Wondering Pilgrim

Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan would have us choose between the military procession following Pontius Pilate in triumphant might through one gate of Jerusalem, reminding the Passover crowds that it is Caesar who is really in charge around here – or the more modest procession entering another gate, the one led by a country rabbi riding a donkey proclaiming the peace of a realm that is not Caesar’s.

The other choice is whether we reflect on the event as presented by Luke’s gospel or by John’s. The former gives a blow by blow account, almost like a police report. The drama of the Passion is beginning to unfold. John’s account, however, is more reflective, even recalling that “His disciples did not understand these things at first; but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written of him and had been done to him.”

Alexander Shaia reminds us that the journey from Ash Wednesday to Holy Week and Good Friday is only a part of a much deeper and more impactful journey for followers of the way of Christ, beginning with the revelation in the transfiguration of Jesus on the mountaintop yet embracing the journey to Jerusalem, the arrest, trial and crucifixion of Jesus, the Resurrection and climaxing with the Pentecost descent of the Holy Spirit and the release of God’s people into powerfully passionate service.

Palm Sunday gives us the choice of entering the experience of Easter from a perspective of conflict and defeat or the vision of a bigger picture that is already realised, yet awaiting its completion.

It has been a distressing weekend. The sheer man-made horror of the Christchurch massacre and the posturing of politicians on our side of the ditch has occupied much of our attention. Like those present to eerily similar events in next Sunday’s gospel text, we turn to our faith (and some of us, our non-faith) stances to ask the same questions, “How do we make sense of this? How shall we respond?”

Jesus’ response doesn’t let us off the hook. We are all caught up. We all bear the consequences of a broken society, much of it of our own making.

Jesus gives us a fig tree. Is it bearing fruit? If not, cut it down. But a gardener says “Wait! There is still time …” A little tending, some fertiliser, some pruning – it will come good!

Over the weekend, we observed a little tending, fertilising and pruning of our fig tree. Compassionate and decisive nurture by a visibly affected Prime Minister, a swelling of community support for grieving mosque congregations around the world, a prophetic egg splatter that cried “No more!” There is still time…

It’s no secret that Herod Antipas and Jesus of Nazareth don’t get on with each other. One has a transient realm to champion and protect; the other points to a realm that transcends time and space and that is centred in the most intimate depths of the human heart. One works from the outside in to entrap and enslave; the other works from the inside out to release and liberate. One sets out to destroy the other; the other holds up a fearless mirror that reveals insight, yearning and a different kind of winning.

On this 40 day Lenten journey from Ash Wednesday to Good Friday which is itself encapsulated by the greater one hundred days from Ascension to Pentecost, the mirror reveals both the yearning and the victory. The journey of Atonement is absorbed into the journey of Election which catches up the whole universe (and any multiverses of which we are yet to become aware!)

See it for yourself in this coming Sunday’s reading from the Gospel of Luke!

I heard of a priest who will mix glitter with the ashes he will place on children’s foreheads tomorrow.

As we present ourselves for daubing on Ash Wednesday, the traditional launch of the 40 day period of fasting and self-reflection leading to Holy Week and Easter, we may well ask, “What glitters in those ashes?” We are accustomed to Lent as a period of self-denial, some taking it to the extremes of self-flagellation, either metaphorically or literally.

But maybe there’s gold in them thar ashes that confront us with our mortality as we hear the words “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return” (as if that’s the whole story!)

Author Alexander Shaia reminds us that the ancient rite marked a more inclusive journey, beyond the 40 days from Lent to Holy Week and Good Friday, but 100 days from Transfiguration (last Sunday) to Pentecost. Yes, we are mortal, but we also bear the stamp of that which is eternal. Our story embraces not just the hardship of the journey to Calvary, but the anticipation that begins with an incomprehensible hint of glory and travels through chaos, opposition, death, resurrection and flooding of the Holy Spirit that marks us all as sons and daughters of the Highest. That’s what glitters in those ashes!

We see it in next Sunday’s account of the testing of Jesus in the wilderness.

The temptations are the short term fixes of the world of ashes. Jesus responds from the viewpoint of the realm of the Holy One, to which service the teller of Luke’s gospel summonses us all.

There’s gold in those ashes!