Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

April 13, 2025

Church of the Atonement

The Rev’d Charles Everson

Today we begin the holiest of weeks with both triumph and death. We walk with Jesus to the Mount of Olives, where he leaves Bethany and turns his face toward Jerusalem—not to claim a throne, but to embrace a cross. He goes of his own free will. The one who came down from heaven to raise us from the dust now prepares to raise us even higher—into the very life of God.

As St. Paul reminds us in that ancient hymn we heard in the epistle reading:

“Though he was in the form of God, he did not regard equality with Godas something to be exploited, but emptied himself... becoming obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross.”

Unlike the fancy procession we experienced earlier there’s no pomp in this entry. No spectacle. No triumphant display. He comes in humility, riding on a borrowed colt, just as the prophet Zechariah foretold. He comes not to crush but to heal. Not to conquer by force, but to love to the end.

And as we wave our palms and sing our hosannas, we join that first crowd that laid their cloaks and branches at his feet. More than that, we are invited to lay down ourselves—our pride, our ambitions, our self-importance, our identities so carefully curated and defended. We are invited to surrender not out of obligation, but out of love.

And this invitation is not limited to the pious or the powerful. He calls the weary trans woman who’s been turned away by her family. He calls the elderly man grieving his spouse of 60 years in silence. He calls the refugee sleeping under the Wilson viaduct, and the young professional drowning in anxiety. He calls each of us—to come, to lay it all down, to follow him.

The procession we re-enact today isn’t merely a pageant or liturgical theater. It is a summons. A call to walk the way of the cross—not just to admire Jesus from afar, but to be pierced by love, just as he will be pierced for us.

And yes, the crowd that shouted “Hosanna!” will soon cry “Crucify him!” We see that contradiction in our own hearts—how quickly we turn away when the path is too narrow, when the cost is too high, when hope seems out of reach. And yet—Jesus keeps coming. Not because we are perfect, but because he loves us.

Through baptism, we have been clothed with Christ. “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ,” St. Paul said. And so we are invited to spread ourselves like garments beneath his feet: our acts of compassion, our contrition, our longing for mercy. We receive him into the depths of our being at this and every Eucharist—not as a distant memory, but as living presence. Here, at this altar, heaven kisses earth. Here, the mystery of the cross unfolds again—not only before our eyes, but within our very bodies.

Jesus comes to us gently. He bears the weight of our sin without condemnation. His burden is light because it is carried in love. In the bread and wine, that love is made real again. In the Body and Blood, the one who entered Jerusalem enters us.

So let us walk with him. Through betrayal, suffering, and death. Let us not rush to Easter too quickly. Let us pause, breathe in the incense and the silence, and follow him into the mystery of his Passion with open hearts.

And even when the night falls, and the hosannas fade to silence, let us follow him still—because we trust that love, not death, will have the final word. Amen.