Matthew 21.1-11 and Philippians 2.5-11

Matthew 21.1-11 (NRSV)

Jesus’ Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem

¹When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, ²saying to them, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to me. ³If anyone says anything to you, just say this, “The Lord needs them.” And he will send them immediately.’ ⁴This took place to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet, saying,
⁵ ‘Tell the daughter of Zion,
Look, your king is coming to you,
   humble, and mounted on a donkey,
     and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’
⁶The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them; ⁷they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them. ⁸A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. ⁹The crowds that went ahead of him and that followed were shouting,
‘Hosanna to the Son of David!
   Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!
Hosanna in the highest heaven!’
¹⁰When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking, ‘Who is this?’ ¹¹The crowds were saying, ‘This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee.’

Increasingly, the question that the crowds asked when Jesus entered Jerusalem remains pertinent in our times. “Who is this?” Sadly, the Church has not done a good job on declaring the truth about our Lord, instead the truth has become distorted by what has been, in the UK is at least, what the Church has been saying and doing that has brought our faith, and therefore also our Lord, into disrepute.

Far too many would not even go as far as the crowds who proclaimed Jesus as ‘…the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee …’ In fact it is often the Muslims in our communities, who stand up for Jesus in this way, because according to their teachings, Jesus is in fact a prophet.

In this passage, Matthew points out that Jesus is much, much more, he is the fulfillment of ancient prophecy, which Matthew goes to great lengths to prove.

(For this reflection, I have used the commentaries by De Dietrich, Argyle and Meier).

The way Jesus entered Jerusalem, from his starting point, right through the details of the event, all show that this was a deliberate Messianic act performed with deep symbolism, by Jesus. In fulfillment of ancient prophecy (Zecharaiah 9.9) Jesus rode in on a borrowed colt. In John’s account, the disciples only recognized the significance of this, much later (John 12.16). Choosing an ass also made the strong point that Jesus needed to stress that humility is at the heart of true greatness, and he set the example that we all should follow (where too many – even in the Church – do not). At the heart of all leadership should be the model set by Jesus of ‘… humility and one who brings peace …’ (cf Zecharaiah 9.9-10). As De Dietrich explains, by doing this, Jesus affirms his royalty.

When one compares Matthew’s account with that of Mark and Luke, we see that Matthew adds detail: that there were two animals and that there were crowds that went ahead of Jesus. This has been a problem for some people, claiming that it is impossible to know which version is right and which is mistaken? For some this has challenged the whole issue of the inspiration of the Scriptures. People like Schweitzer and Bultmann suggested that in the process of compilation and transmission, errors have crept in which means that we will never know.

However, as an historian by training in the first instance, I become even more convinced of the reliability of the Gospels especially because there are differences. Different people experience things differently, and this is even true of eye witnesses. In a court of law, if every witness were to given exactly the same account, collusions would be suspected and the reliability of the testimony would be brought into question. We have the accounts of the different writers, and it is obvious that they are speaking of the same event, and the differences mean that a later editor has not come and harmonized things, and so we can know for sure that what we read of here and elsewhere are reliably historical accounts of this important event.

We can know with confidence that the crowd acknowledged Jesus as the ‘Son of David’ quoting from their liturgy as recorded in Psalm 118 (part of the Jewish Hallel). ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven!’ ‘Hosanna’ literally means ‘save now’ or ‘come to our help’.

The people of Jerusalem would have been astonished by what they saw and heard, leading to their question. ‘Who is this?’

In Jewish eschatological theology, it was believed that the Messiah would come to Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives (Zecharaiah 14.4) and it was here that Jesus finally told his disciples that he would return (Matthew 24.3). Matthew, therefore, is doing everything he can to show how Jesus was the fulfillment of the hopes of prophecy (see also Isaiah 62.11). Even the riding on a donkey, with the reception of the crowds mirrored the Messianic ideas expressed in 2 Kings 9.13.

There is therefore no doubt in Matthew’s mind that Jesus was the long-awaited messiah that the people had been waiting for, for so long.

The UK is largely a secular society where by far the majority of people know very little about what the Bible really teaches, and where the whole notion of God is largely dismissed as dated and therefore irrelevant. Our society has bought into the distortion that all Christians refute the obvious testimony of science and reject the theories of evolution and cosmology and that we all slavishly and stubbornly insist on believing every word in the Bible to be literally true and of equal value, and if anyone challenges the authority of Scripture, they are wrong and the literal message of each word of the Bible is right. But this is not part of our Christian heritage. Philo of Alexandria, a Jewish contemporary of Jesus shows us that Genesis was not taken literally at the time, but it is still true, but in more important ways; because it captures the essence of something so great that ordinary words just cannot suffice. Early Christians stressed this, people like Origen and Augustine, who stressed that when something clashes, contradicts or seems to be in conflict with what we know in the literal sense, this is a hint that we should look for a deeper meaning – the mystery of God and especially the mystery of this love that motivated God to come to us in Jesus, as Paul explains in the epistle appointed for today.

Philippians 2:5-11 (NRSV)

⁵Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, 
⁶ who, though he was in the form of God,
   did not regard equality with God
   as something to be exploited, 
⁷ but emptied himself,
   taking the form of a slave,
   being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form, 
⁸   he humbled himself
   and became obedient to the point of death—
   even death on a cross. 

