Sermon Illustrations For Passion Sunday (2023)
Illustration
Isaiah 50:5-9a
The 2022 poll of the American Psychological Association revealed the highest levels of stress and weariness in the American population ever recorded. Commenting on this lesson and its reference to the need for the servant to sustain the weary (v.4), John Calvin observed that Christians “cannot escape this condition” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.VIII/2, pp.55-56), and then added:
However that may be, he always watches carefully and runs to give aid; and even when we fly and resist, he calls us to him that we may be refreshed by tasting his grace and kindness. (Ibid., p.54)
Commenting on Jesus’ suffering foretold in the text, Martin Luther observed:
... it hurts the Lord to see that we weep at the sight of his suffering. He wants us to be glad, praise God, thank his grace, extol, glorify and confess him; for through the journey we come into the possession of the grace of God. (What Luther Says, p.180)
Mark E.
* * *
Isaiah 50:4-9a
I can remember being teased as a child. I was the chubby one; my family didn’t have a lot of money (actually we were pretty poor although I didn’t recognize it at the time). It seemed that everything I did caused some teasing and ridicule from my classmates. I wish I had responded as Isaiah writes, and while I sometimes did, I recall clearly an incident in the fifth grade. My “nemesis” on my school bus and in my class, started ridiculing me on the playground. I don’t remember what it was about now, but I remember the physical altercation, the fight in which I took an active part. We punched, and bit and scratched at each other. As I look back on it, I feel a lot of shame for that response. I guess I had reached my breaking point. Reflecting on this Isaiah passage, I wonder what would have happened if I had set my face like flint and truly believed the shame would not touch me. I guess I will never know about that incident and how I might have responded. I can only go forward knowing that it is God’s view of me that is important.
Bonnie B.
* * *
Philippians 2:5-11
Whether you observe Palm Sunday or Passion Sunday, focusing on the triumphant entry into Jerusalem at the beginning of that fateful week, or the final day of betrayal and death, the tension is between glory the world recognizes and the true glory of Jesus in laying aside his garments, his identity, his selfhood, and taking on the pain and suffering of the world. Gerald F. Hawthorne, in his Word Biblical Commentary on Philippians, compares the actions of Jesus in the feetwashing in John 13, where Jesus lays aside his garments to perform the demeaning task of a slave in washing the feet of his disciples before taking his garments up again and sitting at the head of the table as teacher and Lord, with the self-negating action by the divine Jesus who does not count equality with God as something to be grasped, but laying aside his divine nature takes on the persona of a slave and is obedient, even unto death on a cross, resulting in his exaltation to the highest place, where every tongue will confess Jesus is Lord. Jesus lays aside his divinity to become less than all to become more than all. What this makes clear is that we cannot rush past Passion Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday in an effort to get to the glory of Easter Sunday as soon as possible. We serve a risen Lord, but we also serve a crucified God. And while we look to glory for ourselves, we too suffer and struggle in the here and now. (Note that these observations make up the bulk of both the Philippians passage in the Liturgy of the Passion and the John passage for Maundy Thursday. Oh, and I belong to a denomination that practices feet washing on Maundy Thursday and World Communion Sunday, and we spell it feetwashing, not footwashing.)
Frank R.
* * *
Philippians 2:5-11
I came across a story from the January 19, 1987, edition of Our Daily Bread. Archibald Rutledge wrote that one day he met a man whose dog had just been killed in a forest fire. Heartbroken, the man explained to Rutledge how it happened. Because he worked outside, he often took his dog with him. That morning, he left the dog in a clearing and gave him a command to stay and watch his lunch bucket while he went into the forest. His faithful friend understood, because that’s exactly what he did. A fire started in the woods, and soon the blaze spread to the spot where the dog was. Despite the fire, he didn’t move. He stayed right where he was, in perfect obedience to his master’s word. With tearful eyes, the dog’s owner said, “I always had to be careful what I told him to do, because I knew he would do it.”
That is an amazing story of obedience, and a bit sad, too. Jesus also demonstrated obedience in way even more powerfully than that story. Jesus was fully God, but left heaven, emptied himself and took the form of a slave. He was obedient to God’s will to the point of death on cross. Jesus did this for you and for me.
I’d like to think the obedient dog might someday be rewarded. It is abundantly clear that God will honor Jesus. A day will come when every tongue confesses that he is Lord to the glory of God, the Father. Jesus’ obedience brought our salvation. Is there anything more important than that?
Bill T.
* * *
Matthew 26:14--27:66 or Matthew 27:11-54
John Calvin noted that Peter’s denial is a story of the whole church, of all Christians. As he once put it: “Let us therefore remember that our strength is so far from being sufficient to resist powerful attacks, that it will give way, when there is the mere shadow of a battle.” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.XVI/1, p.261) The reformer goes on to note how Peter’s denial teaches us that “we shall never cease to fall, if the Lord does not stretch out his hand to uphold us.” (Ibid. p.264)
We learn something of what Jesus did for us from a famed novel by Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. McMurphy enters the mental asylum with others deemed sick like him. But he teaches the residents to laugh (laughter representing the human spirit) in contrast to the hidden snickers which was all the patients dared do in the presence of their keepers like Nurse Ratched. For such insolence, including gathering twelve residents on a fishing trip which changes them, and even staging a life-giving party for the residents, McMurphy/Jesus is betrayed and meets death through the lobotomy imposed on him by the power brokers in the mental asylum. But this death inspires life among the residents. It saves them from feeling they had to submit to what had chained them, even leading to their escape from the sanitarium. Jesus’ death has set us free from the insane asylum of ordinary life, given us the courage to enjoy and celebrate life!
