The Slow Way: Palm Sunday and "the true nature of things"
This Holy Week, we will be reminded that Jesus’s answer to the reality of human pain and suffering was to suffer. It was to gather all of us up and live out the dream of God.
Here we go into the week of weeks of the Christian year. This week we wave our palm leaves on Sunday shouting “save us!”, watch Jesus give some of his most powerful teachings of his ministry, follow a dramatic story of friendship and betrayal, and stand back as the oppressive Roman powers execute him, breaking the hearts of all who thought that Jesus was actually going to save their oppressed, occupied nation.
Sure people will show up shiny and covered in pastels on Easter morning, having not thought once about the story. God can work with that. But transformation through spiritual practice is an invitation. And the week before Easter we are invited to all of the story. When we allow ourselves to enter into it, to experience every moment of this dramatic week, to wonder about the experiences of all who were involved, to feel the grief and tenuous hope of Jesus, Holy Week can transform us. We show up on Easter morning knowing something in our bodies, and it’s something about what life means, what it means to be rescued by the least likely act of God.
In Life Worth Living: A Guide to What Matters Most, the authors give a summary of something the Dalai Lama has said: that Buddhist practices are often like a pharmacy full of medicines. “You can shop by ‘symptom’ . . . Whatever the emotion, chances are there’s a practice for that . . . “But underlying every human illnesses is a single cause: ‘ignorance of the true nature of things.’”
I confess I have spent very little time considering Buddhist thought or practice. But I find this idea deeply compelling. The “true nature of things” in Buddhism is an understanding that each thing or person in the cosmos is “boundaryless and, in actuality, indistinguishable from the whole,” Like an ocean. Each of us may be part of a particular wave—you one, I another. But the waves move and we are all inside the expanse of water. We are all part of this massive movement of time and space and goodness. Seeing this reality leads to compassion. It leads to individual and cultural transformation.
When Jesus taught about the Kingdom of God, I think he was also speaking of the “true nature of things.” But instead of pointing to interconnectedness, he named the specifics of human existence. There’s a reason I wrote my new book about the Beatitudes, because he does this especially in his poem at the beginning of Matthew 5. In his vision of reality, the poor, the powerless, the ones who grieve, the mercy-givers, the misunderstood and rejected—these are the folks moving closest to what Stephanie Spellers calls “the dream of God.” In the dream of God, nothing is wasted—our grief, our suffering, our acts of mercy. In the reality of our lives, God is restoring all things.
I wonder if we can enter into this week with these two simultaneous truths in mind: The story of Jesus arriving on a donkey, honored and praised by the people, is a story of the dream of God. The people call out, “Hosanna!” which means save us! And I am certain that their dream of being saved is not a wishy washy “getting saved” by asking Jesus into their hearts. Their dream is physical. My God. Save us from our oppressors. Please, rescue us from this Roman occupation, from the soldiers who rape our women, from the tax collectors who steal our money. Jesus, if you’re the Messiah, please do more than ask for our inner transformation. Please fight the ones who hurt us.
And Jesus didn’t fight that battle. He broke bread and said it was his body. He held up a cup of wine and said we’d find our true communion in the giving of his very life. This is not practical.
He allowed himself to be betrayed by a friend he loved, and then turned and taught his followers to love one another all the way to the end. And then, even as he begged God to change the whole narrative, he leaned into the story as it actually was. He let himself be taken and hung.
What is the true nature of things? What is the really real underneath our longings for the kind of rescue that fixes the problems of our human nature?
This Holy Week, we will be reminded that Jesus’s answer to the reality of human pain and suffering was to suffer. It was to join the ocean of our existence. It was to gather all of us up and live out the dream of God: that we might find that in our grief and suffering, God is at work bringing life back to all of it.
Holy Week is a story of self-giving love. And in that self-giving love we find our grief and suffering being transformed into life as God dreams it.
This Palm Sunday, let’s shout “save us!” and mean it. And then let’s see what God does.
A Slow Practice
Y’all, it’s time for kids’ craft corner! I know you love it when I make you pull out paper, markers, and scissors.
Today we’re making a palm leaf! (Also known as a palm “frond.”) You may go to a church that hands out actual palm leaves on Palm Sunday for you to wave during the music and fidget with during the sermon. If so, fantastic. If you don’t, let this be your palm leaf for the week. Now, you don’t have to pull it out during church and be weird about it. You can make this palm leaf and carry it in your purse or pocket on Palm Sunday, or all week. This is your physical reminder of the prayer we’re praying this week: Hosanna, Save us.
A crafty palm leaf is super easy to make because all you have to do is cut a strip of paper with a point at the end. Or just make a plain old leaf. Whatever you want. It’s my kind of craft! But you may want to make yours a little wider than an average palm leaf so you have room to write down some words.
After you’ve cut your palm leaf, you’re going to write “Hosanna, Save us!” in the middle.
On one side of the palm leaf write what you need saving from right now. Your individual needs, the people you love who are suffering, the aches you’re carrying with you into Holy Week.
And on the other side of the palm leaf, write the needs of the world: Whatever comes to mind when you consider the suffering in the world right now: the devastating loss and malnourishment of the Palestinian people, the exhaustion of those in Ukraine, the apathy of those of us in the US who are going into this election cycle exhausted of American politics. Write down issues of injustice around you. Write down the suffering you have seen this week.
Take some time to sit with your palm leaf and the prayers you’ve written. Over every individual or collective pain you’ve written down, ask for that mysterious hope of Hosanna. Lord, save us from this.
Then sit with that ache for a while. This is a week to stay with the ache of the world, to feel our own pain and not run from it.
As you move through your week, allow the presence of your palm leaf prayers to remind you of your need for rescue. Allow it to remind you that your individual life is part of a big story of divine, self-giving love.
Let’s close with this prayer: Oh Lord, Hosanna! Save us! Show us the true nature of things. Allow us to find in our grief the kind of love that transforms the world. Amen.
A Note:
We’re getting closer and closer to the April release of my new book Blessed Are the Rest of Us: How Limits and Longing Make Us Whole. You can preorder the book right now at Baker Book House, where it’s 40% off the price of other booksellers. The first 200 preorders over there will receive a signed copy and a super fun temporary “The Lucky Few” tattoo!
I am still putting together both virtual and in-person speaking engagements this spring as I plan my book launch. If your church or community might be interested in hosting my “Embracing Our Limits, Discovering Our Wholeness” workshop, either virtually or in person, reach out at michaboyett@gmail.com. I would love to make it available to you and your people!
If you are a paid subscriber or are thinking about becoming a paid subscriber, this might be the moment to do so! This week I announced our weekly, free virtual book club for paid subscribers. We’ll be walking through the book together! It’ll be super fun. Sign up to be a paid subscriber here at Slow Waysters.
So beautiful! Thank you!