James T. Cleland - "Triumph and Tears" (March 19, 1967)

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-	Let us pray.	0:25
	Let the words of my mouth	0:28
	and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable	0:31
	in thy sight, oh, Lord, our strength and our redeemer, amen.	0:36
	Today marks the opening of Holy Week,	0:52
	the season which calls to remembrance	0:56
	the defeat and death of Jesus the Christ.	1:00
	The first Holy Week began so well,	1:06
	his triumphal entry into the city of Jerusalem.	1:10
	The first Holy Week ended so badly,	1:15
	his corpse in a borrowed tomb behind a sealed stone door.	1:20
	Now, today, Palm Sunday,	1:31
	we remember and celebrate a very human triumph.	1:32
	The prophet of Galilee seems to have	1:38
	come into his own at last.	1:41
	It's not entirely without reason that	1:45
	one New Testament scholar has asserted	1:47
	that Palm Sunday was the happiest single day in Jesus' life.	1:52
	People were cheering him and cheering for him.	1:59
	He appeared to be on the threshold of victory.	2:05
	Jerusalem, the headquarters of the Jewish religion	2:09
	seemed ready to capitulate.	2:13
	Matthew describes the entry in these words.	2:16
	"When he entered Jerusalem,	2:20
	the whole city went wild with excitement."	2:23
	The author of the fourth gospel jotted down	2:28
	what the Pharisees were captiously murmuring	2:31
	to one another.	2:34
	"You see, there's nothing one can do.	2:36
	The whole world is running after him."	2:40
	Now, there's an unintentional tribute.	2:43
	The whole world is running after him.	2:47
	One begins to understand why that New Testament student	2:51
	said that Palm Sunday	2:56
	was the happiest single day in Jesus' life.	2:58
	And we are gathered here now to hold in memory that man	3:04
	and that day, to join in the enthusiasm, to shout, hosanna.	3:09
	Well, not quite.	3:17
	We are more subdued, more sedate than that,	3:19
	but we've sang it and listened to the choir	3:23
	singing it for us.	3:26
	It all suggests a romantic line from a children's hymn,	3:29
	"I should like to have been with him then."	3:33
	Well, why not?	3:39
	Let us go and be with him on that first Palm Sunday.	3:42
	Jesus and his followers are coming to the Holy City	3:49
	along the Jerusalem Jericho Road.	3:52
	He knew that road.	3:56
	He located the parable of the Good Samaritan on it.	3:58
	The time of the year is that of the Passover,	4:03
	and the thoroughfare is busy with people.	4:05
	It's really jammed with people, all kinds of folk,	4:09
	all the kinds of people	4:15
	we now find in an Easter parade, the devout,	4:16
	the religiously conservative, the ecclesiastics,	4:21
	the curious, the camp followers, the beggars,	4:27
	the petty thieves, the government agents.	4:33
	It is a mob.	4:38
	Joseph and Mary, his parents, once thought	4:41
	they had lost Jesus in a crowd like that	4:44
	at the same time of year on the same road.	4:49
	Jesus was 12 years old then.	4:54
	The first Palm Sunday is 20 years after.	4:58
	20 years after.	5:03
	And Jesus has decided to do something dramatic.	5:06
	Thus far, he has not claimed in public	5:11
	in so many words to be the Messiah, the Christ,	5:16
	the anointed one of God.	5:23
	He's going to do it now.	5:26
	Not in words, but in an act.	5:28
	He's not going to say it.	5:33
	He's going to pantomime it.	5:36
	Let him that hath eyes to see, see,	5:39
	and, God willing, understand.	5:45
	He's going to play the lead in a very serious charade.	5:49
	There's an Old Testament prophecy about the Messiah,	5:55
	which Jesus is going to bring to life in himself.	5:59
	It's in the book of Zechariah,	6:05
	"Rejoice, greatly, oh daughter of Zion.	6:07
	Shout aloud, oh daughter of Jerusalem.	6:11
	Lo, your king comes to you.	6:15
	Triumphant and victorious is he,	6:18
	humble and riding on an ass, on a colt, the foal of an ass."	6:22
	Jesus acts that out.	6:32
	Jesus, the unofficial prophet of Galilee,	6:36
