Palm Sunday - a pilgrimage in the Psalms

Text of the Week:  Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.  He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the warhorse from Jerusalem; and the battle-bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations … Zechariah 6:9-10

Welcome to our services on Palm Sunday, the start of Holy Week. Today is Sunday Special so the younger members of the congregation will be meeting in the hall to begin with and joining us for the last part of the service. Do join us through the week as we walk the way of the cross. On Tuesday we shall have our Messy Easter, celebrating Easter at Messy Church. If you’ve not been before it would be great to welcome you! Afterwards we are showing the film ‘Risen’ with Joseph Fiennes telling the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection. After lunch on Wednesday we shall reflect on the Easter story. On Maundy Thursday we meet at 7-30 to share in a simple communion service. Good Friday at 10-30 is a quiet meditation at the foot of the Cross and is followed by our walk of witness from the Imperial Gardens at 12-00. Saturday afternoon is our Family Film Club. Then on Easter Sunday we celebrate resurrection at 8-00 on Cleeve Hill – meet at the Quarry Car Park and then in our celebration services at 10-30 and 6-30. Be sure to spend time in quiet reflection and follow the Easter trail outside the church. In all we do this week let’s take time to imagine what it was like ‘being there’ and let’s remember again that Jesus is with us here and now and forever more

Morning Worship

Welcome and Call to Worship

120 All glory, praise and honour

Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer

It has been a week when we have been only too conscious of the troubles of the world around us.

We live in difficult times.

We live in troubled times.

They were difficult times then, 2000 years ago that first Palm Sunday.

They were troubled times.

What was needed more than anything else was a prophetic voice to speak truth to power.

The Jewish people like so many peoples around the Mediterranean world were in thrall to the Roman power. It was an awesome power.

The Romans knew exactly how to do to power and authority, kingdom and majesty – they were a brutal power who knew that the way to the peace they could offer was through military might.

There were all sorts of ways of thinking among the Jewish people.

Herod the Great and his successors, the Heordians, wre quite content to go along with it. That’s the kind of power that was all important for them. Military might. The might of grand designs fortresses, cities,  temples

And a sizeable number among those Jewish people looked for a different kind of kingdom – they looked for someone to take the Romans on. To meet force with force. They looked for another Judas Maccabaeus who would replace Roman power with a the Jewish power – and it was the power of the sword.

These were difficult times.

These were troubled times.

What was needed more than anything else was a prophetic voice to speak truth to power.

And that’s when John the Baptist came on the scene.

Have a whole new way of thinking was his challenge. For the kingdom of heaven has come near – God’s rule is breaking in. God’s rule is what is needed.

They had him arrested. He was too dangerous. And not long after he was executed – a barbaraic beheading. Though his followers saw to it that he was buried.

They were difficult times.

What was needed more than anyting else was a prophetic voice to speak truth to power.

And that voice was not silenced.

Jesus took up the mantle.

Have a whole new way of thinking was his challenge. For the kingdom of heaven has come near – God’s rule is breaking in. God’s rule is what is needed.

And through his teaching, through the love he made real in so many people’s lives, in the way so many hurting people found healing the kingdom of heaven had come – God’s rule was breaking in. The very rule of God that was so badly needed.

It was such a different way he knew he had to follow.

He knew it was a way that was nothing less than God’s way.

He knew what it takes to rule in God’s way.

And it was not with the brutal force of the Roman Empire. Neither was it with the brutal force of another Judas Maccabaeus. There were s

What he stood for, all that he was, was rooted in the Bible he had grown up with – he knew there were parts of the Bible that could taking up force of arms.

Those were not the parts of the Bible he went too.

He modelled what he did on other parts of the Bible. On those passages in particular in the prophets that spoke of that coming kingdom of heaven, that spoke of that rule of God that would transform people’s lives and transform the world.

And as he drew near to Jerusalem and the final days that would, he knew, lead to his death, a death that would not be the end but instead herald a resurrection victory all could follow he turned to one of those great passages.

This was it … in Zechariah 4:9-10

Reading: Zechariah 9:9-10

Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!

   Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!

Lo, your king comes to you;

   triumphant and victorious is he,

humble and riding on a donkey,

   on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim

   and the warhorse from Jerusalem;

and the battle-bow shall be cut off,

   and he shall command peace to the nations;

his dominion shall be from sea to sea,

   and from the River to the ends of the earth.

