helps understand what’s going on here.   

 

This story is told by Biblical scholar, Ken Bailey, where, writing about the cultural ideals of Jesus’ day he tells a story from Jordan in the 1980s when the king of Jordan, Hussein bin Talal, had been trying to make peace. This was not popular with the generals in his army. So word came to him that seventy five of them were meeting at one of the army barracks in order to hold a coup, and take over the country. So, the king got into a helicopter, and had the pilot fly him over to the barracks. As he got out, he told the pilot that if he heard gunshots, to take off without him. He went down to where they were meeting, walked calmly in, and said something to the effect of, “If you carry out this coup, the country will be torn apart by civil war. Tens of thousands will die. There is no need. Here I am. Only one need die today.”

 

To be sure, all seventy five of them were guilty. All seventy five had brought shame upon their office. Yet by this one action, the king appealed to their sense of honor, and gave them an honorable way out of this. Every single one of them took it. They all rushed up to him, pledged him their loyalty, and served him faithfully for the rest of their days. This was the outcome King Hussein bin Talal expected. That’s why he went. 

 

And that was the outcome the hearers of Jesus’ parables expected too. The tenants had acted shamefully. They had disgraced and dishonored the vineyard owner and themselves. But the vineyard owner showed just how honorable he was by giving them the opportunity to have their shame taken away. Receive the son. And the transgressions against the vineyard owner through his servants are all forgiven. The relationship and honor and joy would be restored.

 

But of course, that’s not how the parable goes is it. Not so much. But when the tenants saw him, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir. Let us kill him, so that the inheritance may be ours.’ And they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. Instead of honor, they choose violence and shame upon shame. Instead of being restored and at peace with the vineyard owner they reject him and his beloved son. 

 

What then will the owner of the vineyard do to them? ¹⁶ He will come and destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others.” When they heard this, they said, “Surely not!” May it not be. Let it not happen the crowds said. And yet it was happening. Jesus’ parable was playing out right in front of them. As Jesus spoke these words Israel’s religious leaders – the tenants of the Lord’s vineyard of Israel – were plotting murder and bringing shame upon shame. Jesus spoke these words during Holy Week…hours away from the time that he, the beloved Son of the Father, would be thrown out of the vineyard and killed. Crucified. Cast out. Rejected. Shamed.

 

But this, of course, is Jesus’ purpose in this parable. He’s telling us all what’s taking place. What is written? Jesus says. “‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone’? Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces, and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.”

 

In one shameful act upon another, the religious leaders Jesus is speaking about in this parable will crucify in the most shameful death imaginable…death on the cross. And yet it’s not their shame alone that puts Jesus on the cross. It’s Adam and Eve’s shame after they disobeyed God’s word and ate. It’s our shame. Yours. Mine. All of us together. It’s our shameful sin that rests on Jesus. It’s our rejection that he bears. It’s our disgrace and dishonor that he dies in. 

 

And yet, that’s not the end of the story. The Stone rejected becomes the cornerstone. In Jesus’ rejection. In his shame and crucifixion and dying for you, there is your salvation. There is your glory. Where the Beloved Son, Jesus, is cast out of the vineyard and killed, there’s your honor and restoration.

 

Jesus is treated shamefully to cover your sin and shame. Jesus is rejected to restore you to a place of honor. Jesus is made to be the guilty one to declare you and cover you with his innocence. Jesus is broken so you are made new. Jesus goes to his death to bring you his life. 

 

The author of Hebrews puts it this way: Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

 

But he’s not alone there. For the Beloved Son, Jesus, raises us up from the ash heap, out of sin and shame, to give us a seat of honor at his banqueting table. And the Lord of the vineyard pours out his sacred blood for wine and his body for the feast. A feast of joy and honor and forgiveness for you. Today, tomorrow, and forever.

 

In the Name of the Father and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.