Happy Palm Sunday! It will be an exciting time in many churches and children’s ministries today. The palm branches will be flying in many church services. It can be a confusing time for the kids and since the event happens so close to spring break, I had to draw this Palm Sunday cartoon!
For those who don’t know what Palm Sunday is, here’s an explanation. The story is found in all four of the Gospels.
Fifty-five years ago, it was a balmy Palm Sunday in Indiana. My mother was five months pregnant with me. It was evening and even though it was stormy, they were getting ready to go to church.
My grandparents lived about five miles southwest of my parents. My Uncle Preston was with them. As they were chatting, they suddenly felt things go deathly quiet. Uncle Preston rushed out to the mailbox. To the northwest, he saw the tornado. He ran back in and told everyone to get in the coal bin. He rushed to the phone to call my dad.
Double Tornado at Midway Trailer Park, between Elkhart and Goshen, Indiana-April 11, 1965: Paul Huffman for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration / Public domain
My parents had lived in their house for less than a year. My uncle says he had no idea what their phone number was and couldn’t recite it afterward. But by the grace of God, he remembered it and called Dad.
My parents were at the front door when the phone rang. Dad hesitated for a moment but decided to answer it anyway. After all, this was a time before voicemail and mobile phones. If you missed a call, you had no idea who was trying to reach you.
Dad answered the phone and Uncle Preston told them to take cover. Mom and Dad got into a closet. As they waited and prayed, they could hear the tornado approaching like a mighty freight train.
When it was over, they emerged from the house. There was devastation all around them. A neighboring house was gone.
Today, the tornado they were spared from would be considered an EF-4. That one tornado killed twenty-eight people and injured over 100. It was one of the forty-seven tornadoes that killed 267 people in six states on that Palm Sunday.
You can read about the event at these sites:
My parents lived to see another day. And four months later, I was born. I am thankful for the quick reaction of my uncle, for my parents’ wise choices and their faith as well as the grace God gave that day to my family. Three generations of the Spear family could have been snuffed out that day. I am grateful to be alive today.
This day reminds me it was less than a year ago when the community I now live experienced the Memorial Day Tornadoes. It was a series of tornadoes that affected Indiana as well as Ohio. This time, it was my wife and taking cover when an EF-4 tornado passed south of us. It was a miracle no one was killed in this series of tornadoes. Once again, it is another reason I am grateful to be alive today.
As we remain hunkered down in our houses during a stay-at-home order, I am reminded how precious and fragile life can be. It may get aggravating being in our homes. But we have faced crises before. We can expect COVID-19 to not be our last crisis. I am just thankful for the life I have gotten to live and for one more day to live.
It’s Palm Sunday and the start of Holy Week for Christians across the world. It is a very different Palm Sunday for almost everyone. Frequently, our day would start out with wrangling kids, passing out palm branches and marching them into the sanctuary with a triumphant flair.
Palm Sunday reminds me of what a difference a week makes. Jesus goes from riding into Jerusalem triumphantly as the crowd shouts “Hosanna! which means save now! They are expecting a king which will abolish Roman tyranny and establish a new kingdom.
By the next Sunday, Jesus had been arrested, convicted, crucified, died, and resurrected from the grave. No wonder the disciples’ heads were spinning! A lot can happen in a week.
This Palm Sunday, there won’t be spring breakers going to Florida. There won’t be churches with boys and girls bugging each other with palm branches. What there will be are faithful people gathering together around a computer or television to worship. We will remind each other that things can look bleak, then turn in an instant. We will encourage each other with the hope that things are rarely what they appear and they will be better someday.
We will also implore God to Hosanna!: Save now!
Save now, I beseech thee, O Lord: O Lord, I beseech thee, send now prosperity.
Psalm 118:25-26 King James Version (KJV)
Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord: we have blessed you out of the house of the Lord.
Last month, I got to spend spring break in Florida with my wife and daughter. Each time I’ve gone down for spring break, palm branches would be on my mind. For a kid from Indiana, they are exotic. But in Florida, they are as common as Indiana maple leaves.
When something is common to us, it loses its meaning. To the disciples, that Sunday when Jesus entered Jerusalem could have been just another amazing day with their teacher. They had three years of amazing days. It may have felt common. But soon, they would realize how amazing that event was. In less than a week, the crowd would turn on the one they praised with “Hosannas.”
I drew this in 2010 for Kidzmatter Magazine.
Tomorrow will be a day that makes full use of the palm branch industry across the country. Many churches will have kids marching into big church with palm branches held high.
I love Palm Sunday because it is a time of celebration before the drama of Passion Week. We go from the high of Palm Sunday to the low of Good Friday, and back to the high of Easter Sunday. Life is that way. We have highs and lows. Sometimes there are in the course of a day. Take time to celebrate the high points in your life. And when the low points come, remember that things are cyclical. Eventually, a high point will come again.
I drew this in the Adobe Illustrator Draw app. It was a quick sketch on my iPhone.