A Pregnant Pause

Read Philippians 2:1–11

And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross (vv. 7–8).

Next week is Holy Week, and I face the perennial preacher’s challenge of how to approach Palm Sunday. This is the day on which we traditionally commemorate Jesus’s “triumphal entry” into Jerusalem just before his death. But in recent years many churches have started to hold on this date what has become known as “Passion Sunday,” a remembering of the whole story of Jesus’s passion (his suffering and death). I’m never sure how to handle these two options.

One of the main reasons for the substitution of Passion Sunday for Palm Sunday is a recognition that fewer and fewer people attend Holy Week services on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, and church leaders are rightly reluctant to have two celebratory Sunday services—Palm Sunday and Easter—in a row without any mention of Jesus’s suffering. To skip the passion would be to present a distorted version of the gospel that removes the cross from the picture. I certainly agree with the wish not to do that.

This reminds me of the “Christ hymn” that appears in chapter two of Paul’s letter to the church in Philippi. It’s a hymn that apparently predates Paul’s epistle, and Paul uses it to bolster his argument in favor of unity and humility among the Philippians. The first part of the hymn, verses 6 to 8, depict Christ’s descent from exalted member of the Trinity—“he was in the form of God” (v. 6)—to ignominious death—“even death on a cross” (v. 8). The next set of verses (vv. 9–11) show Christ’s ascent back to the heavenly glory he enjoyed at first, going from lying dead in the grave to possessing “the name that is above every name” (v. 9), before which every creature will ultimately bow down.

I have long held that when reading these verses one should pause for a long moment between verses 8 and 9. We read, “He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross,” then we pause to let that sink in before going on to the next verse in which “God also highly exalted him….” Too many people blithely skip from the death to the exaltation without stopping even for a moment to consider the terrible price Jesus paid in that death on the cross. But failing to pause and to ruminate on that death holds the seed of triumphalism, the notion that the life of discipleship is about victory and glory rather than servanthood, humility, and the cross. Observing Passion Sunday is one way to take that pregnant pause so that the meaning of Jesus’s sacrifice sinks in before we move on to the great celebration of Easter morning. That’s why part of me is in favor of Passion Sunday.

But another part of me—some might describe it as the ornery or curmudgeonly part—bristles at the change from Palms to Passion, because it represents a capitulation to the lowest common denominator of “Chreaster” practice. (A Chreaster is one who attends church only on Christmas and Easter.) To create a new observance (Passion Sunday) because the average Christian can’t be bothered to come to church one or two extra times during the holiest week of the Christian year sets a terrible precedent. Shouldn’t we hold people to a higher, not a lower, standard?

But at a deeper level I reject the impulse to replace Palm Sunday with Passion Sunday because the reasoning behind the change is based on a misunderstanding of what Palm Sunday signifies. Far from being a celebratory, triumphal event, Jesus’s entry into Jerusalem was part and parcel of the passion as a whole. It was an act of political theater in which he thumbed his nose at the religious and political leaders and undoubtedly accelerated his way to arrest and crucifixion. If we understand Palm Sunday properly, we don’t need a Passion Sunday.

Grace and peace,
bob