One thing I miss in contemporary churches is having a palm to wave around on Palm Sunday. As a kid we always had palms & I mentioned this to our pastor. He asked, "What would we do with them?" I told him, "The kids run around waving them pointlessly in the air...you know...as a reminder of the triumphal entry..." He didn't know, but this year we had palms...
I am on the greeter team so I got to hand them out. A lot of people gave a wistful thanks & murmured about them from their childhood. I thought a lot about why they are so meaningful for me. As a kid I loved waving them around pretending to hail Jesus as King as He entered Jerusalem on a colt. As I watched the kids in our parking lot doing the same, I realized that for me it was more about His arrest, than His entry. How could an entire city hail Him one day & turn on Him so a few days later?!? As a kid, I think the palms of Palm Sunday demonstrated the exaggerated difference between how the people accepted, then rejected Him.
The world is like this now... We want our Jesus riding on the clouds & coming to take out those who we perceive as doing us wrong. We all jump on the train when everyone is happy & partying, but when the world shuns Him, we too often turn our backs on He who we lauded only days or hours before. He loves us anyway....
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