	is claiming to be the Messiah,	6:41
	the inaugurator of the kingdom of God.	6:44
	Now the question is, will those who see the charade	6:49
	understand the intent of it?	6:55
	Will they remember the prophecy of Zechariah	6:59
	and really believe that it's being fulfilled	7:02
	before their eyes?	7:05
	Jesus' followers, mostly Galileans,	7:08
	seem to catch something of its purpose,	7:13
	enough to transform a caravan into a procession.	7:17
	As a sign of allegiance to their rabbi,	7:23
	they strew the road with garments and palm branches.	7:27
	One hopes that Jesus is mounted on a sure footed animal.	7:34
	He is their prophet, God's spokesman.	7:42
	That they know, and they will show him to Jerusalem.	7:46
	Let those hoity-toity city dwellers live and learn.	7:52
	Let the inhabitants of the Holy City see a thing or two.	7:58
	Now they're beginning to shout,	8:03
	"Hosanna to the son of David."	8:05
	That means to the Messiah.	8:07
	"Blessed it he that cometh in the name of the Lord."	8:10
	That suggests Messiah.	8:15
	"Blessed is the kingdom that cometh."	8:18
	That's a messianic statement.	8:21
	"The kingdom of our father, David."	8:23
	That ought to be messianic.	8:26
	"Hosanna in the highest."	8:28
	What the choir sang at the opening of the service	8:31
	this morning.	8:34
	Now, that invites the angels to join in the messianic claim.	8:35
	The Messiah has come to Jerusalem.	8:43
	It's the happiest single day in Jesus' life.	8:46
	But, is it? Is it?	8:51
	Look at his face.	8:57
	There are the marks of tears on it.	9:01
	He has been crying.	9:04
	Well, maybe they are tears of joy.	9:06
	He is being recognized for what he is	9:09
	in the very headquarters of the Jewish faith.	9:12
	And yet, that isn't what he seems to believe.	9:15
	Listen to him.	9:19
	"And when he drew near and saw the city,	9:22
	he wept over it, saying, would that even today,	9:27
	you knew the things that make for peace,	9:34
	but now they are hid from your eyes.	9:37
	For the days shall come upon you	9:41
	when your enemies will cast up a bank about you	9:44
	and surround you and hem you in on every side	9:48
	and dash you to the ground,	9:53
	you and your children within you,	9:55
	and they will not leave one stone upon another in you,	9:58
	because you did not know the time of your visitation."	10:05
	What's wrong?	10:17
	Why did Jesus weep when he saw the city?	10:21
	We're not told, but here are two hints of an answer.	10:25
	First, he may have had a premonition	10:33
	that Jerusalem would not listen to his gospel.	10:38
	Why not?	10:45
	Because it would mean the subordination	10:48
	of ecclesiastical pride, of legal self righteousness	10:51
	and of spiritual status.	10:57
	It would mean a life lived in the humility of love,	11:01
	of goodwill even to enemies,	11:06
	of serious efforts at cooperation.	11:10
	And it's almost too much to expect a capital city	11:16
	to behave like that.	11:22
	And yet, if Jerusalem will not behave like that,	11:24
	then destruction and doom awaited.	11:30
	And that actually happened to Jerusalem 40 years later,	11:36
	as Jesus may have seen it happen to another town	11:44
	25 years before the first Palm Sunday.	11:49
	Four miles from Nazareth, where Jesus grew up,	11:55
	was the town of Sepphoris,	12:01
	which Rome took stone from stone in AD 6	12:05
	because it harbored proud, religious revolutionists	12:13
	who were not in any way interested in the humility of love.	12:18
	Do you think that a boy of 10 by the name of Jesus	12:25
	could be living four miles from Sepphoris	12:31
	and not be aware of what was going on there?	12:35
	And when that town was rebuilt by Herod Antipas in AD 16,	12:41
	wouldn't you have expected to see a journeyman carpenter	12:49
	by the name of Jesus on the job,	12:53
	walking the four miles from Nazareth to work	12:58
	six days a week?	13:03
	Jesus knew what came to pass	13:06
	when the stubborn ecclesiasticism of Judaism	13:09