And it’s what he did.

It was quite deliberate.

He knew what he was doing.

He had been speaking of the need for people to have a whole new way of thinking. He had been speaking of the kingdom of heaven breaking in, of the rule of God coming in to transform people’s lives.

It was a long pull up from Jericho – more than 4,000 feet in seventeen miles or so – and a terrible heat.

Coming towards the city he knew he wanted to make a statement.

So many of his parables had been all about the kingdom of heaven.

This would be one of the most powerful, one of the most telling – an acted parable if you like.

Reading: Matthew 21:1-11

When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, 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. If anyone says anything to you, just say this, “The Lord needs them.” And he will send them immediately.’ This took place to fulfil what had been spoken through the prophet, saying,

‘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.’

The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them; they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them. A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. 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!’

When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking,

‘Who is this?’ 

The crowds were saying,

‘This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee.’

In that moment the crowds had got it.

They were difficult times.

They were troubled times.

What was needed more than anything else was a prophetic voice to speak truth to power.

And speak truth to power Jesus did – in the temple symbol to him in the way it had been rebuilt of such a different way of thinking –

He said to them in a voice they ever afterwards remembered

 ‘It is written,
“My house shall be called a house of prayer”;
   but you are making it a den of robbers.’

This was it.

This was the voice they needed to hear.

This was nothing less than the Word of God for their generation … and for every generation since and for our generation too.

For these too are difficult times.

These too are troubled times.

What is needed now more than anything else is a prophetic voice to speak truth to power.

119 Ride on, ride on in majesty

I want us to spend a few moments.

Thinking about our world – its many troubles. The stuff we see on the news. The stuff that goes on in people’s lives we are so aware of in the local news. The stuff that goes on in our own lives and in our own hearts.

I want us to hold in mind the kingdom of heaven that was ushered in by Jesus – that rule of God that transforms our hearts, our homes, our community, our world.

And then I want us to go up to God and seek again his help, his blessing, his presence in our lives.

The place we go to should be a house of prayer.

Let this be for us in these few moments a house of prayer.

And for our prayer let’s draw on some ancient prayers of pilgrimage used long ago in Jerusalem.

  

Psalms 120 to 132 are described in the Book of Psalms as Songs of Ascents. They were pilgrimage psalms, used by people as they made their way up to Jerusalem, as they made their way up to the Temple, as they made their way up into the presence of God.

Some of us have done that pilgrimage walk up to Jerusalem – but it matters not

In our minds eye let’s think of ourselves as going up into the presence of God so that we may sense the presence of God with us in this troubled world that cries out now as ever for a prophetic voice that will speak truth to power and bring the presence of God into our hearts

Let’s draw on these songs of Ascent and seek to go up into God’s presence from that world of distress.

Our prayers begin with lament – at the evil around us in the world – at the things that trouble us

It is a lament from the heart.

120

In my distress I cry to the Lord,
   that he may answer me:

‘Deliver me, O Lord,
   from lying lips,
   from a deceitful tongue.’ 

Too long have I had my dwelling
   among those who hate peace.

I am for peace;
   but when I speak,
   they are for war.

Let’s turn in our thoughts from the troubles of the world to the God of creation, to the God whose presence is with us come what may. It is the God who is there for us. It is the God who cares for us. It is the God whose love will not let us go.

121

I lift up my eyes to the hills—
   from where will my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
   who made heaven and earth. 

122

I was glad when they said to me,
   ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’ 

123

To you I lift up my eyes,
   O you who are enthroned in the heavens!
As the eyes of servants
   look to the hand of their master,
as the eyes of a maid
   to the hand of her mistress,
so our eyes look to the Lord our God,
   until he has mercy upon us.

Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us,
   

124

Our help is in the name of the Lord,
   who made heaven and earth.

The God we believe in is a God who is there in the weeping.

The God we believe in is a God who transforms the weeping into laughter.

The God we believe in is the God who surrounds us – who is before us and behind us, above us and beneath us, around us and within.

125

As the mountains surround Jerusalem,
   so the Lord surrounds his people,
   from this time on and for evermore.

126

The Lord has done great things for us,
   and we rejoiced. 

