Daily Devotion for Palm Sunday of 2016

Scripture Reading: Exodus 34 (NRSV)

I like this picture in that it reminds us that stone
was the most permanent material the ancients
had to preserve communication.  The safety
glasses remind us that the covenant was
made with imperfect, vulnerable people.

As we celebrate Palm Sunday and the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem today, this particular passage is interesting in the fact that God speaks of driving out foreign nations for the Israelites.

This is exactly what the people were looking for in the time of Jesus: a messiah who would come and drive out the Roman overseers.

Jesus turns out to be a messiah that varied from expectation.

The enemy that we overcome in Christ is sin - a struggle that we can see has gone on for quite a while in human history.

At the end of the reading, we have the curious account of the face of Moses shining after he encounters God.  This is a transference of the mystery of God.  Moses now encapsulates this mystery and the people become afraid of him.

It may be that we fear that which we do not know.  What happens after death may be our ultimate unknown.  How do we trust in God's mercy and grace?  May we remember that God is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

This is what we truly celebrate as we remember Jesus entering Jerusalem.



Photo by Yamanaka Tamaki via Flickr.com, used under the Creative Commons license.