Eyes Filled with Tears

As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, “if you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side [Luke 19:41-43].

Today, for the first time in the more than two years that I’ve been writing these Wednesday meditations, the Lectionary text that I’ve chosen as the basis for this piece [Luke 19:28-40 Passion/Palm Sunday, RCL, Year C] serves as an overlay for the text we discussed this morning in our 11:00 a.m., Wednesday Bible Study. To be sure, the texts aren’t identical. After all, our class is moving through the Gospel of Matthew, whereas the Gospel reading appointed for this Sunday is from Luke. Yet both Gospel texts, Matthew 21 and Luke 19, offer important insights into how each Gospel writer saw the triumphant/tragic entry of our Lord into the city of Jerusalem less than a week before He would be lynched on Golgotha.

As we’ve sometimes discussed in our Bible Study class, it’s interesting to see how two authors, looking at the same first century events, can see things somewhat differently. For example, Luke tells us that, per Jesus’ instructions, two of the disciples secure “a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden” [Luke 19:30]. Luke doesn’t tell us what sort of colt Jesus wants. And yet, without saying so, Luke is giving a tip of the hat to the prophet Zechariah, who had proclaimed that one day a new type of king would ride into town not on a war horse, but “on a colt, the foal of a donkey” [Zechariah 9:9].

Matthew, apparently not as experienced with farm animals as Luke, apparently saw “colt” in Zechariah’s writings, but then also saw “donkey” and thought that there must have been two animals set aside for our Lord’s use on Palm Sunday. And so, in Matthew’s version of the story, you see the following:

They brought the donkey and the colt and placed their cloaks on them for Jesus to sit on [Matthew 21:7, emphasis mine].

Two animals or one—I don’t think it matters much. The important thing to remember is that Jesus has been moving toward Jerusalem for some time and now, after some three years of teaching, preaching, healing, and miracles/signs, He is entering the gates toward what He knows is to be the eschatological confrontation that will save humanity from itself. That’s “theology-speak” for “Jesus knows He is close to the Cross.”

The excitement is fever-pitched. The crowd of disciples (note that there are many more than 12) is shouting what appears to be the Sanctus, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” Only here, in Jerusalem, on the Sunday before Jesus will be killed, the crowd doesn’t use the pronoun “he”; it instead uses the noun, “king.”

Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! [Luke 19:38a]

You see, many in the crowd know their prophets well. What might appear to be harmless to a Roman—a man riding into town for the Passover feast on a donkey—becomes earthshaking placed as it is within the context of Zechariah’s prophesy. Jesus may as well have worn a sign (printed only in Hebrew) saying He is the Messiah.

What is more, listen to the second half of the crowd’s Hallelujah: they shout “Peace in heaven and glory in the highest” [Luke 19:38b]. This is essentially the same cry echoed by the angels at the announcement of the birth of this new king to some lowly shepherds tending their flocks by night [Luke 2:14]. It seems that Jesus attracts crowds—crowds of disciples and crowds of angels—and everyone is proclaiming a new dawn and a new day in the life of all Creation.

And this, of course, scares the Pharisees, who have so much to lose. And so, they warn Jesus, they plead with Him, to calm down the assembly. The Roman authorities might catch on to what the crowds are saying and meaning. Jesus, having disregarded their earlier warnings, again is steadfast. He says to them:

I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out” [Luke 19:40].

It is a jubilant day. Jesus will not hush the crowd. He will not back down from His moment. He will turn His cheek, yes, but He will not silence the crowd of disciples because here, and at least for now, the multitudes are joined in eschatological praise. Indeed, “Heaven and earth are full of His glory. Hosannah in the highest.”

There is a subtle sort of sadness here, however. Jesus knows that the enthusiasm of the crowd will begin to evaporate as he moves closer and closer to the Cross. Their fervent cries will change when the crowd begins to calculate the cost of following Him, as they learn that His yoke, while easy, is not the sort of yoke that they have expected from the Messiah. And yet, at this moment on what we call Palm Sunday, all of Creation—all the disciples and even the inanimate stones—are joined together in their shouts of Hosannah. I suspect that even the donkey colt was flicking her tail. The crowd no doubt thinks, “What in the world could go wrong with this picture?” Well, Jesus, who always sees the full picture, knows quite well what lies ahead.

I mentioned that Luke and Matthew have different views on the animal(s) used by Jesus on that triumphant day. There’s another significant difference between the way the Gospel writers saw things on that Palm/Passion Sunday. We don’t know if Luke was even present that day, and if he wasn’t, we don’t know where he would have picked up on an important detail that isn’t mentioned by any of the other Gospel writers, but Luke—and only Luke—mentions our Lord’s tears on that day [Luke 19:41].

For years now, I have found it interesting that while compassion was one of Jesus’ core essences, He seems to have been moved to tears on only three occasions—at least there are only three mentioned in Holy Scripture [John 11:35; Hebrews 5:7-9, and here, Luke 19:41]. And so, the question hangs heavy over the moment. Why does He weep in the middle of what appears to be His moment of triumph?

He weeps because He can see the future. Jesus looks at the crowd on Palm Sunday and knows exactly what will take place all too soon. Luke reveals that our Lord’s tears aren’t being shed for himself. To be sure, He doesn’t welcome the pain, humiliation, torture and yes, death that He must endure. He weeps, however, not for himself, and not for what will happen in just a few days. He weeps for Jerusalem and her future destruction.

Jesus knew that Jerusalem—whose very name evokes “peace”—would forsake him once it came to understand more fully what sort of Peaceable Kingdom upon which He was intent. On the one hand, Jerusalem, home of the Pharisees and several other active “anti-Jesus” sects, was the center of opposition to Jesus. And yet, on the other hand—this fact would be pointed out by Luke in his later writings—Jerusalem was the center point from which the Good News would go out “to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). Jesus, with tears in his eyes, looks at those around him on that original Palm Sunday and laments that if only the people would heed His message—not “their version” of His message—they could have peace. What will be their choice?

Alas, while Jesus’ message is taken up by a small, brave band of men and women, many of whom will later die for their faith, that message—like Jesus himself—will be despised and rejected by Jerusalem, the city whose name means peace. And so, here in the midst of their cheers, knowing all that He knows, Jesus laments the consequences of Jerusalem’s decision to refuse His offer of Grace. As Jesus warns Jerusalem in this Lucan passage, there will come a day—that day will come in 70 A.D.—when the Romans will destroy both the city and the Temple [Luke 19:44]. The stones themselves will be upturned. The Hebrew nation will lose its capital and be dispersed to the corners of the world because Jerusalem chose its own vision of Yahweh’s kingdom instead of that offered by our Lord.

And what say we, those of us who repeat the creeds in this 21st century and who, therefore, have the benefit of 2,000 years of hindsight? As we so different from the throng in Jerusalem? Jesus offers us Peace. But it is Peace on His terms, not our own. Are we willing to accept His kingdom, or do we have a better idea? What might happen in this world if we doubled our efforts at prayer, if we put our neighbor ahead of ourselves?

This lively, interesting, familiar Palm Sunday/Passion Sunday story told by Luke shows the sorts of responses that folks like us have to Jesus. For some there is the response that springs from humble faith. For others, there might be hand-waving jubilation and praise. Still others calculate the cost and can only answer with hostility, mockery, or self-deception. Throughout our story of human frailty, a story within which some of us want to blow both hot and cold, a story in which some of us are actually blind and others choose just not to see, a story to which some of us respond with love and others with hardheartedness, there is but one everlasting constant: Yahweh’s unquenchable determination to show Mercy and provide Grace to all of Creation. Remember that Jesus only weeps for us because He loves us.