May those who sow in tears
   reap with shouts of joy.
Those who go out weeping,
   bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
   carrying their sheaves.

How important it is for us to build our lives on the ways of God and not on our own plans and counsel

How important it is for us to look to God and find in God the sure foundation for the living of our lives.

How important it is that God is there in all that we do

127

Unless the Lord builds the house,
   those who build it labour in vain.
Unless the Lord guards the city,
   the guard keeps watch in vain.

It is in vain that you rise up early
   and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
   for he gives sleep to his beloved.

128

Happy is everyone who fears the Lord,
   who walks in his ways.

129

‘The blessing of the Lord be upon you!
   We bless you in the name of the Lord!’

In the business of praying all is not changed in an instant.

We live in a world that expects instant gratification.

Praying is not like that.

In our praying in one moment all seems well.

And in the next moment we plumb the depths once more.

This is as it has been and as it shall be till the world’s end.

But the God we believe in is the God who can take our prayers, our longings. He is the God who looks with mercy. He is the God who forgives and cares and loves with a love that will not let us go.

130

Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord.
   Lord, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive
   to the voice of my supplications! 

If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
   Lord, who could stand?
But there is forgiveness with you,
   so that you may be revered. 

I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
   and in his word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord
   more than those who watch for the morning,
   more than those who watch for the morning. 

Hope in the Lord!
   For with the Lord there is steadfast love,
   and with him is great power to redeem.
It is he who will redeem us
   from all our iniquities.

There is a gentleness in the God who is the God of love

He knows us in all our troubles.

He comforts us in all our sorrows.

He is with us come what may.

God’s love is the love of a mother for her child.

131

O Lord, my heart is not lifted up,
   my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
   too great and too marvellous for me.

But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
   like a weaned child with its mother;
   my soul is like the weaned child that is with me. 

Hope in the Lord
   from this time on and for evermore.

It is good to come together in this place and sense the love of the God who is love – it is good to come apart and sense that love deep in our hearts.

It is good to come together as God’s family – here in this place bound together in love for God, in love for one another. Bound together in the love God has for us.

132

‘Let us go to his dwelling-place;
   let us worship at his footstool.’ 

133

How very good and pleasant it is
   when God’s family live together in unity!
It is like the precious oil on the head,
   running down upon the beard,
on the beard of Aaron,
   running down over the collar of his robes.
It is like the dew of Hermon,
   which falls on the mountains of Zion.
For there the Lord ordained his blessing,
   life for evermore.

134

Come, bless the Lord, all you servants of the Lord,
   who stand in the house of the Lord!
Lift up your hands to the holy place,
   and bless the Lord. 

May the Lord, maker of heaven and earth,
   bless you from Zion.

121

I lift up my eyes to the hills—
   from where will my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
   who made heaven and earth. 

He will not let your foot be moved;
   he who keeps you will not slumber.
He who keeps Israel
   will neither slumber nor sleep. 

The Lord is your keeper;
   the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day,
   nor the moon by night. 

The Lord will keep you from all evil;
   he will keep your life.
The Lord will keep
   your going out and your coming in
   from this time on and for evermore.

Song: I lift my eyes up to the mountains

Being There … Being Here day by day

Each day of this week Jesus went up to the temple.

Each night he returned to Bethany.

And each day and each night he prayed.

As this week unfolds let’s have a sense of being there with Jesus.

Sharing with him in his glory.

As this week unfolds let’s read of the coming of his death.

And in things we do together – a sense of being there with Christ and a sense of his being here with us.

A service this evening of Passion tide readings and of hymns for Holy Week – being there with Christ in his passion, being here in the presence of Christ with us.;

Tuesday evening Messy Easter – join with families and sense the presence of God with us in Christ Jesus

Risen – the film in all its drama telling the story of Jesus last week.

Wednesday after lunch a short time to share for Holy Week that’s special.

Maundy Thursday – being there in the upper room as we break bread. And here in this place being here with us.

And at the foot of the cross and on the walk through the town – being there and knowing Jesus being here with us.

A film on Sunday … and on Easter morning at 8-00 in a shared breakfast together, in our celebrations – being there with Christ in resurrection victory knowing he is here with us in the mess of our world present in our hearts to strengthen and sustain.

