Such a bloke!

 

When I wrote ‘Miriam’s Sisters, Deborah’s Daughters’, my aim was to uncover the biblical stories of the women who had been hidden in narratives edited by the patriarchy. To re-imagine what leadership might look like if our exemplars were women rather than men. I didn’t have to look far or dig too deeply - the women are most certainly there - just covered up by the amplification of many less competent men around them.

I was reminded yesterday of just one of the things that is manifest in patriarchal leadership - that absolute confidence to take on a task even when only part of the task can be imagined: While women might pause to consider the full implications and be more hesitant, men will often leap right in as soon as they see the beginning.

This Palm Sunday, as we reflect on the story of Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey, to the adulation of the crowds around him, I’m grateful for that trait in Jesus that made him ‘such a bloke’. To take on flesh and blood, not knowing where that would take him, what he would encounter on the way and the cost of paying the price in the vengeful politics of empire that don’t react well to subversive opponents. I’m grateful that he was willing to carry on regardless, meeting and enduring each part of the mission.

As we move through this week, considered holy in the Christian calendar, bearing witness to how the journey became lonelier for Jesus and how he became more isolated in ‘seeing it through’, may our gaze encompass the courage and tenacity of the women who accompanied him all the way to death and beyond. As we celebrate that Jesus was ‘such a bloke’ in embarking on a mission whose end he could never orchestrate or conceive, may we notice the women who remained with him at the cross, who prepared to anoint him in death and who were witnesses to resurrection.

Led by donkeys

 

Mark 11:7-11

Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it; and he sat on it. Many people spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut in the fields.

Then those who went ahead and those who followed were shouting,

“Hosanna!

Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!

Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!

Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

Then he entered Jerusalem and went into the temple; and when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve.

Led by donkeys 

Synonymous with protest

A tale or tail as ancient as time

alerting those who willingly

go with the flow

to stop

and smell the droppings left behind

The carnage of political promises

that deliver hardship and suffering

a trail that if stepped in

sticks around

with its cloying smell of decay

May our Palm Sunday processions

call out today’s political shenanigans

and call us to account

to stand with those in this age

who need saving

from all that empire continues to leave in its wake

locally and globally

as the procession moves on.

(Liz Crumlish Palm Sunday 2024)

Which crowd?

Luke 19:36-40

As he rode along, people kept spreading their cloaks on the road. As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the deeds of power that they had seen,

saying,

“Blessed is the king

who comes in the name of the Lord!

Peace in heaven,

and glory in the highest heaven!”

Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, order your disciples to stop.” He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out.”

This is the time

to work out

who we are

without a crowd.

We, who are so fickle 

often drawn in by popular opinion

often dragged along for the ride

have the opportunity

to question

who we are

and what we believe.

Will we still cry out

Hosanna!

Lord save us!

Or will we keep on colluding

with political forces

that oppress the poor

and allow the rich to prosper?

Silencing the voices of dissent

ignoring pleas for justice?

This Palm Sunday

away from the crowd,

whose name is on our lips

and whose creed

is written on our heart?

Blessed is the One who comes in the name of the Lord.

Hosanna! 

Fool’s Errand

 

It started with the search for a colt

a fools errand for the disciples

It ended with a parade

a clown's procession for the common people.

For Jesus used that colt

to laugh in the face of the authorities

taunting them

flexing his muscles of influence and popularity.

He really should have been keeping a low profile.

But, throwing caution to the wind,

he took himself into the city

and, enjoying, momentarily, the protection of the crowd

he pushed his enemies over the edge.

And he knew it.

He looked around, saw it was late, and left.

Late on so many levels.

Late in the day.

Late in the journey.

Too late for him.

His boats were now burned

and the salvaged timber already fashioned

into a cross.

A simple request: Find me a colt

set in motion

a whole series

of truths and dares

of arrest and trial

of betrayal

and denial.

His fate was sealed

and so was our redemption

as palms dissolve into passion.

A fool's errand indeed!

Liz Crumlish Palm Sunday 2012