⁹ Therefore God also highly exalted him
   and gave him the name
   that is above every name, 
¹⁰ so that at the name of Jesus
   every knee should bend,
   in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 
¹¹ and every tongue should confess
   that Jesus Christ is Lord,
   to the glory of God the Father. 

Here I turn to William Barclay for inspiration ...

Barclay suggests that this piece of poetry of St Paul is ‘... in many ways  ... the greatest and the most moving passage that Paul ever wrote about Jesus ...’ Here he echoes what he has written elsewhere – that Jesus was rich, but for our sakes he became poor (2 Corinthians 8:9) which seems to be the essence of Paul’s understanding. In our passage, Paul takes this further and re-states his understanding with a greater fullness and richness without parallel. Paul has been pleading with the Philippians to live in unity and harmony, to lay aside their disharmonies and discords, to shed their personal ambitions, their pride and desire for prominence and prestige ‘... and to have in their hearts that humble and selfless desire to serve, which is the very essence of the life of Christ.’ He ends his plea with verse 5 of our reading: ‘⁵Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus ...’

Verse 6 is loaded with rich meaning and Barclay comes into his own as he unfolds the significance of the Greek words used: ‘... though he was in the form of God ...’ The word form is a translation of the Greek word morphe which refers to the essential form of something – that which never changes. This is a reference to what something is in its very essence. Here he is making the claim that Jesus was ‘... essentially and unchangeably God ...’ because he was in the morphe of God. There is another word for form – schema­ – which refers to the outward form – what something looks like. This continually changes as we age and other things happen to us. So, the schema of Jesus might change, but his essence – his morphe never would.

Verse 7 has another interesting word: emptied being a translation of the Greek word kenoun which literally means to empty – to pour something so that there is nothing left. This, in effect, gives us depth of understanding of the essence of the Incarnation – “He emptied himself of his deity to take upon himself his humanity.” He emptied his morphe of and took on the morphe of a servant. So being a man was not play-acting, it was stark reality – he really was fully human. The Greek clearly states that Jesus took on, not only the schema of man but the morphe as well.

Here we run into mystery – can one unchangeable morphe - be replaced by another unchangeable morphe? Tis indeed mystery all ... as Charles Wesley was to write. But what we do know is that it was and is true in Jesus – but something our finite minds simply cannot grasp – but it is good that we struggle and try, for in doing so, we find rich truth and blessing. It is not always in the answers that we are enriched but in seeking to ask and answer the questions.

I come back to the comment by one of my students: “Always trust a seeker after truth, but never one who claims to have found it!”

Paul’s reflections are never only theoretical or intellectual – they were always practical as theology and action are always bound together. Barclay writes: “Any system of thought for him must necessarily become a way of life.” These verses are some of the greatest theological utterances in the NT but their whole aim was ‘... to persuade and to compel the Philippians to live a life on which disunity, discord and personal ambition were dead.’

The great characteristics of Jesus’ life were humility, obedience and self-renunciation and we should all aspire to be like this. Jesus did not desire His own way; He desired only God’s way. Jesus put it this way, only those who humble themselves will be exalted (Mt 23:12).

Christians needs to follow the example of Jesus. True Christian greatness and Christian fellowship depend on the renunciation of self and are destroyed by the exaltation of self. Barclay continues: “Selfishness, self-seeking, and self display destroy our likeness to Christ and our fellowship with each other.” It was the self-renunciation of Jesus that brought him the greater glory – the wondering worship of the entire universe – the bowing of every knee. Jesus won the hearts of people, not by blasting them with power, ‘... but by showing them a love, a self-renunciation, which cannot but move the heart.’

We do not fall at the feet of Jesus in broken submission, but ‘... in wondering love ...’  This theme is picked up by the hymn writer ... ‘love so, amazing, so divine, demands my soul my life my all.’ Worship is founded not on fear, but on love. As a result of Jesus’ humility and submission – God gave Jesus the name that is above every other name.

It is a biblical idea to give a new name to mark a new and definite stage in a person’s life: Abram became Abraham; Jacob became Israel the new names of Jesus are Christ and Lord. Lord comes from kurios which originally meant master or owner. It was always a title of respect: the official title of Roman emperors (Latin dominus) as well as the title for heathen Gods. Jesus is the master of all life, the Lord of all emperors (lords) – the God of gods.

So, Jesus Christ is Lord – to the glory of God the Father. Barclay suggests that verse 11 is one of the greatest verses in the New Testament. This is the aim of God – when ‘... every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord ...’ This is one of the marks of a Christian – we declare that Jesus Christ is Lord and that Jesus Christ is unique. Christians are those who give to Jesus the obedience we are not prepared to give to anyone else; we are prepared to give Jesus the love and loyalty and allegiance that we will give no one else in the universe. Our experience cannot be expressed in words ‘... but so long there is in his heart this wondering love, and in this life ... obedience.’ This is all that is required.  Barclay puts it brilliantly: “Christianity consists less in the mind’s understanding than it does in the heart’s love.”

One day all will acknowledge Jesus as Lord, but they will do so to the glory of God the Father.

Too many Philippians had their eyes focused on themselves: the main aim of Jesus was to focus eyes on God the Father. Followers of Christ must think not of themselves, but of others – to seek not our own glory, but the glory of God.