Funny, isn’t it?  How Holy Week is kind of a mirror of our lives as Christians. 

Today is Palm Sunday.  Today we are all about welcoming Christ, waving our palm branches and shouting Hosanna!  Today Jesus is king!  Today Jesus is the best thing going since sliced bread!  Today we are all about loving Jesus! 

But Thursday and Friday are coming….

Jesus will be arrested, tried, convicted, and executed.  And don’t we do the same?  We proclaim Jesus, proclaim ourselves to be Christians, and then….  We, like the crowd before Pilate, scream for Jesus to be crucified.  We fail to welcome the stranger.  We fail to feed the hungry.  We fail to house the homeless.  We fail to love as He loved us.  We, like Peter, deny Jesus.  We, like the Roman soldiers, pound those nails into Jesus’s flesh, every time we fail to do what our Christ has taught us to do.  Turn the other cheek???  Nope.  Pound!  Spread stories that are not true???  Yep.  Pound!  Make snide and cutting comments???  Yep.  Pound!  How often do we crucify Jesus, over and over and over again???

But Sunday is coming, just as assuredly as Thursday and Friday….

And Jesus will rise again.

We, as Christians, proclaim ourselves to be “Easter People,” all about resurrection.  All about a new life in Christ.  And we pray for forgiveness, humble ourselves, and start over again. 

As Holy Week begins, let us remember that we reenact Jesus’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem every time we proclaim Christ.  Let us remember that we reenact Jesus’s crucifixion every time we act in a manner that is in opposition to Christ.  Let us remember and celebrate that Jesus died that we might be forgiven, and every time we are forgiven, Jesus reenacts our own personal Easter.  Forgiven.  Resurrected.  Risen again. 

I wish each of you a most blessed Holy Week, one in which you spend time reflecting on just what makes this week holy.  What makes this week life-changing.  And how we can, indeed make changes to our lives, in order to live as Christ has taught us to live.  Amen.