6^th Week of Lent:  Palm Sunday (C); 4-14-19

Is 50:4-7   Ps 22   Phil 2:6-11   Lk 22:14-23,56

Deacon  Jim McFadden

 

            In our Gospel reading for the Palm Sunday procession, Jesus sends his disciples into Jerusalem to prepare  for his triumphal entry.  They are told to untether a donkey and if there is any protest from the owner, they are to say, simply, “The Master has need of it.

            Let’s stay with the phrase “…has need of it.”  Strictly speaking, God has need of nothing, since he is perfect: he is the great “I AM”!   Put bluntly,  God does not need our praise or our good works or anything.  Everything we are and everything we have is from him.  So, what does it mean that the Master has need of you?  This phrase signals the wonderful truth that God allows us to cooperate with his grace so that we can participate in the work that he wants us to do.  God allows us to participate in a derivative way in how he operates in the world.   We are privileged to be instruments in his hands so that we can get some of the joy that he gets by exercising his providential guidance of the world. 

            Once we get this, everything changes.  Customarily, we think that our gifts and talents are for us.  We look at them and think they are meant to serve our purposes, right?   That’s how the fallen world thinks.

            But, turn it around.  Think that whatever you have is from Christ Jesus and for Christ.  It was given for you so that you may serve his purposes.   Did it ever occur to you that you can use your mind with your skills and talents to serve the Lord  as  the saints did and do?   What would happen if your gifts and talents were not just  meant  for self-promotion, but so that you could serve the Lord like a donkey: quietly, humbly. 

            In order for the donkey to do his service, it had to be untied.   We are tied to so many things that we think are important: money, status, career, the esteem of others—all of that stuff, the goods of the world.  And, we think we’re so cool when we amass these things.  It’s like that bumper sticker that says, “Those who have the most toys at the end, wins.”  But, you know what—they are tying us down, every one of them; tying us to a kind of stake.  What a wonderful moment when someone comes along and unties us  from what is limiting us precisely so that we can do the Lord a service.

            But, trust me that when that untying happens, that will be the turning point of your life.  Untied from these worldly things and concerns, you can find true freedom.  You can find out who you were meant to be.  I would venture to say that the greatest moment of your life when you realize that the Master has need of you.  That the Master has a plan for you.  That the Master has created you to serve his purposes.  In that moment you will find your real freedom.  Amen.