136 My song is love unknown

Prayers of Concern

139 O sacred head surrounded

Being There … together

A Hy-Spirit song

Words of Blessing

What kind of triumphal entry?

What kind of triumphal entry?

 

The people of Jerusalem were used to triumphal entries.  And they didn’t much like them.  That’s because the ‘triumphal entries’ they were used to were made by the Romans.  And they were an awesome statement of power.

 

Herod the Great had established what some regarded as an unholy alliance between the Jewish people and the Roman power.  He played one side off against the other.  This half-Jewish, half-Idumean came to power thank to the way he weedled his way into the good books of Cleopatra and Anthony.  When they lost out in battle to Octavian, that August character who became the first Roman Emperor and took the name Augustus, Herod did the thing power-crazed tyrants tend to do.  He switched sides.

 

To win over the Jewish people he built a magnificent new temple to Yahweh the Jewish God  the like of which the people had never before seen in Jerusalem.  And on the coast he built a major new port and city with its very own temple to Augustus the Roman God-Emperor.

 

At Herod’s death his kingdom was shared out among his sons.   But the one who took charge of Judea and Jerusalem couldn’t keep the Jewish rebels who wanted to overthrow Rome down.  So by the time Jesus had his bar mitzvah and came of age at the age of 12 and made that first memorable visit to Jerusalem and its new Temple, the Romans had dismissed Herod’s son.

 

In his place they placed a Procurator who would be based not in the Holy City of Jerusalem on Mount Zion, but down in the much more conducive modern Roman city of Caesarea Maritima, Caesarea by the seaside.

 

By the time Jesus’ ministry began in the reign of  Tiberius, the Roman Emperor, Pontius Pilate had become the Procurator.  His capital was in Caesarea by the Seaside.

 

But he would from time to time have to make his way to Jerusalem and enter into the city.  He was the representative of Rome.  And he most certainly would not ride on a donkey!

 

In fact, we have a description of the kind of presence he would have in the Book of Acts.  Paul was arrested in Jersualem but transferred under guard to the Roman Procurator’s capital in Caesarea.  Luke it is who describes the way the Romans took him under guard, rescuing him from an assassination attempt.  It must have been pretty impressive!

 

The high-ranking Tribune based in Jerusalem ‘summoned two of the centurions and said, “Get ready to leave by nine o’clock tonight for Caesarea with two hundred soldiers, seventy horsemen, and two hundred spearmen.  And provide mounts for Paul to ride and take him safely to Felix the Governor.”

 

What is interesting about that snapshot account is that it shows what the Roman presence was like.  How much serious armed guard they needed in what could be very troubled times.  It indicates the tensions there could easily between those among the Jewish people who wanted to rise up in rebellion against Rome.

 

The military might was very impressive.

 

Did you see the pictures on the news of the fleets of lightly armoured police vans heading into central London in order to police the G20 meetings this week.  That’a a pretty awesome statement of power.

 

That was what the Roman statement of power was like … but it was very much more sinister.

 

If that was what it took to protect a prisoner, you can imagine that the guard for the Roman Procurator would be even more impressive.

 

It as at Festival ltimes that unrest could easily flare up.  So it was that Pilate, maybe unwillingly, would have to ride into Jerusalem and take up residence there.  Pilate would have ridden into Jerusalem on a mount that was massively impressive flanked by horsemen, maybe spearmen.

 

And arriving in the city he would have come through the gates in the wall and curiously made his way towards the Temple.  Not to go into the Temple.

 

A mark of the way King Herod the Great had played Roman off against the Jewish people was the way he built the big fortress for the Roman presence.  It was built immediately beside the Temple itself – and it towered over the walls of the temple.  And Herod named it after one of his first Roman heroes, Mark Anthony.  The Antonine Fortress towered over the Temple mount itself.

 

That would have been Pilate’s base.

 

That’s the power.

 

Some of the Jewish people went along with the Roman power.  Especially the wealthy, those with influence, those with power, those with clout!  The Saducees, the High Priests, the Lawyers, the Scribes.  But there were those among the Jewish people who wanted something very different.  The Pharisees stood for a purity that would not compromise with the Gentile Rome.  There were those who said a plague on both your houses and went off to the desert, the Judean wilderness, notably to Qumran.  And then there were the Zealots, and the other sword-bearers, revolutionaries.  They wanted to overthrow Rome by force of arms.

