April 5, 2009 Palm Sunday
Lord's Prayer Series
"Save Us From The Time Of Trial, and Deliver Us From Evil"
Let us pray:
The Lord is our shepherd, we shall not want. He makes us lie down in green pastures; he leads us beside still waters; he restores our soul. He leads us in right paths for his name’s sake. Even though we walk through the darkest valley, we fear no evil; for you are with us; your rod and your staff— they comfort us. You prepare a table before us in the presence of our enemies; you anoint our heads with oil; our cups overflow. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our lives, and we shall dwell in the house of the Lord our whole lives long. Amen.
While serving as Program Coordinator on M-Staff for Laurel Ridge [1] during the summer of 2005, I took many trips to West Jefferson to purchase supplies for camp. Most of these trips were late at night, because I couldn't get away to go shopping until after campfire. One trip in particular stands out in my mind, not because of the shopping, but because of the journey involved. If you're familiar with the roads around camp, or any curvy mountain roads, you can relate. This particular night, it was raining and the fog was the worst I've ever seen. I was driving the big blue van, and it seemed no matter how fast I turned up the windshield wipers or how slow I drove, I could barely see a few feet in front of the van. Now, I'd driven that road a lot that summer, and felt that I knew every twist and turn well, but that was the longest and scariest trip to West Jefferson I'd ever made. Then once I was done shopping and had stopped shaking from the drive there, it was time to turn around and head back to camp. It was a journey of fear and faith--fear of the fog and driving almost blind, faith that the van would get me there and back safely; fear of the possibility of hitting deer, faith that I would find my way there and back; fear of driving an unfamiliar and large vehicle; faith that the road would indeed be there where I expected it around the next blind curve or hill crest; fear of what I couldn't see and faith that God would keep me safe and guide my trip. It was a journey that God took with me and indeed brought me back to camp safely, and believe me, I cried out to God through every twist and turn along the way.
Being in a fog surrounded by fear. This is an image that keeps coming to mind as I've thought about today's phrase in our Lord's Prayer series. "Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil." Evil has a way of bringing out our deepest fears, and our fears can paralyze us. As hard as I prayed for the fog and rain to go away on the road to camp, it didn't. It was a long white-knuckled trip gripping the wheel in fear. While fog isn't evil, it sure did feel evil as my fear mounted and the fog refused to let up. Can you relate to this? Have you ever been in a fog where the next step of the journey wasn't clear? Have you ever felt fear or been surrounded by evil so strong your only option was to cry out to God for help? Or maybe the fear was too strong and the cry to God wasn't even possible--it was more of a sigh too deep for words that only the Holy Spirit could understand?
Fear is a powerful feeling. It's worth paying attention to when we feel it to try to understand what is going on and why we feel that way. When fear goes too far, it can become paralyzing. We don't know which way to turn, so we just freeze. The fog is so thick we just stop. But even that isn't safe, as other cars might not stop behind us. As much as stopping the car sounds good when we feel surrounded by evil, we have the other choice to call out to God to get us through. Yea though I drive through the New River valley, I fear no evil, for God is with me or as the Psalmist says in Psalm 23--Yea though I walk through the valley of death, I fear no evil, because You are with me. (Psalm 23:4) The psalmist proclaims God is present in our dark places and claims the comfort that God brings. Through his proclamation, the psalmist calls out to God to be saved and delivered from the fear and evil, and God comforts him in God's own way.
In our Scripture text this morning, we hear the people in Jerusalem calling out to God in fear. The Jews are under Roman occupation and are looking for salvation from the evil around them. Their fears are real and they believe the Messiah will be able to save and deliver them. Hosanna, Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna! As I've thought about past Palm Sundays, I believe we often join in the Hosannas with a "Yeah Jesus" tone. Yeah Jesus! Look here he comes on the donkey [Waving and pointing as in a parade]. It's almost like we are cheering on our favorite celebrities in the Thanksgiving parades. Yeah Jesus. But Hosanna means, "Save Us!" "Save Us, PLEASE!" It's a cry, a plea, in a moment of crisis. [2] They feel lost in a fog of fear for their lives and are crying out to Jesus to save and deliver them from Roman occupation. At the same time many pilgrims were in Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. Passover is a holiday to help them remember their cries in Egypt and the wilderness to be saved and delivered from Egyptian slavery. In the desert they cried out to God for help to be saved and delivered from the evil that surrounded them, and God brought comfort and salvation as they were delivered through the valley of the parted Red Sea.
