Easter reflection (4.02)
We’re well on the way for what’s known on the church calendar as “Holy Week,” leading up to Easter. Each of the Lectio Divina readings will correspond to the days of Jesus’ last week.
In today’s reading–Matt. 21:1-11–Jesus is found riding into Jerusalem on a donkey. The image is fairly simple and the connotation is one in which Jesus is so humble, so gentle, so meek, so agrarian, so low-key. And our typical take-away? We should be gentle and meek too? Why do we like making Jesus out to be so vanilla? Why do we make these things always about us? In the biblical world, the donkey–more than just a work animal–was a royal animal of kingly peace and rulership. When a king would ride into the city, he would do so typically on a donkey because to do so on a more aggressive animal–namely, a horse–would be considered an invasion, an act of war. When David’s son Solomon is anointed as King of Israel, he rides a mule into the city for this purpose. Think of a presidential stretch limo–that’s the mule–vs. the president riding into a city in a tank–that’s a horse in the ancient world. So, in this case, Jesus is riding as the peaceful, rightful king of Jerusalem, the anointed son of David. He’s riding in making a statement, not of his gentleness, but of his Kingness–the city is his.
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. As he enters the city of his impending death, he did not come in our lives to be our passive feel good about ourselves take a backseat to our own plans so santa claus softy ahh isn’t his blue eyes and sandy blond hair flow nicely sugar coated savior. He comes and dies to be our king. He enters the city to buy us at the highest price to take ownership of what was always his: your life and mine.