Mark 11:1-11
“Jesus Isn’t a Rock Star”
What is going on here?
It appears that a whole crowd of people have fallen head over heels in love with Jesus!
The people are infatuated.
It’s as if Jesus were a rock star or something!
“Many people spread out their clothes on the road while others spread branches cut from the fields.
Those in front of him and those following were shouting, ‘Hosanna! Blessings on the one who comes in the name of the Lord!’”
It’s not hard to imagine a wild kind of “Woodstock” scene when we read about Palm Sunday.
The people are partying!
The streets are overflowing, as folks are streaming into town for the Passover Festival, and Jesus has become the headlining act!
He is the star of the show.
He is the coming King—the One Who will reign on King David’s throne.
Jesus will defeat Israel’s enemies with a rock show-like barrage of pyrotechnics.
Everything is going to be alright now.
The King has come!!!
It’s such an ecstatic atmosphere that crowds of adoring fans are taking off their clothes and spreading them on the dusty, stony Middle Eastern Road…
…in order for a donkey to ride over them.
That’s a big deal!
Most people only had one set of clothes.
You don’t do that sort of thing…
…not for a friend or even a really respected person in your family.
You do it for royalty!!!
You do it in the midst of an emotional frenzy.
And you don’t cut branches off trees to wave in the streets for just anybody.
And what they were shouting?
“Hosanna” is a Hebrew word that mixes exuberant praise to God with the prayer that God will save God’s people, and do it right away!!!
You know, if we stick with the rock star or pop-star theme for a minute we can perhaps, fairly easily, sum up what happens…rather quickly to the frenzied and crazed love of their fans.
Let’s see, Davey Jones of the 1960’s Beatles parody band—the Monkeys, who passed away recently—probably caused quite a stir for a while.
Then there was David Cassidy from the Partridge family.
Later, his younger brother, Shawn Cassidy had a run with the “teen idol” thing.
He was on a t-v show called the Hardy Boys, and even had a hit song on the radio called the “Do-run-run.”
My oldest sister, Wendy, had a big crush on him for a few months.
She also had a short-lived infatuation with another guy named Leaf Garrett.
More recently we had The New Kids on the Block.
Even Michael Jackson was a has-been for the last…say…20 years of his career?
And now there is Justin Bieber.
How long will love last for him?
A girl who attends the church I pastored in Newport News, Virginia recently wrote on her facebook page: “I ‘heart’ Justin Bieber forever.”
Hmmm…you think so?
So, on the first Palm Sunday, so long ago a big crowd of people seemed to “fall in love with Jesus.”
He was the top of the charts.
The fans could hardly contain themselves!!!
Psychological writer Robert Johnson states that “Romantic love, or falling in love [or emotional infatuation], is different from [real loving].”
Real loving is more steady.
It’s constant.
It’s unconditional.
It’s not here today and gone tomorrow.
Let’s face it, there is something a bit overblown and bigger-than-life about infatuation or falling in love.
It’s like getting onto an emotional roller coaster.
It’s got a lot of excitement.
It can be fun.
But it’s short-lived.
The ride does come to an abrupt hault.
But Christian love does not come to an end.
It is eternal…
…it is living eternally in the presence of the Living God!!!
It is a quality of life which can start now and goes on forever.
And it withstands the twists and turns, the wrinkles and the pain of life.
It even beats death itself!!!
It’s sad, quiet often the life of a teen idol ends in tragedy.
A few years ago, Corey Haim, who was a big hit in the 1980’s died in his 30’s after years of drug abuse.
Not a lot of people paid a whole lot of attention.
And then there was the recent death of Whitney Houston.
She had been a huge star, but we hadn’t heard a thing about her since about 1992.
The kind of love we heap upon pop idols is a superficial kind of love.
Once the singer or actor begins to age a bit, or after their show is canceled…
…or we grow up…
…our love fads.
It’s not real love is it?
Actually, there is not much about it that is real at all.
And that was one of the big problems on Palm Sunday.
There wasn’t a lack of love for Jesus.
The problem was that the love was the superficial kind.
It was smoke and mirrors.
It was like a vapor, or fog that disappears by mid-morning.
It was overblown; then it was gone!
Within a week this acclaim for Jesus will turn into humiliation, mockery, hatred and then murder!
Talk about a fickle crowd!!!
What is our love for Jesus like?
Is it real or is it superficial?
Does it stick with us, even when things don’t go our way…
…or even when we find out that following Jesus is not glamorous, nor is it comfortable, nor is it “politically correct.”
Are we willing to put our property, our money at Jesus’ disposal?
Will we obey Jesus’ orders even when those orders puzzle us?
Are we ready to go out of our way to bring honor to Jesus, and in doing so, find that our own lives are similar to those clothes that were spread on the road in front of Him?
Or have we domesticated and trivialized our commitment to Christ and to the Church?
Last week I was asking the current pastor of a church I used to serve about a certain family.
I asked that pastor if that family is active in the church.
The pastor’s answer?
“Well, they are about as active as they ever were.
They show up about once a month.”
And then I asked, “I wonder, when there are people who only come to worship once a month or once every few months…how do they suddenly decide…oh, this is the Sunday I’m going to church rather than sleep in?”
How important is our faith to us?
How important is this Church?
Is Jesus and the church something we look upon to help us through the various things we want to do anyway, someone to provide us with comforting religious experiences, perhaps?
Have we forgotten, in biblical terms, what it really means to follow Christ…
…to make Him Lord of our lives…
…to give Him our complete and undying allegiance…
…to love God and our neighbor as ourselves?
The central claim of our faith is that God is love.
And this central claim isn’t based on any abstract or sentimental emotional feeling about love.
It’s based on God’s activities in human history and in our very lives.
Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem among palm branches should help us to fight against our tendency toward superficial love.
Because in Jesus, there is no superficial love.
Instead, we are given a love that withstands and overcomes even the horror of crucifixion, and all the worst that people are capable of…
…even the worst that Satan is capable of!
Jesus’ love is the love that stops at nothing and is defeated by nothing.
And nothing can separate us from that love!!!
What is your love for Jesus like?
How do you live it out?
It has been said that “the correct kind of love for Jesus has to contain a full glimpse of reality as well as endurance through suffering.
[it’s] not sentimental.
It is more like the love of a parent who washes feces from a pouting 3-year-old.”
How often do we misinterpret God’s love, as well as our love for God?
The true measure of our love for God is found in our capacity to give ourselves in real acts of compassion toward other people, forcing us to come out of ourselves.
Jesus rode a donkey through the streets of Jerusalem.
This afternoon, some of us are going to walk the streets of our neighborhood.
I hope you will be part of the “us”.
We will pray for the people in the homes as we walk.
Some of us might hand out invitations to come worship at East Ridge United Methodist Church.
Some of us might ask our neighbors some questions about church.
Others of us will just walk and pray.
Won’t you come and take it to the streets for Jesus?
Loving Jesus isn’t like going to a rock concert.
It doesn’t end when the last song is sung.
It isn’t over when we get tired of playing the records or c-d’s or looking at the posters.
It is real.
It never ends.
It takes risks.
It can make us uncomfortable.
It changes us.
It causes us to do wonderful things we never would have known we could do.
It puts us in touch with people we never would have thought we’d associate with, let alone serve.
It walks straight, all the way to a Cross.
And it lives in glory forever.
