Dr. King and the Irresistibility of the Gospel

Lectionary reflections for Palm Sunday (C)

by Mark Handley Andrus

Palm and Passion Sunday (Martin Luther King, Jr.)

Reading for the Liturgy of the Palms. Year C, Apr. 4, 2004

Luke 19:29-40

[ Ed. Note : There are two gospel readings for this coming Sunday. Our gospel reflection for this week focuses on the Liturgy of the Palms. The other reading – for the Liturgy of the Word – is Luke (22:39-71) 23:1-49(50-56).]

The anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s martyrdom, April 4, coincides with Palm and Passion Sunday this year. This convergence allows the homilist to layer several understandings of God's justice, God's peace into the proclamation of the Gospel.

It may be useful to consider the Gospel in the light of two basic metaphors: life as pilgrimage, and the irresistibility of the good.

To move together into the sacred center of power, the poor shifting from margin to center, from isolated invisibility to vital connectedness, this is the essence of the march, and is also perhaps, part of pilgrimage. Certainly the goal of pilgrimage is the touching of divine energy, often for the purposes of healing.

Seen backwards, through the filter of the struggle for Civil Rights in mid-20 th Century United States, Jesus' entry into Jerusalem takes on aspects of a march, a movement. It was Fred Shuttlesworth who coined the term “the Movement” to describe the mass demonstrations, the civil rights marches, the organized non-violent protests of the late 1950s and ‘60s. To move together into the sacred center of power, the poor shifting from margin to center, from isolated invisibility to vital connectedness, this is the essence of the march, and is also perhaps, part of pilgrimage. Certainly the goal of pilgrimage is the touching of divine energy, often for the purposes of healing. We need not limit our understanding of that healing to the level of the individual only, but may see the pilgrimage, the march, the movement as a journey to the center for the healing of the community.

It may be of interest and help to compare the Lukan account of the entry into Jerusalem, the Year C selection before us this week, with a passage in Matthew that is clustered near the Matthean account of the same incident. Matthew 21:31 has Jesus declare; “I tell you the truth, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.” It is a vivid image: a pilgrimage into the kingdom, led by the unclean and rejected. If we join this pilgrimage, might not the healing of the nations begin?

The other basic metaphor, the irresistibility of the Gospel, I'd like to lay before you for this Sunday also gains power by considering it in the light of Martin Luther King's life and ministry. The concluding verses of this Sunday's Liturgy of the Palms Gospel are: “Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, rebuke your disciple!' [For their joyful outbursts, hailing and welcoming Jesus] ‘I tell you,' he replied, ‘if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.'” This is a Gospel that cannot be suppressed, or even hidden for long.

Have you seen the Robert Lentz icon of Martin Luther King, Jr. in the Birmingham jail? In the calm resolve of the man behind the bars is the reality of a gospel of liberation which can only temporarily be constrained. You might compare some of Jesus' parables of how it will be when creation acknowledges with joy not only its own essential connectedness, and also our deep, life-giving connection to God, particularly the parables of the sower and the seed; the parable of the mustard seed; and the parable of the leaven in the dough. In all these it is the dynamic of a small, but ultimately prevailing Gospel message, incarnated in people who hear and respond, which is being taught. It is preliminary to but necessary for the coming of that time when God will be all in all.

The Rt. Rev. Mark Handley Andrus is bishop suffragan of the Episcopal Diocese of Alabama. He is the coordinator of The Healing Relationships Between Humans and Our Animal Friends: The Spirituality Connection , a conference being held at the Kanuga conference center in North Carolina from June 20-25, 2004. Mark may be reached by email at mandrus@dioala.org .