Mark E.
* * *
Matthew 26:14-27:66 or Matthew 27:11-54
The last two years I’ve preached a different kind of sermon for Passion Sunday. I have invited three to five readers to read the entire lectionary Passion Sunday text. They are seated, and each is assigned a block of text that involves one of the movements or actions of the story. Occasionally for dramatic purposes, one reader will read a single verse. I put in pauses between some of the readers so folks can pause and reflect. Early in the sequence I include hymns between the readings, but after the beginning of the crucifixion there are no hymns. Your sanctuary will be different from ours, but I have the tall windows covered with dark curtains. Gradually the overhead lights are lowered. The readers hold the text in their hands but can also look up to read the text that is projected on the back wall. The emphasis is on hearing. Towards the end things are dim, but not dark, because when the reading is over the service is over. People are invited, through text projected on the front screens, to depart quietly.
As much as I have appreciated tackling the task of preaching the crucifixion, I’ve begun to realize that the power of each the four extended Passion narratives in the gospels speak for themselves.
Frank R.
* * *
Matthew 26:14--27:66
We know the stories well — the betrayal, the supper and sharing of bread and cup, the arrest, the denial, the crucifixion, the burial. Jesus knew the weaknesses of his disciples, his friends. Jesus understood that they would respond out of fear, pain, grief, and loss, Jesus knows us as well. We remember the actions of the disciples and sometimes we judge them — or we transform their negative actions into behaviors that were necessary for our redemption through the cross. How are we living into our faith and following of Jesus? Are we denying Jesus and his path for us? Are we breaking the promises of our baptism and confirmation? Are we acting with denials of grace and faith and love for one another? I think the crucifixion is as much about us as it was those disciples on those days long ago. When do we choose the world over Jesus and the eternal? When do we choose to deny our faith, even with our questions and uncertainties? When we make those choices or those denials, we crucify Jesus all over again? Rather than judging the disciples, perhaps we may need to forgive them, so we can forgive ourselves? After all Jesus proclaimed it from the cross, “Forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Bonnie B.
The 2022 poll of the American Psychological Association revealed the highest levels of stress and weariness in the American population ever recorded. Commenting on this lesson and its reference to the need for the servant to sustain the weary (v.4), John Calvin observed that Christians “cannot escape this condition” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.VIII/2, pp.55-56), and then added:
However that may be, he always watches carefully and runs to give aid; and even when we fly and resist, he calls us to him that we may be refreshed by tasting his grace and kindness. (Ibid., p.54)
Commenting on Jesus’ suffering foretold in the text, Martin Luther observed:
... it hurts the Lord to see that we weep at the sight of his suffering. He wants us to be glad, praise God, thank his grace, extol, glorify and confess him; for through the journey we come into the possession of the grace of God. (What Luther Says, p.180)
Mark E.
* * *
Isaiah 50:4-9a
I can remember being teased as a child. I was the chubby one; my family didn’t have a lot of money (actually we were pretty poor although I didn’t recognize it at the time). It seemed that everything I did caused some teasing and ridicule from my classmates. I wish I had responded as Isaiah writes, and while I sometimes did, I recall clearly an incident in the fifth grade. My “nemesis” on my school bus and in my class, started ridiculing me on the playground. I don’t remember what it was about now, but I remember the physical altercation, the fight in which I took an active part. We punched, and bit and scratched at each other. As I look back on it, I feel a lot of shame for that response. I guess I had reached my breaking point. Reflecting on this Isaiah passage, I wonder what would have happened if I had set my face like flint and truly believed the shame would not touch me. I guess I will never know about that incident and how I might have responded. I can only go forward knowing that it is God’s view of me that is important.
Bonnie B.
* * *
Philippians 2:5-11
Whether you observe Palm Sunday or Passion Sunday, focusing on the triumphant entry into Jerusalem at the beginning of that fateful week, or the final day of betrayal and death, the tension is between glory the world recognizes and the true glory of Jesus in laying aside his garments, his identity, his selfhood, and taking on the pain and suffering of the world. Gerald F. Hawthorne, in his Word Biblical Commentary on Philippians, compares the actions of Jesus in the feetwashing in John 13, where Jesus lays aside his garments to perform the demeaning task of a slave in washing the feet of his disciples before taking his garments up again and sitting at the head of the table as teacher and Lord, with the self-negating action by the divine Jesus who does not count equality with God as something to be grasped, but laying aside his divine nature takes on the persona of a slave and is obedient, even unto death on a cross, resulting in his exaltation to the highest place, where every tongue will confess Jesus is Lord. Jesus lays aside his divinity to become less than all to become more than all. What this makes clear is that we cannot rush past Passion Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday in an effort to get to the glory of Easter Sunday as soon as possible. We serve a risen Lord, but we also serve a crucified God. And while we look to glory for ourselves, we too suffer and struggle in the here and now. (Note that these observations make up the bulk of both the Philippians passage in the Liturgy of the Passion and the John passage for Maundy Thursday. Oh, and I belong to a denomination that practices feet washing on Maundy Thursday and World Communion Sunday, and we spell it feetwashing, not footwashing.)
