The Other Side of the Tapestry

Comparing the Palm Sunday Entrance into Jerusalem with the Passion account, we see a beautiful example of the difference between how God looks at things compared to how we look at things.

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Good Morning. God says in Isaiah 55: My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

That’s a good summary of what we see in our lessons this morning. What I hope to show in reviewing the lessons we read is the how God plans and works things out, and how we tend to look at thing very differently.

In preparing this week, I was reminded of a story Corrie Ten Boom told in her book “Reflections of God’s Glory.” Corrie, if you did not know, was a Dutch Christian imprisoned in a Concentration Camp by the Nazi’s during WWII for helping Jews escape the Holocaust.

In the book, she shared a beautiful picture about how God looks at things from a very different perspective than we do. In giving a talk, she would slowly unfold a cloth with hundreds of strings pulled through it and tied in knots. It all looked very random and didn’t make much sense, comparing it to how we can often see our own situation in life as a tangled mess.

We sometimes question God about what is wrong with us, why we sin or falter, or why He has allowed bad things to happen to us. But in reality, we have a limited perspective of God’s plan, and what He is doing in our lives.

Corrie would then turn the cloth around to reveal the other side. It was a beautiful tapestry of a crown of gold with multicolored jewels. This is what God sees. From His perspective, we are a masterpiece. When our life is the messiest, we need to trust God the most.

But both during the best times, and during the darkest times in our lives, God is present, weaving a beautiful tapestry.

The Triumphal Entry, and the Passion Story, when you look deeply at each, both reflect well how Man and God look at the same thing differently. From man’s perspective, when you consider it, the Triumphal Entry seems to be one of the clearest great celebrations in the Bible. Not that it is the greatest event.

But Mike…the Birth of Jesus was greater and of course our Christmas celebration these days is greater. But, at the Birth of Jesus itself, there weren’t too many people involved. Mary and Joseph, a few shepherds, and a few years later some wise men. The first Christmas was almost a secret time.

The Resurrection of course is greater, and our celebration of Easter is the MOST IMPORTANT event of the Church Year. But the first Easter – Only a few witnesses and it was a terrifying time for the disciples. There was some joy, but most everyone was very afraid, and some didn’t even believe what they saw.

If we are looking for a great day of celebration in the Bible, where people know what we want to celebrate, and it comes true here and now – then Palm Sunday might be the biggest party in the Bible.

Palm Sunday right before the Passover, when the population of Jerusalem, not to different from Ventnor, swelled from 55,000 to about 180,000. The city was crowded with pilgrims excited about their faith.

As for Jesus, all through the gospels the crowds were calling for Jesus to step up and be recognized as King and Messiah. Many people had been watching and waiting for years for this demonstration, and on Palm Sunday, Jesus finally allowed them to recognize him as just that.

‘Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!’ Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”

The people wave palm branches, the sign of royalty. Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a donkey, as Zechariah said he would 550 years prior to this.

You can see the enthusiasm of the people laying their cloaks down. If you put your coat in front of someone, you are offering your entire being to His service. So, there was joy, there was celebration among his followers. The word went out like wildfire across the city. “The prophet from Galilee is being recognized by everyone as the Messiah.” Well, maybe not everyone.

 This was the celebration in the Bible that could have had a brass band! This was the celebration in the Bible where fireworks would have fit right in! Because this the celebration that was “here and now.” Not sometime in the future. Jesus is King! Let us celebrate and acclaim him King.”

The point being, of course, they were looking at the tapestry all wrong. Not wrong in saying that Jesus was King, but wrong in thinking he would be an earthly king like Herod or David. They celebrated because they thought God was finally doing things their way. But they couldn’t see God’s plan, his intricate weaving.

They saw Palm Sunday as a Political Day that would change everything. In that sense it was a failure. And what shows this best is that from man’s point of view, the king is killed a few days later, and this king and prophet, who was supposed to change everything, died, and most people were just disappointed.

Again, of course, the opposite was true, but nobody could see God’s plan. Nobody knew what was right around the corner from Palm Sunday except Jesus, but we know he was going to die on the Cross. And nobody could have even begun to guess what was coming after that on Easter Morning.

When Jesus rode on the donkey and allowed the shouts and the palms and the cloaks on the road, that was a beautiful picture of God meeting the people where they were. Meeting us! Even though we are confused, and can’t see at all what God is doing. But even in our sin, He comes to meet us where we are.

Like them, God meets us where we were. But we are not left there.

He meets us where we are, and through this week, Christ carries us to the Cross. And the cross, death, is the last place we want Jesus to take us. But he went there for us, and He rose again for us so we can rise again as well. But in God’s plan, His intricate weaving of our life, it is His place of redemption. Palm Sunday is a wonderful celebration because it represents God grabbing a hold of us where we are, in sin and confusion, blind, and without hope.

He grabs us and loves us, and redeems us, not the way we expect, but through the Cross, through our death, in the Resurrection to eternal life.

Let us pray we can have faith in His true redemption.