This Sunday is known in the church as Palm Sunday. Churches around the world will gather this Sunday to remember Jesus’ final entry into Jerusalem in which palms were waved in celebration of what people assumed would be a triumphant liberation. The New Testament stories of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem draw heavily on the images found in Psalm 118. We’ll root our worship this Sunday in Psalm 118 as we gather for Palm Sunday to mark the beginning of an entire week in which followers of Jesus are invited to remember his passion, or suffering in those final days.
Nancy Koester writes, “In its ancient Jewish context, Psalm 118 was most likely an entrance liturgy to the Temple, used at the festival of Passover. It proclaimed God’s deliverance from Egypt and, later on, from the Exile.'”
Psalm 118 would likely have echoed in the hearts and minds of the ancient followers of Jesus as he entered Jerusalem and faced his final days. Our worship series this Lent has invited us to reflect upon being BROKEN OPEN. As we move toward the final week of Lent, perhaps we hear the echoes of people who’ve been broken open before us through Sacrifice, Generosity, Discipleship, Authenticity, Solidarity, and Trust.
How has your understanding of being “Broken Open” evolved through our Lenten journey? What echoes from this worship series resound in your heart and mind? What questions persist?
One Comment
Ashley Symons
This was the first year that I’d ever done anything for Lent. I wasn’t planning on it, but something really touched me at our Ash Wednesday service, and I decided I was going to go into those places of darkness within my own soul that most frighten me and allow myself to be ‘broken open’ even though I didn’t yet know what that would look like, or if it was even possible for me. I struggled a lot as I tried to do this. I lapsed and relapsed and re-relapsed, but I will never say I failed because each time I’ve discovered something new:
(1) Being broken open is a process that requires a lot of effort. So I’m slightly embarrassed to admit that I though being ‘broken open’ was supposed to be this sudden epiphany, and from thereon out, things would just be sunshine and rainbows.
(2) I, too, can be broken open. Just like God’s grace, being broken open isn’t solely for the Mother Teresas and Bayard Rustins of the world.
(3) I am being broken open. I just didn’t see it that way. I don’t know what I’m being ‘broken open’ into, whether it’s generosity, solidarity, authenticity or something else entirely. And maybe I’m not supposed to know yet…