Devotional 3-30-12

Read Psalm 118:15-18, 26-29

This is the source of the song we sing on Palm/Passion Sunday. The ending of Psalm 118 opens a great window onto themes in Hebrew scripture. Some scholars propose that this psalm of thanksgiving originally celebrated a great military victory in the history of ancient Israel. Others think of it as a sung or recited acclamation of praise in a thanksgiving festival. In either case, it carries the unmistakable note of jubilation. No wonder the Gospel writers of the New Testament would find these words appropriate to the triumph of Jesus Christ over the forces of evil and death.

The psalm ends as it began with that wonderful refrain: giving thanks that God’s “steadfast love endures forever.” Reading over the whole psalm once again, we may find that it is a kind of sung parable about the coming Holy Week itself. On Palm/Passion Sunday we greet Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, perhaps not quite understanding all that will take place. The difficult words of verses 17-18 now resonate: Jesus Christ was put to suffering for the world’s sake, but death did not have the last word. “I shall not die, but I shall live.” He did undergo death, but it cannot hold him. Even though the world may ignore or oppose his way of love and justice, that lavish love for all God has created will not cease.

Empires will rise and fall, our lives will experience limitations difficulty. Death will come to us all, but the steadfast love of God still enters Jerusalem and still calls out to us. The divine love, as Charles Wesley wrote, excels all loves. This is the love we must learn to receive again and again because the struggles of life will always be part of our mortal days.

Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.

Jim Perry