Holy Week begins this Sunday, with Palm Sunday.
Palm Sunday is a service that holds celebration and joy, as we welcome Jesus with palms and processions, alongside the suffering and heartbreak of the passion gospel, where Jesus takes the painful journey to his own crucifixion.
Holy Week is a journey of faithful devotions and big feelings, especially when experienced against the backdrop of the painful realities of animosity, uncertainty, and war.
In a world where suffering is such a lived reality, why would we devote so much time and energy to stories where someone we love is made to suffer and die? We might even find ourselves asking—as many in the passion gospel do—whether we need a God who can do a little more to prevent that kind of suffering in the first place.
But when we walk alongside Jesus through the days and hours that lead up to death and resurrection, and we see him carry many of the same burdens and heartbreak that are lived experiences of far too many in this world, we come to see just what it means to be loved by a God who knows what it means to hurt. When we see Jesus pour himself out for the world, giving up his very life, we realize that growth and grace come not from power and wealth and the accumulation of things, but from giving ourselves away for the good of our neighbor.
The journey of Holy Week reminds us that God suffers in solidarity with those whose hearts and bodies are broken, and that violence is itself ungodly and an affront to the dignity of all human beings. Implicit in our Holy Week worship is the cry of confession and hope for a world of nonviolence and belovedness. This hope is the seed we plant in the soil of our troubled world, knowing that it will sprout and bloom as the gift of resurrection.
Faithfully,
