As he approached
Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it—Luke 19:41
As Jesus summits the Mount of Olives and looks down upon the
city, the tumult of the parade breaks off raggedly in Luke’s telling
of the story. The scene grows quiet, and we are pulled in close as Jesus pauses there.
Jesus is weeping. The ground beneath his donkey is damp with
the tears of God. Here we stand on holy ground. From the beginning of time God has
looked at the choices we make and grieves us. God grieves the damage we do to
ourselves, to those around us, and to the creation itself.
The residential population of Jerusalem will quadruple with
Passover pilgrims during the coming week. These visitors must be fed; sacrificial
animals must be bought. Three hundred barrels of wine will be brought in so
everyone can drink the prescribed 4 cups of wine mixed with crushed fruit, fresh
fruit that will be sold in the market that week. The pilgrims’ money must be
converted to Tyrian shekels, the official Temple currency. Profits will be made
at the currency exchange tables.
Lacking water and other resources, stone was the only resource
in the region of Jerusalem. The Jewish Temple and its festivals were the principal
source of revenue for the region.
Jesus looks down on the city, the gold on the façade of the Temple glistening in the sunlight and the streets crowded with pilgrims and merchants. It all appears so wonderous, so prosperous, so hopeful, so lucrative. As Jesus takes in the bustling city, his eyes are full. His cheeks are damp. We can almost hear his broken sobs.
We might want to turn away from this private moment, but we should not. If we remain, we can learn something about God, about ourselves, and about the choices we make.
Jesus weeps at the brokenness of the city—the greed, the arrogance, and the violence that lies just beneath the surface. He knows the tendency of the city to destroy any voice that questions its legitimacy and supremacy, any voice that threatens the security of its income stream (Luke 13:34-35).
It should be noted that immediately upon entering the city,
Jesus goes to the Temple and drives out the merchants. The people, before the
week is out, will cast their vote for a strong economy rather than for peace when they turn on Jesus
before Pilate.
Why does the city make such poor choices? Because the city has no idea what makes for its own peace: “If you, even you, had only
recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden
from your eyes” (19:42), laments our Lord.
The city took the promise of prosperity, the illusion of security, the reassurance of its invincibility, and its self-congratulatory arrogance as peace. None of these things make for peace, as they will soon learn. In the winter of 70 AD, the Roman General Titus will lay siege to the city. Within three years it will all be destroyed and its wealth carried off to Rome. Their city’s leaders played the people for chumps.
In that feel-good moment of Passover, the people of the city
saw a fiction. Jesus saw the truth. And he grieves their poor choices, the
losses they will endure.
God still grieves the choices we make, the things in which we
seek passing security, the inebriation of self-interest that drives us, and the pride that blinds us to what makes for our
own wellbeing and the healing of our communities. We go on making, to this very day, poor choices. And
we break the heart of God.
So, what shall we do?
Miguel de Unamuno wrote: “The chief
sanctity of a Temple is that it is place where people weep in common.” We begin
by mourning together our world and the choices we have made. We are all guilty; we are
grieving ourselves. In that moment we share in the rhythms of God’s heart.
Then we turn to love; we give that a try.
We live in a day when words of kindness and mercy and reconciliation are drowned out,
even mocked, by the voices of the people shouting the loudest, ugliest, meanest,
most self-serving messages. We idolize people who amass obscene wealth to
glorify themselves at the expense of those who struggle to get by and go
without. Love seems like a quaint memory
from a bygone day, ineffectual and naïve.
None of this is an excuse to give up. It is reason, even
more, to embrace the arduous and risky work of love and peace and reconciliation.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr in his speech at the 10th
anniversary of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, “Where Do We Go
from Here?” said:
Darkness cannot put out darkness;
only light can do that.
And I say to you, I have also
decided to stick with love, for I know that love is ultimately the only answer
to humankind’s problems. And I’m going to talk about it everywhere I go. I know
it isn’t popular to talk about it in some circles today. And I’m not talking
about emotional bosh when I talk about love; I’m talking about a strong,
demanding love. For I have seen too much hate. [...] and I say to myself that
hate is too great a burden to bear. I have decided to love. If you are seeking
the highest good, I think you can find it through love. And the beautiful thing
is that we aren’t moving wrong when we do it, because John was right, God is
love. He who hates does not know God, but he who loves has the key that unlocks
the door to the meaning of ultimate reality.
Love is our task. It is one we must grow into. It does not come to any of us naturally; it is a capacity given to us by God.
Buried within the tears of Jesus is the key that unlocks the meaning of ultimate reality. Despite it all, God still loves us—all of us—and grieves us in all our brokenness. God still wants us.
To model this love is our greatest challenge. To embody it will be our greatest glory.
Jim Kelsey—Executive Minister ABC of New York State
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