“Sacred Semantics”

“Sacred Semantics”


Date: April 9, 2017

1
“SACRED SEMANTICS”
SCRIPTURE PSALM 118: 1
–
2, 19
–
29; MATTHEW 21: 1
–
11
GRACE COVENANT PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, ASHEVILLE, NC
April 9, 2017
The Rev. Dr. Marcia Mount Shoop, Pastor
Matthew 21:1
–
11
21:1 When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphag
e, at the Mount
of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples,
21:2 saying to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately you will find
a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to me.
21:3 If anyone says anything to you, just say
this, ‘The Lord needs them.’ And he will
send them immediately.”
21:4 This took place to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet, saying,
21:5 “Tell the daughter of Zion, Look, your king is coming to you, humble, and
mounted on a donkey, and on
a colt, the foal of a donkey.”
21:6 The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them;
21:7 they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat
on them.
21:8 A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others c
ut branches
from the trees and spread them on the road.
21:9 The crowds that went ahead of him and that followed were shouting, “Hosanna
to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna
in the highest heaven!”
21:10 When
he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking, “Who is
this?”
21:11 The crowds were saying, “This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee.”
The Word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
No winning campaign of a sports team would be comp
lete without bandwagon
fans
—
you know the type
—
the ones who didn’t pay their dues, who didn’t suffer
2
through losing seasons and stay loyal
to
their team. The ones who just show up
wh
en things are going well and claim
they are
real fan
s
.
Hardcore fans, l
oyal fans
look at the bandwagon fans
as imposters, posers, as fake
fans
—
they
scoff that those bandwagon fans
just like the team because
they are
winning
—
that’s not real loyalty or
real commitment
, that’s not true love
.
Real commitment, real loyalty
is
in it for the
long haul
, through good times and bad,
through losses and wins.
This delineating of true fans and fake fans based on what
one is willing to endure surfaces around championship times
—
perhaps there has
been similar moral indignation in the Tar
Heel state in the last week or so.
Moral indignation from the
real fans about these imposter fans
is an interesting
thing for us to consider today in church
—
on a day whe
n we ritually remember and
even celebrate one of the most pronounced and profound
moments of bandwagon
jumping the world has ever seen.
The crowd in
the Holy City of
Jerusalem heralds the triumphant entry of a king who
they are convinced
will fix all their problems, right all the wrongs. They c
heer a king
they think they see,
a king
they want to see
—
a winner in the mold of winners
they’ve grown to long for in their lives
.
W
e remember and celebrate this moment
today in the church year
all the while
knowing what lies ahead, aware that we
are making
our way down a roa
d that leads
us t
o this s
ame king’s brutal, violent execution,
put into motion by the sa
me crowd: a
crowd who
so quickly jumped from one bandwagon of Jesus as King to the next
bandwagon
of Jesus as criminal.
So, this does seem like a good time for us to
take a closer loo
k at this bandwagon
impulse that seems to be wired into our humanity.
It’s understandable,
maybe
even rational, this jumping on the bandwagon habit of
human kind
—
who wouldn’t want to be associated with a winner instead of a loser.
It may be a base kind
of self
–
interest that fuels this ability we have to conjure up
affection for a winner because they m
ake us feel like a winner, too, especially in a
competitive culture like ours.
In the cosmic game of musical chairs, we want to have a place to sit down,
a way to
belong, a way to win.
T
his impulse to ally with winners
is
a glimpse of something quite dangerous
in the
way we humans are wired.

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