	met the even more stubborn imperialism of Rome,	13:13
	and yet, do arrogant people listen to gentle commands,	13:17
	however sensible?	13:24
	Would Jerusalem listen?	13:26
	He knew the likely answer.	13:30
	It would not.	13:32
	And Jesus wept.	13:36
	There may be a second reason for his weeping.	13:39
	He may have been too well aware	13:43
	that people did not understand what he meant by Messiah.	13:46
	His own disciples hadn't.	13:53
	Peter had given him that title,	13:55
	but when Jesus linked it with possible suffering and death,	14:00
	Peter had ejaculated, "God forbid, this shall not be!"	14:05
	And what about James and John?	14:13
	Jesus had nicknamed them sons of thunder.	14:16
	They had once suggested	14:22
	that they call down fire from heaven	14:24
	and burn up a Samaritan village	14:27
	which had refused to receive Jesus and his disciples.	14:30
	Sons of thunder, Donner und Blitzen.	14:36
	What did they know about a peaceful Messiah?	14:42
	Now, we shouldn't be too quick to criticize	14:46
	Peter and James and John.	14:48
	Jesus' view of the Messiah was hardly	14:50
	a popular contemporary interpretation.	14:54
	But, if the disciples did not gather	14:59
	the purport of his message or the quality of his person,	15:03
	then would those shouting hosanna understand him	15:09
	and his claim any better?	15:13
	Oh yes, they cheer him as God's anointed.	15:16
	But it is as a son of David Messiah, a warrior king.	15:20
	They expected him to slay the Roman Goliath.	15:26
	But he's not that kind of Christ.	15:31
	His kingdom is not the product of the sword.	15:35
	They appreciate him. Of course, they do.	15:40
	But, in their way.	15:44
	They understand him in their fashion,	15:47
	and Jesus knew that their interpretation	15:52
	was hardly one which pertained to peace.	15:56
	One has to see the whole tableau to apprehend Palm Sunday.	16:02
	The crowd shouting and Jesus in tears.	16:08
	On what we casually believe to be a day of triumph,	16:16
	Jesus weeps.	16:21
	So, after we studied the Lucan account carefully,	16:24
	we are not so sure that the scholar was right	16:28
	who said the at Palm Sunday was the single happiest day	16:33
	in Jesus' life.	16:39
	Would you like to have been with him then,	16:42
	on that first Palm Sunday before the first Easter?	16:47
	Well, here we are on another Palm Sunday	16:56
	worshiping in a great chapel,	17:02
	remembering a procession, cheering the Messiah.	17:05
	And as our acclamations arise,	17:10
	one wonders if Jesus is weeping again,	17:13
	weeping over this modern Jerusalem on the campus in Durham,	17:18
	in the United States, in the world.	17:26
	Is he saying again, even now,	17:29
	through his tears, would that you, too, knew even today	17:31
	on what your peace depends?	17:36
	But no, it is hidden from you,	17:39
	and all because you would not understand	17:44
	when God was visiting you.	17:48
	Oh, he could well say it to us and to men everywhere.	17:51
	World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Little Rock,	17:57
	Birmingham, Selma, Los Angeles.	18:04
	Do we really know him for whom we sing hosannas?	18:11
	Do we know what he stands for?	18:18
	If we did, would we live	18:21
	with such angry tension and such frustrated fatigue?	18:24
	Are we intentionally	18:31
	or unintentionally misunderstanding him?	18:32
	Are we molding the Christ to fit our patterns	18:37
	even as we gather to honor him?	18:41
	Is he a Christ in military uniform?	18:46
	Is he a Christ tearing up a draft card?	18:51
	Is he a white Christ?	18:57
	Is he a Black Power Christ?	19:01
	Is he a capitalist Christ?	19:05
	Is he a Republican Christ?	19:08
	Hmm. Is he a Presbyterian Christ?	19:11
	Now, maybe he is one of these, but is he because he says so	19:16
	or because we want him to say so and make him say so?	19:28
	Has he anything to say about our behavior in corporate life,	19:37
	international, national, civic, campus,	19:41
	or doesn't he count for anything	19:45
