Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 1

Cursed is anyone who hangs on a tree. Galatians 3:13 (NASB)(Show this. I will not read it. Leave it up until the next slide.)

This is Palm Sunday.It is Palm Tree Sunday.

That name & tradition comes from how people waved palm tree branches when Jesus entered Jerusalem the week before he went to the cross.

The gospel of John tells usJohn 12:13They took palm branches and went out to meet him [Jesus], shouting,

“Hosanna!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Blessed is the king of Israel!”

They waved palm branches and shouted “blessed is the king!”

In the Old Test, Isaiah 9, shows us that that’s the connection they made.In Isaiah 9 a palm tree is used as a synonym for a head of state.

Probably because a palm tree has such a long high top, it was a symbol of elders, dignitaries, and kings – those at the top.

Waving palm branches for Jesus meant they thot He was the Messiah, the promised Son of King David,

heir to the throne, who would establish his kingdom forever and ever.

They hoped Jesus would establish a material kingdom and overthrow the Romans by force.

But Jesus had come to establish his spiritual kingdom. and overthrow sin and death by the cross.

Palm branches show and say that Jesus is the King, the Messiah.

I had a thought about the branches.I’ve been to Jerusalem.

It’s a very dry region.It’s not a sandy desert, but it is like Southern Arizona dry.

In his directions to the Israelites about the Feast of Tabernacles,God tells them to go to the hill country for palm branches.

Palm branches lying on the ground would be rare in Jerusalem.And, people needed wood to cook every day,

so if they fell, they would get scooped up immediately.

Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 2

So, some boys or men would have had to have founda nearby grove of palms and climbed them.

Or on their way to Jerusalem for the Passover Feast, some stopped and climbed the palm trees they passed,

to get branches to wave.

I think it’s certain, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree.

Who here has climbed a tree or two in their day?

I always liked to climb trees.(Pic) In my childhood, we had an maple tree in our front yard.

I loved the helicopter propeller seeds it dropped.We’d throw them up and watch them spin down.

And I loved the low hanging sideways branches it had. I remember you’d hang on one and swing your legs up and over it

and then pull yourself up.Maples have the best branches and open layouts for climbing.

(Pic)I also remember one time in around 4th grade climbing a pine tree.

I climbed it to the top; 20-25 feet high, or so, I think. I still can picture it in my head.

And I proceeded to try to draw attention to myself with a Tarzan yell and holding the top of the tree and swaying back and forth hard,

... until the top snapped off and I went tumbling backwards.

As I fell back first down through the branches,I remember having the thought “oh no, this is bad!”

I hit the ground on the side of the slope of a hill and the slope broke my fall a little,

because I got up and was amazed that I had not been hurt!I remember my neck was stiff later and for a couple days.

But I should have broken it.

When we get older, that’s what we say will happen.“Get out of that tree! You’ll break your neck.”

A few weeks ago, I went to Washington DC with my wife and boys.We were out front of the American Indian Museum and my older boy Wesley, who is 19, started climbing this tree.

And I said, “You better get down from there. You’ll get a ticket for climbing a tree here.”

Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 3

“No I won’t,” he said in his “I know everything” tone of voice. :) “I bet it’s illegal to climb trees in the National Mall,” I said in mine.

“No it’s not.” “Get down anyway,” I concluded.

(Pic)Here is my other son Josh in a tree at Ohiopyle a few years ago.

His mom kept telling me to tell him to get down, too.But he’s the king of this tree!

I had to give equal time.

When we become parents we lose our love for climbing trees. Most of us do.

We tell our kids, “Get out of that tree. You’ll get a ticket.”Or “you’ll break your neck . like that Pastor Tim should have

when he fell on it when he was a kid.”

Why is it . that a part of us loses that love for climbing trees when we get older?

Pete Nelson never lost it.Does anybody know who Pete Nelson is?

He’s on a TV show on Animal Planet?

(Pics) He’s the Treehouse Masters guy.

Treehouse Masters is a show about making modern treehouses.They’ve taken the old thing we did as kids, tree houses,

and they build them for adults.They make huge treehouses with bedrooms & baths & big screen TVs.

They’ve made a Santa’s Workshop treehouse.A recording studio treehouse.A hobbit treehouse.A wedding chapel treehouse.And just lots of huge family retreat treehouses.

When Pete goes to a property to build a treehouse for a customer,they search the property for the best tree – the right tree.

And since Pete is from Oregon where everyone is a little wacky :), he acts like finding the tree is a spiritual experience for him.

... the trees speak to him.

When he feels he’s found just the right tree, he climbs it. Grown man that he is – he gets up in it to become one with it.

He finds the one tree and he climbs it to become one with it.

Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 4

Some might argue that one tree in a forest is very much like any other. But that’s not always true.

(Fall forest)Imagine for a moment you’re out for a walk in the woods on a fall day.

The sun is warm.But there’s a faint hint of frost in the sparkling air.

All the trees are decked in gold and crimson.For some reason, the beauty of the scene escapes you.

Maybe it’s because you’re preoccupied, mulling over a problem.Maybe you’re tired.Maybe you just don’t have the eyes to see.

Then all at once, you pause as a particular tree catches your eye.For some reason you can’t explain,

this one tree catches your attention in an extraordinary way.It may be a red maple. It may be a yellow poplar.

It may even be a tree that’s dropped.In any case, it’s just like all the other trees you’ve seen that day

and your whole life, for that matter, but for some reason

this tree feels like the most beautiful tree in the entire world. You see it more clearly than any other tree.