Frank R.
* * *
Philippians 2:5-11
I came across a story from the January 19, 1987, edition of Our Daily Bread. Archibald Rutledge wrote that one day he met a man whose dog had just been killed in a forest fire. Heartbroken, the man explained to Rutledge how it happened. Because he worked outside, he often took his dog with him. That morning, he left the dog in a clearing and gave him a command to stay and watch his lunch bucket while he went into the forest. His faithful friend understood, because that’s exactly what he did. A fire started in the woods, and soon the blaze spread to the spot where the dog was. Despite the fire, he didn’t move. He stayed right where he was, in perfect obedience to his master’s word. With tearful eyes, the dog’s owner said, “I always had to be careful what I told him to do, because I knew he would do it.”
That is an amazing story of obedience, and a bit sad, too. Jesus also demonstrated obedience in way even more powerfully than that story. Jesus was fully God, but left heaven, emptied himself and took the form of a slave. He was obedient to God’s will to the point of death on cross. Jesus did this for you and for me.
I’d like to think the obedient dog might someday be rewarded. It is abundantly clear that God will honor Jesus. A day will come when every tongue confesses that he is Lord to the glory of God, the Father. Jesus’ obedience brought our salvation. Is there anything more important than that?
Bill T.
* * *
Matthew 26:14--27:66 or Matthew 27:11-54
John Calvin noted that Peter’s denial is a story of the whole church, of all Christians. As he once put it: “Let us therefore remember that our strength is so far from being sufficient to resist powerful attacks, that it will give way, when there is the mere shadow of a battle.” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.XVI/1, p.261) The reformer goes on to note how Peter’s denial teaches us that “we shall never cease to fall, if the Lord does not stretch out his hand to uphold us.” (Ibid. p.264)
We learn something of what Jesus did for us from a famed novel by Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. McMurphy enters the mental asylum with others deemed sick like him. But he teaches the residents to laugh (laughter representing the human spirit) in contrast to the hidden snickers which was all the patients dared do in the presence of their keepers like Nurse Ratched. For such insolence, including gathering twelve residents on a fishing trip which changes them, and even staging a life-giving party for the residents, McMurphy/Jesus is betrayed and meets death through the lobotomy imposed on him by the power brokers in the mental asylum. But this death inspires life among the residents. It saves them from feeling they had to submit to what had chained them, even leading to their escape from the sanitarium. Jesus’ death has set us free from the insane asylum of ordinary life, given us the courage to enjoy and celebrate life!
Mark E.
* * *
Matthew 26:14-27:66 or Matthew 27:11-54
The last two years I’ve preached a different kind of sermon for Passion Sunday. I have invited three to five readers to read the entire lectionary Passion Sunday text. They are seated, and each is assigned a block of text that involves one of the movements or actions of the story. Occasionally for dramatic purposes, one reader will read a single verse. I put in pauses between some of the readers so folks can pause and reflect. Early in the sequence I include hymns between the readings, but after the beginning of the crucifixion there are no hymns. Your sanctuary will be different from ours, but I have the tall windows covered with dark curtains. Gradually the overhead lights are lowered. The readers hold the text in their hands but can also look up to read the text that is projected on the back wall. The emphasis is on hearing. Towards the end things are dim, but not dark, because when the reading is over the service is over. People are invited, through text projected on the front screens, to depart quietly.
As much as I have appreciated tackling the task of preaching the crucifixion, I’ve begun to realize that the power of each the four extended Passion narratives in the gospels speak for themselves.
Frank R.
* * *
Matthew 26:14--27:66
We know the stories well — the betrayal, the supper and sharing of bread and cup, the arrest, the denial, the crucifixion, the burial. Jesus knew the weaknesses of his disciples, his friends. Jesus understood that they would respond out of fear, pain, grief, and loss, Jesus knows us as well. We remember the actions of the disciples and sometimes we judge them — or we transform their negative actions into behaviors that were necessary for our redemption through the cross. How are we living into our faith and following of Jesus? Are we denying Jesus and his path for us? Are we breaking the promises of our baptism and confirmation? Are we acting with denials of grace and faith and love for one another? I think the crucifixion is as much about us as it was those disciples on those days long ago. When do we choose the world over Jesus and the eternal? When do we choose to deny our faith, even with our questions and uncertainties? When we make those choices or those denials, we crucify Jesus all over again? Rather than judging the disciples, perhaps we may need to forgive them, so we can forgive ourselves? After all Jesus proclaimed it from the cross, “Forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Bonnie B.
