St. Paul’s Episcopal Church Wesley Chapel, FL
Preacher: The Rev. Adrienne R. Hymes
Palm Sunday (Year C): April 13, 2025
Passion Narrative Luke 22:14-23:56
“We have seen him without beauty or majesty, with no looks to attract our eyes. He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces, he was despised, and we esteemed him not. His appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the children of men. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed.” These are the words of the unique reflection for the Sixth Station of the devotion known as the Stations of the Cross, or the Via Crucis, which commemorates Jesus’ passion and death on the cross—certainly appropriate for Palm Sunday.
Speaking of the Stations of the Cross, take a moment to gaze at the walls around the sanctuary. On these walls are powerful images capturing Jesus’ passion and death. Since March, Fridays in Lent have been set aside for the spiritual practice of praying the Stations of the Cross. Much more than artistic décor, the stations are powerful images, accompanied by corporate prayers, which invite the pilgrim to be transported to a very specific place along Jesus’ passion and death, reminding us, with each station, that by Jesus’ holy cross, he has redeemed the world.
I invite you to observe a station of the cross closest to you. Notice that Jesus is at the center of them all. Notice, also, that there are other people depicted around Jesus or in the background. In particular, the eighth station of the cross captures Jesus’ words to the women of Jerusalem who bewailed and lamented him as they followed after him which we heard in our gospel narrative today. Jesus turned to the women and said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.” I recently heard a statement that captured my attention. The statement, as I recall it, was this: We are all background players in someone else’s story.
The first thing I thought about was when I first moved to Los Angeles and I actively sought opportunities to get hired as an extra in a music video, a movie or TV show. Getting a good “extra” role, with a speaking part, could mean credits towards the actor’s union card. All I had to do was show up and hopefully meet the criteria. One of the music videos was for a famous hip-hop artist’s new song, which years later, is now a hip-hop classic. When I watch that video, I know approximately where I was positioned, and I know that I was there, but can never spot myself. I wasn’t the focus—the famous hip-hop artist was. I wasn’t even the pre-selected person who was pulled from the crowd to dance with the artist on stage. I was an extra—someone to add to the background crowd surrounding the main attraction. I was a background player in someone else’s story.
As I continue to ponder that statement, it follows that my own life’s story, of which I am the main player, has its own background setting with its own “extras” inhabiting that background, some with speaking roles and some without. Either way, the image is one that places each person at the center of their own universe with everyone else, just there to be a part of the scenes in which we live, move and have our being. It is something to think about for sure.
Throughout Luke’s passion gospel narrative, there are a lot of background players, even those “extras” with speaking roles. There are the disciples, including Peter whose speaking role emphasized the abandonment of Jesus, the accusers, Pilate and the criminals. Oh, and I can’t forget the background players, identified as “the assembly,” who had speaking parts that directly led to Jesus’ bloody and deadly outcome. Still, there is one more “extra” player—the Roman centurion. The centurion was there, in the background, witnessing the cross event and who, after hearing Jesus commend his spirit to his father, praised God. The centurian’s one line, “Certainly this man was innocent,” testified to who Jesus was, the Son of God, and kept Jesus as the focus of the story. The centurion was able, with his one line, to keep the main thing the main thing.
We do well to remember the centurion’s example as we work to intentionally make Jesus the center of our own focus, in the midst of the daily distractions and in navigating this dangerous world. As we journey through Holy Week—pondering Jesus’ journey from the last supper with his disciples, the betrayal and arrest on Maundy Thursday; the terror and agony of Good Friday; the silence and waiting of Holy Saturday, let us resist the human tendency to rush through the hard and difficult things so that we can hurry up and get to the resurrection on Easter Sunday.
Vulnerability is frightening for a lot of people. Suffering is not fun to experience or witness. This Holy Week let’s make a commitment to resist the secular world’s pull to prematurely celebrate Easter for weeks before Holy Week, with the main character of the Easter bunny, and Jesus’ life, ministry, passion and death pushed to the background scenery or even worse, with Jesus as the background “extra” in God’s story of the salvation of the world for which he sent his only Son to save.
Let us commit to absorbing the nuances of the raw, tough and tender stories and bravely engage whatever feelings they evoke within our souls. These stories of Holy Week are not meant to mask the reality of what Jesus did for us on the cross. These stories are meant to disturb your soul. Through these narratives, you are invited to journey with Jesus at the last supper and arrest on Maundy Thursday, through his passion towards the cross and death on Good Friday and in the silence of the tomb as we await his resurrection.
The good news is that through our baptism into the death and resurrection of Christ, we are not background players in God’s universal, unfolding love story for humankind’s salvation. Through Christ, we are inextricably entangled in God’s work of restoring all people to unity with God and each other through Christ. The good news is that when we show up in the world, we have what so many background players do not—a personal relationship with Jesus Christ who has given us the authority to position ourselves in this world to speak and to share the good news of God in Christ with those who do not yet know him.
The priest at my home church in Los Angeles said something to the congregation after experiencing two years of low attendance for Holy Week services and standing room only Easter services, that I have never forgotten. He said, with some irritation in his voice, “Why would you attend the party if you don’t know who or what the party’s for?”
Friends, Holy Week is upon us. Easter Sunday is not yet here. Make a plan to attend the Holy Week services so that you may come to the Easter celebration with renewed clarity about who and what the Easter party is for. Amen.
