Rev. Jared Buss
Pittsburgh New Church; April 13, 2025
Readings: John 12:12-19 (children’s talk); Leviticus 23:39-40; Apocalypse Explained §458.4-5
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Those people on the first Palm Sunday were so excited about the Lord—and wouldn’t it be great if we could be that excited? When was the last time that any of us were prepared to shout and cheer for the Lord? Wouldn’t it be nice if we could be so confident in Him?
Of course, those people in the reading who shouted and cheered and were so confident didn’t necessarily have the clearest ideas about who the Lord was or what He was going to do. They called Him the King of Israel (John 12:13), and presumably many of them meant that title very literally. But the Lord never became an earthly king. Being excited about something that turns out not to be real kind of knocks the wind out of the excitement.
The thing is, the Lord has given us the teachings we need to understand who He really is—and who He really is is far more wonderful than being the literal king of Israel. So we can learn something from that crowd that celebrated the Lord on the first Palm Sunday. Their ideas were off track, but their actions were dead on. They held up palm branches and they declared truths about the Lord—and the things they said were true, even if they didn’t understand them. We can do the same. Literally holding up palms and literally shouting is less important than capturing the spirit that we see in this story—a spirit that declares wonderful truths about the Lord.
Something that can help us understand that spirit better is the symbolism of palm branches. Palm branches are only mentioned in the gospel of John (12:13)—Matthew and Mark both say that people laid down branches to make a pathway for the Lord, but don’t specify that they were palm branches (Matt. 21:8; Mark 11:8). But nobody ever pictures people using any other kind of branches than palm branches on Palm Sunday—after all, it’s called “Palm Sunday.” And the teachings of the New Church confirm that the symbolism of palms is important to this story.
We might be tempted to think that people chose to lay down palm branches for practical reasons: palms branches are fairly flat, so if you put them in someone’s path they’ll make a carpet rather than a barrier. That might have been part of the reasoning, but there’s more to it than that: it’s clear that, even at the time, palm branches were understood to be symbolic of something. A piece of evidence in support of this is that the ancient Israelites were instructed to use palm branches during some of their religious celebrations. Here are some of the instructions, given in the book of Leviticus, that pertain to a holiday called the feast of tabernacles: [read 23:39, 40].
So the people were told to “rejoice before the Lord” holding fruits of the tree of honor, and three different kinds of branches: palm branches; leafy branches, or branches with thick foliage; and willow branches (v. 40). It’s pretty clear that these instructions would never have been given unless these specific fruits and branches represented something. Our next reading is a passage from the Heavenly Doctrine of the New Church, from the book Apocalypse Explained, about the symbolism of these trees. The first part of this reading reviews all of the trees mentioned in that passage from Leviticus; the second part focuses on the specific meaning of palm branches. We read: [§458.4-5].
There are two ideas that we’re going to draw out of that reading and focus on. The first is that palm-trees symbolize “spiritual good—that is, the good of truth;” the second is that people used to hold palms in their hands “to testify to their joy of heart.” These two ideas are, of course, connected, and the connection between them captures the spirit that we see in the Palm Sunday story. There’s something in there about truth, and there’s something in there about joy and testimony: the spirit that we’re talking about today is a spirit that puts those things together.
Palms are said to symbolize spiritual good, which is the same thing as the good of truth. The good of truth means good that comes from truth. It’s the good that comes from living the truth—the good that comes of doing what you know to be right (see the beginning of AE §458). A good idea in your head is just an idea. We may call our ideas “good,” but ideas all by themselves don’t accomplish anything good. It’s only when we do something with them that they can have a positive effect on the world—so that’s the point at which an idea actually becomes good. The good of truth is simply truth that we bring to life. So palm branches fundamentally represent truths, or true ideas—but they represent truths that we love enough that we’re willing to do something with them (cf. SH §8369).
And when we do what we know to be right, we feel happy. We feel joy. So the reading from Apocalypse Explained says that all joy of heart is from spiritual good, “for spiritual good is the… love of spiritual truth” (§458.5). When we love spiritual truth, and therefore do it, the result is good and that good makes us happy. All of this is what palm branches symbolize. And the reading says that, because of this symbolism, people in ancient times used to hold palm branches in their hands to “testify to their joy of heart”—joy that comes from believing and living a truth. That’s why people chose palms when the Lord rode into Jerusalem. They may not have understood all of the symbolism that we’ve just gone over, but they knew—because it was in the Old Testament, and because it was an ancient custom—that palm branches were symbolic.