 

And in one way or another they looked to one who would come as anointed of God, the kind of king, messiah who would usher in the kingdom of God.

 

Word came to the shepherds in the fields just outside Jerusalem, the fields of Bethlehem …”Do not be afraid; for see – I am bring you good news of great joy for all the people, to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour who is the Messiah, the Lord.  This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped I bands of cloth and lying in a manger.”  And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace …”

 

Those wise men expected the one born to be king to be born in one of Herod’s palaces.  That’s where they went.  Instantly Herod the Great saw the coming of a promised king as a threat to his power.  He had killed a lot of people to get to the position he was in, including members of his own family.  He had few qualms, so we are told by Matthew.  Maintaining the power and the security of Rome took precedence over the lives of little ones.  The innocents were slain.

 

Glory to God in highest heaven, and on earth peace.

 

Jesus didn’t exactly burst on to the scene unannounced.  John the Baptist paved the way for the one who was to come.  When he came his message was all about the Kingdom of God, the rule of God taking root in people’s hearts, people’s homes, in the world at large.  Love God, love your neighbour, love your enemy too.   This was a powerful message.

 

Glory to God in highest heaven, and on earth peace.

 

How he turned things upside down.

 

Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,

Blessed are those who mourn for they sill be comforted.

Blessed are the meek for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be filled

Blessed are the merciful for they will receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God.

Blessed are the peace-makers for they will be called children of God.

Blessed are those whoa are persecuted for the sake of righteousness / justice for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

 

Glory to God in highest heaven and on earth peace.

 

He matched deeds to words and brought healing, wholeness salvation into people’s lives.

 

And then came the point when he steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem.

 

It was the Pharisees who felt that unwise.  Some of them came to him with a warning.  Get away from here, they said, for Herod – not Herod the Great he had died shortly after Jesus’ birth, but Herod Antipas, the son of Herod the Great who had jurisdiction over Galilee.  He was the Herod who had been responsible for the cruel execution by beheading of John the Baptist.

 

“Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.”

 

Jesus knew exactly where he was going.  And he knew why.  And he said so in the most forthright of terms.

 

“Go and tell that fox for me, ‘Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work.  Yet today, tomorrow and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.”

 

Jesus knew what Jerusalem was like.  He knew what was in store for him there.

 

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it.”

 

Things haven’t changed a lot.  It’s still a centre of conflict.

 

How Jesus longed for the peace of Jerusalem.

 

“How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under wings, and you were not willing.”

 

By now Jesus is very much on his journey to Jerusalem.  A journey that will take him to rejection, intense suffering, death … and beyond to resurrection.

 

His route takes him partly through Samaria, down to the river Jordan along the river, before he makes his way through Jericho, up into the mountains and reaches the outskirts of Jerusalem.

 

And now he is ready.

 

Ready for a triumphal entry.

 

But what kind of triumphal entry will it be?

 

He has come to the place of the prophets.  Just as the prophets before he is used to making symbolic statements charged with meaning.

 

He has one prophet in particular in mind as he makes his preparations for that triumphal entry.  Matthew it is who identifies the prophet – it is the prophet Zechariah.

 

In his choice of a donkey of all things – as nonsensical to people used to those triumphal entries of the all-powerful Roman Procurator coming as the personally-appointed representative of the Roman Emperor himself, as it is to us, he had the words of this prophet in mind.

 

Reading:  Zechariah 9:9-10

 

Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
   Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
Lo, your king comes to you;
   triumphant and victorious is he,
humble and riding on a donkey,
   on a colt, the foal of a donkey. 
He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim
   and the warhorse from Jerusalem;
and the battle-bow shall be cut off,
   and he shall command peace to the nations;
his dominion shall be from sea to sea,
   and from the River to the ends of the earth. 

 

Cut off the chariot?

 

Cut off the war horse?

 

Cut off the battle-bow.

Command peace to the nations … this is a very different kind of triumphal entry.

 

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!’ 

 

Haven’t we heard that chant somewhere before?

 

Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven.

 

In the shepherds’ fields they had been heavenly hosts, now it was a very earthly multitude.

 

Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace

 

Has become.

