Sunday 13 April 2025
Palm Sunday
Welcome!
We know not everyone who is part of Westwood Church is able to be in church on Sunday morning however, we thought it would be good to offer some excerpts from the Sunday morning service. Where we can, we offer parts of the service in text and audio, whichever works best for you. If you want to plug in headphones to your computer, tablet or mobile phone now is a good time to do it ! If you want to offer some comment or feedback just use the comment box at the end of this post.
Your Weekly Church Notices
Scripture
Philippians 2: 1 – 11
Luke 19: 28 – 40
Praise – Hosanna Loud Hosanna
Prayers
You Lord, you entered the city as a poor man, in simplicity, no style, no arrogance or show, yet You still caused uproar. People questioned who you were and what it was all about. With their eyes they could see but in their hearts they did not understand. You drew the expectations and imaginings of a hungry crowd. Conflicts long since oppressed and buried were brough to the light once more.
May we, who are sometimes swayed by the crowd’s approval, and who often avoid conflict for fear of its cost to us, hold fast to the truth of the gospel and follow faithfully in Your way of compassion wherever it may lead us.
We gather to seek God, to praise the Creator, to adore the Son, to abide in the Spirit. To give thanks to the Lord for He is good. God’s steadfast love endures forever.
We gather on this last Sunday of Lent to share in the praise of Palm Sunday, to anticipate the events of Holy Week, to journey towards the cross and tomb. To give thanks to the Lord for He is good. God’s steadfast love endures forever.
We gather together bringing all the worries and wonders of the world. Bringing all that is heavy in our hearts or light in our souls, bringing all the joys and challenges of life whatever our circumstances. To give thanks to the Lord for He is good. God’s steadfast love endures forever.
Here now we offer our thanks for all you have offered to us and all humanity, a new way of life, a Way that is Christ, a better way for humanity to be. Here now we make our offering not just of our resources but of ourselves intent that we should live the Way of Christ.
Hear us as we join in the words of the Lord’s Prayer saying…
Our Father who art in Heaven Hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, for thine is the Kingdom, the Power and the Glory forever. Amen.
Address
Nothing happens in isolation. Everything that happens, happens in relation to everything else. Yet curiously, on Sunday mornings as we read the scriptures we so often take each passage, each story, each parable, in isolation. Today is Palm Sunday and all we tend to do is focus on Jesus on that donkey and the crowds, or was it just the disciples, or as Luke puts it – the large crowd of his disciples, waving those palm branches.
“Jesus said this,” is the opening words of our passage today. What was it that Jesus said? It was the Parable of the Gold Coins. Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, like many will have been, as they prepared for the celebration of Passover. Passover recalling the setting free of God’s people from their slavery in Egypt and in that sense the birth of the Jewish nation. What better time for expressing fresh hope of new beginnings, of God doing something to save His people, not from the Egyptians, but from the oppression of the Roman Empire. There is a sense of expectation embedded in the themes of Passover.
Now, I might equate this to our celebration of Pentecost. What preacher or minister or priest or church member does not hope for some outpouring of God’s Spirit that brings revival to the church. We would be happy for God to act in such a way at any time but the story of Pentecost seems to focus those thoughts. What then might be a more appropriate time for God to act than on Pentecost Sunday. A mighty wind rushing and tongues of fire touching each and every person gathered in church. Okay, we might still be waiting but I’m sure you understand my point that religious celebrations can so easily become a focus for particular hopes and expectations.
As Jesus travelled toward Jerusalem he became the focus of people’s hopes and expectations. All of his preaching and teaching and the miracles he performed seemed only to encourage the focus of these expectations upon him. Jesus was now almost at Jerusalem and the people supposed that the Kingdom of God was about to appear. What I cannot work out is just how the Parable of the Gold Coins speaks to those expectations. Does it raise or lower them? Your guess is as good as mine.
I can say however, that the triumphant entry certainly raises expectations. We are not even within the city of Jerusalem, not even at the city gates. We are just on the dusty road from the villages of Bethphage and Bethany down the Mount of Olives toward the city. All the normal traffic is using the road, busier than normal perhaps because of pilgrims heading to the city for Passover. We cannot avoid the fact that Jesus is making a statement. He is there to be seen and heard, encouraging the focus of expectations upon him. And letting the authorities know that he has arrived. Maybe hopeful that his obvious presence and the enthusiasm of the crowd will allow him safe passage into the city. He cannot be quietly arrested; he cannot just go missing. Are the crowds who gather round him something akin to a human shield that affords him safe passage?
We cannot be surprised that there are Pharisees in the crowd. Jesus enemies who were plotting His demise and keeping a close and watchful eye on all his movements ask Jesus to silence His disciples. They are nervous of what Jesus will do next or how he might incite the crowds. They are fearful of rebellion and the Roman army descending to crush the Jewish nation and destroy the Temple. Their fears are justifiable although it takes another 40 years for their worst fears to be realised. Jesus is playing with fire and he hasn’t even entered the city yet.
What no one knows is how it’s all going to play out. People full of expectation, a preacher who can focus those expectations, authorities who are nervous and a Roman governor with power over life and death. Palm Sunday is where it all hangs in the balance.
Praise – From Heaven You Came
Prayers for Others
Living God, an image of Christ’s entry to Jerusalem lives in our imagination; the excitement of Passover preparations, the excitement of the city, we see all the people around Him. People crowding in on him; and people crowd in on us in our thoughts as we come to you in prayer.
As Christ placed Himself in the midst of the crowd, let us be aware of the centrality of that same Christ to the people for whom we pray, that they, and we, might know they are close to the Lord of Heaven and earth and that He is always with them.
We pray, with the excitement of the children, for all who celebrate today: celebrating the newness of a birth; the fresh start of a marriage; good news about their health; the success of a task; a new way love has been expressed and felt.
Let our voices join with theirs, as we shout, “Hosanna! Christ is here!”
We pray, with loyal disciples, for those who show their commitment, who prepare for Jesus’ presence, who give their cloaks for His service, who make the way clear so that others can follow the procession.
Let our voices join with theirs, as we shout,
“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”…
We pray, with the people in the crowd, for those who watch and wait:
for the ‘not so sure’ people; for the silent majority; for those who have little to celebrate; for the many who don’t see the point.
Let our voices not drown out their silent prayers, but, in being aware of their needs, let our prayers carry their yearnings to our Lord…
We pray, with those who know nothing of this, who live on the edges of our awareness, who shy away from the crowd, who live with anger and not expectation, with pain and not Hosannas, with scepticism and not acceptance.
Let our voices not condemn them, but pray for them and with them.
For the unknown, yet needful people we pray, as we look beyond the crowd…
Let us be aware on this day of rejoicing that many cannot or will not rejoice.
But let us also be aware, that Christ comes into the midst of all of this,
to understand, to be fully present, to die and rise, for each and every one of them.
Amen
Praise – When I survey
The Grace
And now… May the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Love of God and the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you and all whom you love, now and for evermore. AMEN.