Elsewhere in the Heavenly Doctrine the symbolism of palms is explained a little bit differently. In the book Apocalypse Revealed we read that, “Holding palm branches in the hands symbolizes confessions springing from Divine truths because palm branches symbolize Divine truths” (§367). We’ve got the same basic components in this statement as in the longer reading from Apocalypse Explained: something about truth and something about declaring that truth, or testifying to it. But the word “confession” is one that we need to take time to understand. A “confession” is a heartfelt acknowledgment of something. Nowadays this word is mostly used when people acknowledge bad things that they’ve done—people confess their sins, or confess to their crimes. But the word doesn’t have to have such a narrow meaning: we can confess good things too. When the Heavenly Doctrine talks about confessing the Lord, or about confessions springing from Divine truths, it’s talking about a heartfelt acknowledgment of who the Lord is and what He does. And what He does is really, really good. So confessing the Lord actually means something very similar to thanking the Lord, and also praising the Lord (cf. the translation of Is. 51:3 in SH §100). With these ideas in mind, you can maybe start to see the overlap between “confessions springing from Divine truths” and “testifying to your joy of heart.” The spirit that these phrases capture is the spirit that’s symbolized by holding up palm branches to the Lord.
All of the details in the Palm Sunday story symbolize things that have to do with truth. We’ve already talked about the palm branches. The clothes that people spread on the road and placed on the donkey for the Lord to sit on also symbolize truths (cf. Matt. 21:7, 8; Mark 11:7, 8; Luke 19:35, 36)—our own truths, or our own ideas, which we lay down before Him. We’re told that when the disciples put their garments on the donkey, this represented “the recognition that truths in their entirety were the foundation on which the Lord as supreme Judge and King rested” (SH §9212.6). The donkey itself symbolized that the Lord was the supreme Judge and King—and again, that symbolism would have been known to the people who were present at the time. In ancient Israel, judges and kings rode on donkeys (SH §2781.7-8, 9212.5-6). So those people shouted out that the Lord was the king of Israel (John 12:13). And in the Heavenly Doctrine we’re told that, “the title ‘king’ in reference to the Lord symbolizes Divine truth” (AR §664). Palm Sunday is all about celebrating and declaring truths.
And what truths did the people declare when the Lord rode into Jerusalem? There are two that come to mind. They called Him the King of Israel, and He is a king—He’s the King of Heaven, and of all creation. But before those people shouted out that He was king, they shouted out “Hosanna,” which means “save us” (John 12:13). By shouting this, they were declaring that the Lord could save them—that He had the power to save them. So, essentially, they were declaring the same truth that was declared by that multitude in our recitation from Revelation—the multitude who held palm branches in their hands and cried out, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (7:10)
The Lord is King, and salvation is His. Within the context of Christianity, these truths are a given. If you’ve grown up in the church, then you’ve heard these truths all your life. They’re the basic teachings of the church. But think about the difference between knowing these truths and confessing them—lifting them up to testify to your joy of heart, because you love these truths and you’re willing to live in their light.
Take the truth that salvation is the Lord’s. We need the Lord to save us. If we know this truth, but don’t confess it, the result can be that this truth makes us feel anxious: what if He doesn’t save us? We’d better cross our spiritual t’s and dot our spiritual i’s, or else we won’t secure His salvation. We can hold that truth so differently: the Lord is salvation! He has all power in heaven and on earth to save us, to make us safe, and that power can be with us now. He can save our souls: He can surround our souls with safety, safety that the world cannot take from us. Confess that truth—testify to it with joy. “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” (John 12:13)
Or take the truth that the Lord is King. The Lord is in charge—He’s the boss, and we’re not, and so on. We can understand this truth and find no joy in it; we can even resent it, because it means that we should probably do what He says. But the truth that the Lord is King is something to celebrate—because if He’s in charge of this crazy world, then maybe the world isn’t as crazy as it seems. Sure, a lot of stuff goes wrong, and we sure don’t have the power to fix it. But if the Lord is King then there is something good reigning over all of this—and justice will prevail in the end, because a Divine king would never permit it to be otherwise. That’s a truth that we can celebrate.
This particular church, the Pittsburgh New Church, hasn’t historically been one in which people shout out praises during worship. And that’s fine—there are lots of different ways to worship, and they all have their own merits. We don’t need to literally shout out praises; but we are meant to do more than think about the truth. Just because we know a truth doesn’t mean that we get it. Ultimately we’re meant to do what the truth teaches us to do—but while we’re on that road it’s also good to look for and celebrate the goodness of those basic truths about the Lord and His kingdom. Yes, we know them. Do we confess them? Do we rejoice in them? We can do these things together—for example, when we sing during Sunday worship. We’re also called to do them individually, in our prayers and in our lives. Do we lift up those palm branches in our own spirits? Do we cry “Hosanna” to the Lord?
Amen.