Read: Matthew 21:1-11
Jesus Is Worthy of Our Acclamation and Praise
Some of us have started the Lenten season with the ceremony of the ash, singing “Sunday’s Palm Is Wednesday’s Ashes”. A friendly reminder “that dust we are and to dust we shall return? (Genesis 3”19). We have journeyed along the way of the cross and have come to Palm/Passion Sunday, a day of glad rejoicing and celebration of “the one who comes in the name of the Lord” (Matthew 21:9). This is the closest Jesus came to the acclamation and proclamation he truly deserves as “King of kings and Lord of lords” Revelation 19:16). Within days the crowd was shouting “away with him.”
But let us not be too quick to judge the crowd, for it is so easy to be blindsided by the numerous issues impacting our own lives individually, as a family, the society and the nation, that we refuse or forget to sing the Lord’s praise, not in a strange land, but in our own land and time (Psalm 137:4). I pray that our reflections, practicing the spiritual disciplines, and acts of self-denial/examination, would have bolstered our conviction that Jesus is worthy of our adoration, acclamation and allegiance.
I wonder if the people of Cuba and especially the Christians can sing or are singing “blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” Let us sing for them and with them as they grapple with and try to come to terms with the harsh realities of punishing sanctions and isolation being meted out to them (Hebrews 13:4). In their dark hour, let us pray that Jesus will indeed ride into their midst and affirm “Lo I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Ride on King Jesus to set the captives free and bind up the broken-hearted. Amen.
Rev. Michael Graham
Jesus Is Worthy of Our Acclamation and Praise
Some of us have started the Lenten season with the ceremony of the ash, singing “Sunday’s Palm Is Wednesday’s Ashes”. A friendly reminder “that dust we are and to dust we shall return? (Genesis 3”19). We have journeyed along the way of the cross and have come to Palm/Passion Sunday, a day of glad rejoicing and celebration of “the one who comes in the name of the Lord” (Matthew 21:9). This is the closest Jesus came to the acclamation and proclamation he truly deserves as “King of kings and Lord of lords” Revelation 19:16). Within days the crowd was shouting “away with him.”
But let us not be too quick to judge the crowd, for it is so easy to be blindsided by the numerous issues impacting our own lives individually, as a family, the society and the nation, that we refuse or forget to sing the Lord’s praise, not in a strange land, but in our own land and time (Psalm 137:4). I pray that our reflections, practicing the spiritual disciplines, and acts of self-denial/examination, would have bolstered our conviction that Jesus is worthy of our adoration, acclamation and allegiance.
I wonder if the people of Cuba and especially the Christians can sing or are singing “blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.” Let us sing for them and with them as they grapple with and try to come to terms with the harsh realities of punishing sanctions and isolation being meted out to them (Hebrews 13:4). In their dark hour, let us pray that Jesus will indeed ride into their midst and affirm “Lo I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Ride on King Jesus to set the captives free and bind up the broken-hearted. Amen.
Rev. Michael Graham
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