Triumph or tragedy? We begin Holy Week with the account of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Cheering crowds, back-slapping, high fives, “you go-s,” all around. Then we tell the tragic story of Jesus crucifixion. Betrayal, condemnation, suffering and death. And yet, a deeper insight into these two events reverses the initial impression we might have of them. Was the Palm Sunday procession of Jesus really a triumph? The adulation of the crowd was fickle. The acclamations were temporary. The abandonment imminent. What looked like a triumph was in fact a frumped up show with no more substance than a snowman in April. Was Good Friday really a tragedy? The suffering was redemptive. The cross was salvific. The death was but the prelude to God’s mighty deed of resurrection on Easter Sunday. What looked like a tragedy was in fact a divine drama inaugurating the new age of the kingdom of God present in our midst. To recognize whether something is a triumph or a tragedy requires looking beneath the surface event and seeing the mighty hand of God at work.
It might look like a triumph to become the president of a large corporation, to be a captain of industry, to be a CEO with the salary and the perqs to match. But ask Harvey Weinstein if he feels very triumphant. It might look like a triumph to be a tremendous athlete, a sport superstar. But ask Lance Armstrong if he feels very triumphant. It might look like a triumph to be the best singer of your generation, to be recognized as the premiere artist, to be a celebrity in the media spotlight all the time. But do we look on Whitney Houston as triumphant? Or the other hand, a poor seamstress who was arrested because she was too tired to sit in the rear of the bus is not a tragic figure but one of triumph. Six year old Ruby Bridges’s experience of being cursed and spat at and threatened simply for going to school is not tragedy but a triumph of the human spirit over adversity. And even the assassination of a young pastor in the prime of his life with a wife and four young children while tragic enough in itself led to the triumph of the movement for equality that he had labored for over so many years. Triumph and tragedy look different when you apply the lens of love and justice to the circumstances of life.
Church, as we enter the events of Holy Week let us walk with Jesus up Calvary’s hill. We won’t grasp after the seeming triumphs of success, recognition, money, possessions for we see those things as passing, here today and gone tomorrow, shifting sand which provide no sure foundation on which to build a happy life. We won’t be discouraged by the seeming tragedies of life: personal troubles, difficulty in the family, wrestling with an illness, grieving over the loss of a loved one. Instead we trust in the power of the cross to make all things new, to overcome all obstacles, to turn tragedy into triumph. According to St. Mark’s gospel it was only at the most tragic moment, the death of Jesus, that for the first time someone recognized Jesus for who he was: “Truly this man was the Son of God.” As we walk with Jesus in the shadow of the cross our tragedies too will reveal the triumphant plan of God. Then we can bend our knees and join our voices with those in heaven, on earth and under the earth in the triumphant hymn confessing Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
