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Watching is a vote

Maybe it’s a generational thing, but it appears to me that today’s “Xers” generation thinks that by sitting on the sidelines and watching history unfold right before their eyes, that this is a “non-vote.” In other words, if I just sit and watch I am staying uninvolved and above the situation, no matte what is going on. It is like a video game. I can enter or fast forward, or even erase the situation.

As we march toward Easter, we read of Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey and the crowds throwing down their articles of clothing to give Him a red-carpet entrance into the city. Then they were breaking off palm branches and waving them in the air, proclaiming Him king. This Sunday, churches throughout the Christian world will celebrate Palm Sunday with the re-creation of this glorious event This is one time in Bible history when the crowd got it right. In fact some of the disciples tried to hush the crowds and Jesus replied, “If they were silent, even the rocks would cry out.”

Before Jesus entered Jerusalem on the colt of a donkey that had never been ridden, He paused outside of Jerusalem and “wept over it.” He knew He had been born to die! But wiping His tears, He “set His face like a flint” and gave the people another chance to “cast their votes” and cast their palms” at His feet!

Then came the horrors of the brutal crucifixion depicted so graphically in Mel Gibson’s film “The Passion of the Christ.” As Jesus passed the crowds that day there were many watchers as He slowly dragged the cross up to His execution site.

There were a few incidents of interaction of the watchers as Simon of Cyrene was ordered to assist Jesus carry the cross. Most were silent as they watched it all unfold.

The Romans were not occupiers who cared anything of what any crowd thought or felt, and certainly would have responded very quickly to any interruption of their typical brutal missions. Then there were the hearts and minds of the crowds. There were probably those in the crowd that had been fed by Jesus as part of the five thousand who heard him preach that day. Then some may have been there when Lazarus had been raised from the dead, or maybe they had been there at the wedding feast when He turned the water into wine or healed the blind beggar at the city gate.

Still, there could be no “watching non-vote” that day. So where does that bring us on this Palm Sunday? If you decide to sit it out and not worship this Sunday, you have just “voted.” There is a scripture that sounds very cold to me and yet the longer I live and minister, the more and more it proves to be true. It is a scripture that was spoken by Jesus himself and it reads, “You are either for me, or against me!” This seemingly cold and cutting scripture leaves little for debate. So now we are down to Palm Sunday, where to “say and do” nothing, is a definite vote.

I have heard it said that in churches today, “people vote with their feet,” and I would probably agree with that. So this Sunday, when the crowds finally “got it right,” place your vote!

It was said last Sunday that we went from “the church alive in the doublewide on 85, to the Sistine Chapel of Senoia.” I like Jason Wetzel, who said that.