	in decisions about global conflict and race tension	19:49
	and campus friction and daily living?	19:55
	What am I getting at?	20:00
	It certainly is not an answer to these problems,	20:03
	which are baffling the minds	20:10
	and breaking the hearts of our clashing cultures.	20:11
	What I think I'm getting at is an attitude.	20:17
	I am suggesting that in all these areas	20:23
	of our corporate life, we hesitate	20:27
	before we give our definite answers in his name.	20:33
	Our definite answers in his name.	20:41
	If we are sure of anything about Jesus,	20:47
	it is that his ways are like God's ways,	20:50
	and the Bible reminds us that God's ways	20:55
	are not naturally our ways.	21:00
	I'm asking for a tentativeness in our certainty,	21:04
	because it may be that our desire	21:10
	is not really to be on his side but to have him on our side.	21:13
	That's why I said that perhaps he weeps,	21:22
	even as we worship now with hosannas.	21:24
	Moreover, we must not forget	21:29
	that the first Palm Sunday was followed in five days	21:32
	by a cross on a hill,	21:38
	outside of a wall surrounding a city called Jerusalem.	21:42
	Jesus carried a cross after others carried palms.	21:49
	Hosanna is drowned out by, "Crucify him."	21:59
	That's why a Good Friday hymn was sung this morning,	22:03
	as well as a Palm Sunday hymn.	22:09
	So let us walk into Holy Week on tiptoe.	22:13
	Let us be sure of nothing but that we want	22:21
	to come to know Him and His will for us	22:25
	as He would have us know Him and His will for us.	22:31
	The phrase which should be on our lips this week	22:38
	as we head toward the real triumph of Easter is,	22:41
	Lord, I believe. Help thou my misbelief.	22:46
	Help thou the misbelief that is in my very belief.	22:55
	Yes, let us walk tentatively, very tentatively,	23:02
	into Holy Week as we remember that while	23:06
	many men cried, hosanna, one man wept	23:11
	for their enthusiastic misunderstanding.	23:21
	Amen. Let us pray.	23:28
	Almighty God, long suffering and slow to anger,	23:36
	we beseech thee graciously to behold us,	23:43
	a company of men and women for whom Jesus wept,	23:47
	because of whom he was betrayed,	23:55
	and to whose advantage he rose again from the dead,	24:00
	through the same Jesus Christ, thy son,	24:06
	our savior and our Lord.	24:09
	Unto God's gracious mercy and protection	24:12
	do I commit you.	24:15
	The Lord bless you and keep you.	24:17
	The Lord make His face to shine upon you	24:21
	and be gracious unto you.	24:23
	The Lord lift up the light of His countenance upon you	24:26
	and give you peace this day and forever more.	24:29

Item Info

Title:

James T. Cleland - "Triumph and Tears" (March 19, 1967)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4nv9fc09

Date:

March 19, 1967

Speaker:

Cleland, James T. (James Tough), 1903-1974

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0375
ref5953_4rt
uachapelsermaud
duke:628225
dcrau002370
ark:/87924/r4nv9fc09
e70963f6-1fe4-42af-b789-43bd19606444

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Duke Chapel Recordings

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Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

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Language:

English

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United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

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The Duke University Chapel Recordings were transferred to the Duke University Archives beginning in 1970.

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James T. Cleland - "Triumph and Tears" (March 19, 1967)

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1. James T. Cleland - "Triumph and Tears" (March 19, 1967)

Duke University Archives

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James T. Cleland - "Triumph and Tears" (March 19, 1967)

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