Save Us Now
Matthew 11:1-11
Emmanuel Baptist Church
March 29, 2026
Rev. Kathy Donley
Note: A recording of the worship service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm146dOamZY
If the first Pride Festival was a riot, the first Palm Sunday was a protest. The images on the screen as we sang about Jesus and paving the way with branches were of some of us at the No Kings rallies yesterday. If it felt like religion and politics were getting mixed up, they were. And they were in Jesus’ day as well.
It was the time of the Passover festival. The Passover celebrated the liberation of the people from slavery centuries earlier. It was a volatile time, since they were celebrating liberation while simultaneously being under Roman occupation. The Romans were so wary that they increased the normal number of troops in the city, and the governor himself, a man by the name of Pontius Pilate, moved inland from his headquarters in Caesarea to Jerusalem during Passover.
Jesus has been teaching and healing for a few years. Crowds have been following him. Across the Lenten season we have been looking at the good news that Jesus brings. We remembered Jesus turning water into wine, saving a wedding party and offering news so good that it catches us by surprise. We remembered the abundance of the feeding of 5000 people, the good news that sometimes what seems impossible is possible. We’ve remembered teachings about care and protection of the vulnerable, and faith that is rooted in both mercy and justice.
These teachings resonate with Jesus’ listeners. Their country has been under occupation for the last century. The rich are getting richer. The powerful are getting more powerful, while the poor and the powerless are being pushed more and more to the margins. It’s the kind of political oppression and economic exploitation that the world has seen over and over again.
But the system is not acceptable to Jesus. So, he reaches a point where he has to go to Jerusalem, has to confront the authorities, has to put his principles into action.
Jesus and his followers are joining a huge crowd. Scholars estimate that Jerusalem’s population swelled from its usual 40,000 to as much as 200,000 at Passover. [1] That’s a lot of people in one place, a lot of emotions running high. It’s probably true that this piece of street theatre is small. Jesus on the back of a donkey, people running ahead to create a make-shift red carpet, people alongside yelling Hosanna. Even if two or three hundred people get involved, most of the thousands of people in Jerusalem that day probably remain unaware of it. But it is still revolutionary.
What Jesus does is subversive and creative, not just in terms of speaking against Rome, but in challenging the mindset of his supporters. They want the same kind of power that Rome has. They want the system to work in their favor. Jesus wants to abolish that system of power and exploitation altogether.
One scholar writes, “Revolutionary and subversive acts do not have to be grandiose or immediately altering. They can be small, seen but immediately unseen, loud and expected but bewilderingly unconventional. In that way, the powers that be cannot control, stop, or even anticipate the next revolutionary act. . . In other words, Mark 11:1–11 is depicting to us the revolutionary side of Jesus and his disciples who performed their unconventional jab against the empire. This is their act of solidarity with the oppressed.” [2]
Revolutionary acts don’t have to be huge. That’s good news, isn’t it?
Near the end of the rally yesterday, a stranger came up to me. He said, “May I ask you a question?” His English was very good, but from his accent, I deduced that it was not his first language. My sign said “We love immigrants.” Maybe that’s why he came to me. I don’t know. He looked at around at the hundreds of people lining both sides of Central Avenue and he asked me, “Are these people here because they are paid or because it comes from the heart?” I was so grateful to be to look him in the eye and say that it comes from the heart.
Then he said, “This is important because the country is being ruined. What is happening is dangerous.” We talked a few more minutes and then he said a sincere thank you to Angela and me for being there. I hope our interaction was strengthening to him. It was for me.
Subversive actions don’t have to be huge. Actions that seem small can remind us that we are not alone. Another person’s revolutionary action can empower us to take action ourselves.
About 5 years ago, Bill was baptized here. It was a step in his faith journey, a public statement of his desire to follow Jesus whole-heartedly. In the congregation that day was a boy named Judah. Judah witnessed Bill’s baptism and began to wonder if he might also be baptized.
Several months, later Judah also took that step to proclaim his desire to follow Jesus. On that day, Judah said that when you follow Jesus, it leads you on the path of execution. He also said that Jesus is the one we know we’re safe with, the one we trust. You cannot hear his testimony and think that baptism is not a revolutionary act.
Jasmine was present at Judah’s baptism. Seeing someone her own age do that prompted her to step forward on her own faith journey. The revolutionary act of baptism cannot be controlled or stopped by earthly powers.
Revolutionary actions can be small, but often they are more effective when we do them together. Every gospel writer records this story. If Jesus rode the donkey, without the people’s response, there would have been nothing to tell. If one person had stood on a corner somewhere with a No Kings sign yesterday, it would have been a non-event.
On that first Palm Sunday, Jesus was compelled to move his beliefs into action. He took the most difficult steps alone, but as a model of bold creative love, so that his followers would also act together with courage when their turn came.
In America 2026, we cry Hosanna, Save us. We want to be the country they taught us we were in school. With freedom and justice for all. The land of hard-working immigrants and generous neighbors. The nation that led the world in fighting fascism and was once dedicated to the proposition that all people are created equal.
Yesterday’s No Kings Rallies included 3,300 protests in all 50 states and across the globe. Some of us were compelled to join, to add our bodies, our presence, our voices to declare unequivocally that the current status quo is absolutely unacceptable. It was a loud collective cry of Hosanna. Save us now. Save us from war. Save us from self-destruction. Save our humanity. Hosanna save us now.
We cry Hosanna as a country and perhaps with similar urgency, we cry Hosanna as Emmanuel Baptist Church.
It is not the first occasion. Almost sixty years ago, when our neighborhood was endangered by the so-called progress of eminent domain in the construction of the Empire Plaza and a proposed highway that would have cut right through Center Square, Emmanuel and others responded with the subversive action of reaching across denominational lines. In this unconventional way, the FOCUS Churches was born. FOCUS continues to be one our best ongoing expressions of solidarity with the poor.
In the 1990’s, one Emmanuelite spoke up on behalf of himself and others. He wondered out loud about how welcoming and inclusive Emmanuel was to the LGBTQ+ community. The congregation took those questions to heart and wrestled with them, ultimately coming to the conclusion that the doors of God’s kindom are open to all people regardless of age, sex, race or sexual orientation. Because of that revolutionary action, we have the joy of strangers thanking us for marching in the Pride parade. Because of your action, I have the privilege of ministering to people who might not ever cross my path. Just this month, I had the blessing of praying with a trans woman whose own faith community did not affirm her. Small, revolutionary acts that we do together.
And now as a congregation, we may cry Hosanna, save us because we are not sure of our future. But once again, some among us are modeling creative, subversive love. They remind us that the church does not exist for us, but was always, always intended for others. The good news of Jesus was never meant to be hoarded or contained in only the forms that we know and love. On the contrary, we have a mission from Jesus. A revolutionary mission to act on our beliefs, to share the creative, life-giving power of God’s love in new and perhaps uncomfortable ways as we stand in solidarity with all of those around us.
Revolutionary and subversive acts do not have to be grandiose or immediately altering. The powers that be cannot control, stop, or even anticipate the next revolutionary act. May this be so for all of us. Amen.
[1] Borg, Marcus J. and John Dominic Crossan. The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’ Final Days in Jerusalem (New York: HarperCollins, 2006), p. 18.
[2] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/sunday-of-the-passion-palm-sunday-2/commentary-on-mark-111-11