 

Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven.

 

Peace and Glory – these are the marks of God’s realm where God’s rule prevails.  Peace and Glory – this is what’s in Jesus’ heart as he makes his triumphal entry.

 

And then, Luke tells us, he came near.  And then comes the point.  And to come down from Bethany and reach the so-called Mount of Olives, it is so dramatic.

 

As he came near, and saw the city.  Something happened to Jesus.

 

 

For a moment he was overwhelmed.

 

Luke 19:41-44

 

As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, ‘If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. Indeed, the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another; because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.’

 

As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, ‘If you, even you, had only recognised on this day, the things that make for peace …

 

2000 years on I saw that view through razor wire.

 

Look at Jerusalem today, look at Israel, at Palestine, at the West Bank, at Gaza and you cannot help but weep, echoing the words of Jesus, “If you had only recognised the things that make for peace.”

 

Bishop Suhail, the Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem, has responsibility for the Al Ahli hospital in Gaza: it is supported by the Bible Lands Society.  As war raged in Gaza he wrote to the Bible Lands Society,

 

“Every day since the beginning of military operations, the hospital has received an extra 20-40 people, injured or wounded.  Patients with burns and acute, crippling psychological trauma are being seen more frequently.  The hospital staff is working around the clock, struggling with the effects of exhaustion and against limited resources in an area of ongoing mi8litary operations.

 

“Many medical items are needed.  The hospital’s windows have all  been blown out or shattered from rocket and missile concussion and cold permeates the entire premises.  Plastic sheeting to cover the windows could alleviate some of the cold, but is unavailable now.  Food supplies are scant and maintaining patients’ nutritional needs at the hospital has been difficult.  Some medicines and supplies for the hospital have been generously donated by US Aid, but it has not yet been possible to deliver the items.”

 

Jesus may have wept over a city that failed to recognise the things that make for peace, but he continued on his ‘triumphal entry’.

 

triumphant and victorious

humble and riding on a donkey,
   

His purpose:  to cut off the chariot from Ephraim
   and the warhorse from Jerusalem;
to cut off the battle-bow,
   and to command peace to the nations

 

We who follow in the footsteps of this Jesus and are proud to be children of God are called to be peace-makers.

 

That is what Bishop Suhail, the Anglican Bishop in Jerusalem, recognises in a second letter to the Bible Lands Society

 

“I believe that we must remember during these difficult days that we are celebrating at this very moment the incarnation of our Lord.  That God is present among us, and it is in our own ministries that each of us witnesses to His presence.  Yes, especially amidst conflict and strife, we Christians stand for something here.

 

“We stand for Peace, Justice, Reconciliation and Forgiveness, and the Promise of a time when we can live together in fellowship.

 

“I believe the meaning of this parable we are living now is that we must hold firmly to our faith and trust in the promise that the Lord made to us.  So as always, but especially now, I ask that you walk this parable of Peace and Reconciliation with me, each in your way and in your own ministry.  May the Peace of the Lord be always with you.”[1]

1     It came upon the midnight clear,

       that glorious song of old,

       from angels bending near the earth

       to touch their harps of gold:

       'Through all the earth, goodwill and peace

       from heaven's all-gracious king!'

       The world in solemn stillness lay

       to hear the angels sing.

 

2     With sorrow brought by sin and strife

       the world has suffered long

       and, since the angels sang, have passed

       two thousand years of wrong:

       the nations, still at war, hear not

       the love-song which they bring:

       O hush the noise and cease the strife,

       to hear the angels sing!

 

3     And those whose journey now is hard,

       whose hope is burning low,

       who tread the rocky path of life

       with painful steps and slow:

       O listen to the news of love

       which makes the heavens ring!

       O rest beside the weary road

       and hear the angels sing!

 

4     And still the days are hastening on -

       by prophets seen of old -

       towards the fulness of the time

       when comes the age foretold:

       then earth and heaven renewed shall see

       the prince of peace, their king;

       and all the world repeat the song

       which now the angels sing.

 

Jubilate Hymns version of It came upon the midnight clear Edmund H Sears (1810-1876)

---

[1] Quotations from Bishop Suhail, the Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem, in The Star in the East, The Magazine of Bible Lands and Christian Love in Action, Spring 2009.