The Closer servicem held at All Saints on Sundays at 4pm was wonderful this week. It was so great to see you over 70 people come into All Saints today to worship God with us this Palm Sunday. May God give you all a blessed Holy Week as we prepare our hearts for Easter.

Jordan's service for Palm Sunday. 

Sermon for Palm Sunday

Have you ever had one of those weeks where everything changes? I remember the week before the very first lockdown, it went from laughing about the idea of lockdown on the radio to silence on the streets. It was like stepping into another world. I’m sure you have your own memories of that time where over the course of a few days, everything changed. The world went from normal to bizarre.

Or there was this other time when I had to quit my job but I didn’t have anything lined up. At the beginning of the week I was stressed and miserable and didn’t know what to do, I didn’t know how we’d find enough money to live and thought we might end up moving back in with our parents but then, out of nowhere I got a call for a job interview, went in and smashed the interview; they offered me a job there and then. At the beginning of the week I was hopeless and miserable, by the end of the week I was over the moon and celebrating.

I’m sure you’ve all had one of those weeks where everything changes, whether it’s moving house, the birth of a baby or the death of someone you love, you have one of those weeks where you look back and you think about how you felt at the beginning of the week as though it were a far off, distant memory.

Well this week, brothers and sisters, everything changes too. This week, by the end, we’ll be looking back at palm Sunday and going ‘wow, I can’t believe everything that’s happened in that space of time.’ As we journey through holy week, we will see the true story of the cross and resurrection, it’s important that we follow the story through. We shouldn’t just jump straight to Easter Sunday, to the resurrection, instead we should allow this week to change us as we follow through the whole journey to the cross. We should let this week be one in which we are changed by journeying with Jesus through to Easter.

And it all starts on this Palm Sunday, as the stage is set. Everyone knows that there’s something important about the build-up to Jesus’ crucifixion. If you read through the gospels they all feel like they crescendo, they reach their climax at the Easter story. It’s foreshadowed all the way along; if you were paying attention over the last few weeks you’d see that Jesus more and more was pointing towards his death in Jerusalem and here he is.

People were coming out in great numbers to welcome Jesus as a king, they were shouting the great word of praise, hosanna. The ordinary people were treating Jesus like a king. ‘Here he is,’ they thought, the Messiah, the one who’s going to chuck out the Romans and re-establish the Kingdom of David.

But, usually, when an important person visits a city the leaders of the city should be the ones coming to greet them. If, for example Pontius Pilate were to arrive, all the leaders of the Pharisees, the high priests and community elders would be there to welcome him but here, it is there people, not the leaders, not Pilate, who welcome Jesus. He is a humble king but there’s no official welcome.

And of course, he arrives as a humble king, as foretold in Zachariah “your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” He doesn’t enter on a conquerors warhorse but humbly, on a donkey which, by the way (as an aside), is the most relatable donkey in the world. Jesus chose that specific donkey and you have a lot of time spent in the gospel reading today with the disciples going off to locate that specific donkey, which is great because that’s got to give us hope that we can be chosen too. We might not feel good enough but if Jesus has a plan for that donkey then he may have a plan for us too, he know exactly who to use for what job. (aside over)

After the humble King enters, His first order of business is to go and clean out the temple, to cleanse his Father’s house. Hardly the conquering Messiah that the people expected and, by the end of the week, the religious leaders had turned the people who had been welcoming and cheering Jesus, into the ones who would be shouting for his crucifixion.

The people were welcoming Jesus would be the same ones betraying him when they didn’t get what they expected. So as we come to this week, I wonder what it is you’re expecting from Jesus. As you come to Holy Week, it’s good to have an intention on your heart, to have a thing you are praying for, but what if Jesus doesn’t do what you expect. This feeds into a wider conversation about why we pray. Why do we pray? Is it to get something, as though prayer is a wishing well, or is it to get our instructions?

Do we only talk to God when we want him to do something for us? When we think we know what we need so we go to him with a list of demands. The people of Jerusalem expected Jesus to be a conqueror and when he wasn’t, when he said it was them that he was here to change, they wanted him dead. And we’re just the same.

How many of us beg God that we might win the lottery, ‘oh Lord, if you let me win I’ll give 10% - minus tax – to the poor?’ Instead of asking God, ‘God, who would you like me to be generous with this week?’ How many of us beg God to change someone or to make someone like us or to make things easier for us instead of asking God what we can change to make our lives more about him?

God always has a plan. It may be too big for us to understand, it may not happen the way we want but God moves. But we’re awful at recognising that maybe somebody else has a better idea than us about what to do.

On Monday I arranged to meet my Mum and Dad at Martin Mere. I got Maisie in the car set up the Sat-Nav and off I went. I knew where I was going so I didn’t really listen to the signs I went past and the advice of Becca ringing in my ears as to which way I ought to go. I was sure that I was right and I’d put the Sat-Nav in myself. It was only when we arrived in Blackpool that I actually stopped and checked and realised I’d put in Martin Mere holiday resort, Blackpool, which was the best part of an hour in the wrong direction from Martin Mere. I was convinced that my way was right but, and I hope she doesn’t hear me admit this, Becca was right, and I should have listened.

Well what are you doing to listen to God this week? How are you going to let him change you around and put a new direction in your heart, even if it’s not one you expected?

As we move towards the cross, let us remember that God probably has a better idea about what to do than we do, don’t question his ways, but instead remember he has chosen you, donkey as you may feel, to do his work here in this place.

This is going to be a big week, so let it change you. Come to at least one extra service this week – there’s 14 of them so that should be fine – come and let God work on your heart, you who he loves enough to come to earth and suffer the humiliating death of the cross, come and let his love change your heart and may this week be one to change us.

Amen.

We begin Holy Week, a time when we’re called to walk the way of the cross with Jesus.

You can read a reflection here: https://stgeorgechorley.co.uk/news/news_inner/312

You can find the notice sheet, inc. all of our services, here: https://stgeorgechorley.co.uk/brochure/theway.pdf

You can hear from the next Bishop of Burnley here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WMFufjLmLs

God bless,

Fr Mike