Palm Sunday; 2023

Palm Sunday, 2023

Palm Sunday, the culmination of teaching from a gentle warrior, one who was promised to show mankind God’s forgiveness.  Cheers of hope are heard from the crowds of faithful followers. Tears of regret from the heart of the very one who is God and man.  He came for the lost souls of Israel and they gave him their cold shoulder.

The road he traversed was strewn with branches of peace and tranquility.  A path to complete a journey with the evil of Satan always around to block the will of God.

Palm Sunday, the king of heaven rides a mule, the foal of an ass, a symbol of humility, a touch of the poor for whom he came.  The crowds close in to see and touch their savior, the one whom Isaiah spoke of as the Suffering Servant.  

Palm Sunday, the time to exult a future of freedom, as those yet to be born will inherit and understand.  Inherit they will, but understand?  What happened?

A fourteen year old high school girl is savagely beaten, two days later she commits suicide.  No one appeared to care.  A common scenario that is overwhelming our younger future.  

Our streets are no longer covered with the branches from the fields of compassion, most turn away when the poor who live here cry out for solace.  The days of law and order have suddenly gone underground and it has become an existence of rejection towards the one who came to share God.

The world’s nations ready their arsenals as armageddon lies within reach of Israel. The sound of millions prepare to march into the lives of peaceful believers.  All we can do is lift our branches and wave them as a sign of hope.  

Palm Sunday, our king comes to fulfill his destiny where the cries of joy turn to lamination.  In several days he will dismount the ass upon which he rode into Jerusalem and prepare to climb a hill writing the final chapter and closing the book saying; “It is finished.”  

Death will be defeated and Satan overthrown!  Now we enter the Passion of the Christ.

Ralph B. Hathaway