Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
It was just a donkey – a young
one, at that. Jesus rides into the city of Jerusalem on the back of a beast of
burden. Not much of a hero’s animal, is it? We might expect Him to be astride a
stallion – Hi, ho, Silver! – or in a chariot pulled behind a magnificent mare.
Perhaps some would have expected Him to be riding in a litter – the raised,
boxed platform on long poles carried on the shoulders of slaves – used by
kings. Jesus rides a donkey, instead.
Donkeys are loud, stubborn, not of great stature, and slow, plodding beasts of burden. They are the punchline of
jokes and the antiheroes of stories. People who behave in a stupid, stubborn way are referred to as a three-letter synonym of donkey. In the Disney adaptation of Pinnochio, the
boys turn into donkeys because they misbehave and fall into a trap.
The English poet, philosopher and
lay theologian G. K. Chesterton wrote a poem called “The Donkey.” [1]
When fishes flew and forests walked
And figs grew upon thorn,
Some moment when the moon was blood
Then surely I was born.
With monstrous head and sickening cry
And ears like errant wings,
The devil’s walking parody
On all four-footed things.
And Jesus choses to ride into the
city on the back of this very animal. It’s a rather strange pulpit, isn’t it?
But then, again, Jesus has been in strange places before, preaching in fields,
on hillsides, and in boats.
When Jesus rode into Jerusalem
astride a donkey, he let us in on a secret.
“God has chosen the foolish
things of the world to shame the wise, the weak things of the world to shame
the strong, the base things of the world and the despised, God has chosen, the
things that are not, that he might nullify the things that are, that no man
should boast before God,” (1 Corinthians 1:27-29).
God choses to ride into Jerusalem
on the back of a donkey.
I don’t know a lot about donkeys.
I am making an assumption, here, that in some aspects they are like horses. One
does not simply climb onto the back of a horse and ride it. It has to be
trained, broken to the saddle. There’s a reason that the back of an untrained
horse is called “the hurricane deck” – it’s going to be a rough ride until the
horse settles in. I assume the same is true of a donkey. One does not just
climb onto the back of a donkey – especially a young one, full of fire and
brimstone – without having a series of appointments preemptively made at the
chiropractor’s office.
Jesus rides a young, unbroken
donkey colt. It’s as if this humble beast of burden knows Who it is riding upon
his back, that he, one of the most humble pieces of creation, is carrying his
Creator. He, the donkey, submits to the will of the One who, Himself, is
submitting to the will of the heavenly Father. The beast of burden carries the
One who carries the sins of the world. The servant of all animals serves the
One who came to serve and give His life as a ransom for men.
We know that Jesus came to die
for sinners. He came to rescue and redeem you and me and all of humanity. But,
and this is an important “but” in light of this morning’s Gospel reading, never
forget that Jesus also comes to redeem all of creation. From live oak trees
suffering from oak wilt, to Texas horney toads that are slowly disappearing,
from wild-fire scorched prairies to hurricane-torn oceans, from volcanoes that
spew ash across thousands of square miles to earthquakes that rent the earth
apart, Christ also redeems creation.
And, that includes the humble
donkey upon which He rode into Jerusalem. Jesus is carried
by one for whom He will carry the cross.
As Jesus enters Jerusalem on the
back of a donkey, He is surrounded by asses, all braying their shouts of
“Hosanna: save us!” The Jewish leaders don’t get the fuss. The crowd thinks of
Him only as a glorified physician who can raise the dead. The disciples don’t
yet understand or believe the purpose of the cross. The Romans don’t care who
He is, as long as He doesn’t cause a riot. But the donkey cares. He is carrying
Jesus, Son of David, Son of God. He is heading to the cross. At the cross,
Jesus is Messiah, the Christ, the Savior, the Son of God who fulfills all of
the promises of God.
If you look at the back of a
donkey, there’s a dark line that runs down his spine. It meets a dark line that
runs laterally across the shoulders. From the side, it’s hardly noticeable, but
from the top down you’ll see that those lines form a cross. There is a legend –
please hear that word, like Paul Bunyon
and George Washington’s cherry tree speech – there’s a legend that the cross
appeared on the donkey after he carried Jesus into Jerusalem. If you look on a
donkey’s back, to this day, they are thus marked for the honor he had in
carrying the Master. Whether true or not, it remains true that the only one who
recognized Jesus for Who He is has the God of Creation sitting on his back.
The tattered outlaw of the earth,
Of ancient crooked will;
Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb,
I
keep my secret still.
Fools! For I also had my hour;
One far fierce hour and sweet:
There was a shout about my ears,
And palms before my feet.[2]
The donkey is the faithful preacher, preaching to us in silence. But, he carries us where we also need to be this Palm Sunday, entering Holy Week just as Jesus entered into Jerusalem. The donkey takes Jesus towards the cross. With his head, and with the mark on his back, the donkey points us where we need to be: the cross. That’s where we see Jesus.
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