You reach out and touch it. Feel it.If you’re young enough,

maybe you try to pull yourself up into it.If not, maybe you climb it with your eyes.

You imagine making your way up it from branch to branch. You see the path up.

It’s an encounter. A revelation.You feel like it’s fired your imagination.And you go away changed.1

(Pic)If all the victims of crucifixion

in the history of the Roman Empirewere to be hoisted back on their crosses and gathered together in one place,

they would make a very . large . forest. (repeat)In such a scene,

would there be anything to distinguish one cross from another?... No. nothing at all.

1 The idea and much of the language for the walk in the forest and the forest of crosses comes from Mike Mason. The Gospel According to Job. pg.386 .

Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 5

But One would be different.One would be more beautiful than all the others.

It would be decked in crimson and gold.

If you have eyes to see it, You would see that it is the most beautiful tree in the whole world. Maybe,it could fire your imagination.Maybe you could imagine climbing it with your eye.

You see the path up.Maybe you pull yourself up into it.

The Apostle Paul talked about a tree. In the letter to the Galatians he said: Cursed is anyone who hangs on a tree. (Galatians 3:13)

He calls the cross that Jesus hung upon .. a tree. (3x)A cross is a tree. It’s made of wood.

Jesus took our curse, when he hung on a tree . for us.

The Apostle John tells us about how Jesus hung on a tree for us. A snap shot from that scene:John 19:10-11, 16-19 “Do you refuse to speak to me?” Pilate said. “Don’t you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?” Jesus answered, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above. ... So the soldiers took charge of Jesus. Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha). There they crucified him, and with him two others—one on each side and Jesus in the middle. Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the cross. It read: Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.

Jesus told Pilate, “You would have no power to crucify me, if it were not given to you from above.

Elsewhere Jesus said, “I lay down my life for my friends. No one takes it from me.”

No one took Jesus’ life from him – He gave it.No one crucified Jesus without his willingness.

Jesus climbed the tree for us.Jesus climbed his tree for us.

Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 6

There is no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. Earlier, before this happens, in Luke 14 Jesus is aggravated by the Pharisees and how they argue

with him over healing on the Sabbath.And so Jesus tells a parable about a wedding feast where some people

think they’re important so they sit in places of honor, but when the bridegroom comes he moves other people up to those spots.

And then he tells a parable about inviting lots of people, but everyone has an excuse for not coming.

So, he goes and invites all the lowly people, the poor, the outsiders.

Jesus is telling the Pharisees, “You think you follow God,but you are not as honorable as you think.

God is inviting you in through me, And you keep finding excuses for not following me.”

Then Jesus tells them what it takes to be his follower.He says, Luke 14:27-33“Anyone who does not take up his or her cross and follow me, cannot be my disciple.” (2x)

Now, I know I’m stretching the metaphor just a little now.But I think we could say that,Jesus calls us to climb a tree for Him.

Jesus says we need to take up what he took up.We need to take it up willingly.We need to willing climb onto, what He climbed onto.

In the surrounding passage he implies that this means: We have to be willing to quit all our excuses and do it.We have to be willing to respond when he calls.We need to be willing to give up our families, our homes, even our lives

if that’s what it takes to follow Him.We need to climb up to love for all the lost people in the world.We need to climb up to laying down our lives for Him.

One of my favorite verses in the Bible, Galatians 2:20 says,I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

We need to die with Jesus, and let Jesus live through us.

Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 7

That’s what it means to take up our cross – to climb our tree.There is no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree.

There is no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree to get some branches that day Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey.

There is no Palm Sunday if Jesus doesn’t climb his tree to take the curse for us and to show that He is the King of Kings.

There is no Palm Sunday for you if you don’t take up your cross and climb it in your life and follow Jesus as your leader and Lord.

Last one.Henry David Thoreau, wrote an essay called “Walking.”

It is one of his most famous essays.It extols the virtues of immersing oneself in nature.

In it he talks about the meaning of the word sauntering.Do you know the word.Saunter, sauntering, saunterer.

It means a slow casual stroll.

He says the word is derived “from idle people who roved about the country, in the Middle Ages, and asked charity, under pretense of going a la Sainte Terre.”

A la Sainte Terre – to the Holy Land. Saint – holy. Terra – land. Saunt-ter

The children would say, “There goes a Sainte-Terrer,” a saunterer, a Holy-Lander.

But the saunterers would never go to the Holy Land in their walks, they were pretenders, idlers and vagabonds.

Some of us who follow Jesus today are saunterers.We claim to be following Jesus, but we never go anywhere.

Today I challenge you to take up your cross and really follow Jesus. Climb that tree with Him, if you will.

Even though it’s not safe.No matter how old you are.No matter if you have to leave all to do it.No matter if this world supports you or opposes you.

Let Jesus live his life through You.Let Jesus be your king – the king of your tree.

Sermon, 2014-04-13, There’s no Palm Sunday if someone doesn’t climb a tree. 8

If you’ve never asked Jesus to be your Lord and Savior,

I challenge you to do that today.

Look at that One tree – the cross. See it again or for the first time.

It is decked in crimson and gold – the blood of a King. See it like you’ve never seen it before.

See it with the eyes of faith.

Jesus died on his tree, his cross, to take your curse for your sin.So that you could be forgiven and have eternal life.

In order for that to happen Jesus says you need to follow him.You need to take up your cross and be his disciple.

Learn from him.Follow his example.Obey him.Let Jesus live in you, by his Spirit.

If you’d like to become his follower and receive his forgiveness,Please bow your head and pray with me.

Let’s pray.