Hosanna, Save us, Please. Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil. Many of us can relate to this feeling. We're in the midst of trials. Do we call on God to help lead us out of the difficulty? As I hear it, today's phrase from the Lord's Prayer assumes that life can and will be difficult at times, and we need God's help to navigate the fog as we journey through life. This phrase also asks for us to be saved and delivered, but leaves that up to God. Only God knows how that will best happen. Though I think it's human nature to want to tell God what we think we need, we can't really begin to tell God what we need when we're almost paralyzed by fear of the fog. Sometimes all we can do is call out, "Hosanna, Save Us, PLEASE." Only God knows what is best to bring the evil to light and take our fears away. We have the opportunity when fear is present, when evil is lurking on our doorstep to call out to God, Hosanna, and trust that God will meet us in our need. In our trusting God through our journey through the fog, we can be transformed by God and brought into the light.
One of the most compelling stories from Scripture for me about Jesus and his own time in the fog comes in the Garden of Gethsemane just before he's arrested. We will read it later in Holy Week as we journey through Jesus' last week. I can't help but hear Jesus' prayer here today as we ask for God's hand to guide us through the fog of our own fears and evil. Jesus prays, “Abba, Father, for you all things are possible; remove this cup from me; yet, not what I want, but what you want.” [Mark 14:36] Jesus calls out to God to save him, and God does. But it was not as Jesus hoped it would be--his human side longed for another way out. But God's transformation was coming.
Throughout Scripture we read of God's provision and faithfulness to God's people, especially when times were tough. As I've thought about a modern day example of evil, I couldn't help but think of the Nazi Concentration Camps. 8 years ago I visited Buchenwald Concentration Camp outside of Weimar, Germany during my semester abroad. Walking around the grounds brought an eerie feeling of tangible evil and yet peace as well, in a way I can't quite explain. It is a place where so many lost their lives in such horrible ways, and yet, even there we hear of stories where the fog was lifted and hope was able to shine through. It was 64 years ago today that a resistance movement within the camp was able to overthrow the Nazis leadership. This underground group's plotting and plans finally came into being the same week it was liberated. Then this coming Saturday, April 11th American soldiers arrived to free the prisoners once and for all. Elie Weisel describes his experience as a teenager in Buchenwald in his book Night. In the books' preface, Robert Brown writes, "In [Night] we learn the geography of 'the valley of the shadow of death' about which the Psalmist wrote-- save that this was a valley in which people 'feared evil' for it was a valley in which the 'shadow of death' took on substance...6 million times." [3] Brown goes on to say, "Most readers, having read Night, will want to continue with Weisel on his painful journey through the darkness, through false dawns and false days, until there are hints that tiny shafts of light can pierce the seemingly unending night that Auschwitz [and Buchenwald] ha[ve] imposed upon the earth." [4]
Tiny shafts of light piercing through the fog of fear and evil. Even the darkest nights have a dawn. We journey though today and this coming week, Good Friday's death and all, knowing that Sunday's dawn will lift the fog and let the light shine. In fact, we can't arrive at Sunday without passing through Good Friday. Hosanna, God, Save Us, Please. Journey with us this week, O God. Guide us through the darkest fog and deliver us safely home. When the fog is so thick we can do nothing but cry out to God, we call out Hosanna, Save us please. Save us from this time of trial and deliver us from evil. The hardest part, I believe, is trusting that God will be there with us in the valley of the shadow of death, and that the tomb will once again be empty next Sunday--it's not how we expected the story to end, but God had other plans. We take the next step through the fog of our fear trusting that God is there and knows what is best for us in the end. Hosanna in the highest! Save us, Please. Amen.
1. www.laurelridge.org The Moravian Church Camp for the Southern Province located just off the Blue Ridge Parkway and Hwy 18 in Laurel Springs, NC.
2. William Willimon and Stanley Hauerwas,
Lord, Teach Us: The Lord's Prayer and Christian Life (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1996) 88.
3. Robert McAfee Brown, preface, Elie Weisel,
Night, 25th Anniversary Ed. (New York: Bantam Books, 1982) vi.
4. Brown, preface, Elie Weisel, Night, vi.
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