It always seems strange to begin the season of Advent with the story of our Lord’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem, but we do it every year. I mean, it just feels out of place as you take out the Advent Wreath and light the first candle and have a Christmas Tree up with all the Chrismon’s decorating it. On your way into church, you may have been listening to Christmas carols on the radio. You have no doubt started your shopping and begun all the planning necessary for the big day. Then you come in here and the Gospel reading for the day is about Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey. You come to worship and instead of Christmas you get Palm Sunday. This is how the Church prepares for Holy Week, not Christmas! What are we to make of this. We could change it, of course. In fact, many churches do. They switch to something more festive, more fitting for the season. But I am one who assumes that those who have gone before me knew what they were doing. So, before we just skip over this reading, we ought to give it the thought it deserves.

The text tells us of the arrival of Jesus outside of Jerusalem. His instruction to the disciples is to go in, find the donkey, and bring it to Him. You probably already know this is a fulfillment of prophecy, Zechariah 9:9, to be exact. It says, “Behold, your King is coming to you; righteous and having salvation, humble and mounted on a donkey.” But the real thrust of the scene is what happens as our Lord begins to ride into the Holy City. A huge parade develops among a mob-like fervor which takes hold of the people as they begin to lay their garments on the ground and wave palm branches in the air, and overall treat Him like royalty. But it is what they are saying that is the real clincher to the whole scene. In fact, what they are saying is the reason this text is at the beginning of the season of Advent. “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming Kingdom of our father David! Hosanna in the highest!”

“Hosanna” is one of those peculiar words in the New Testament which are universally left untranslated in pretty much every English version. The other big one is “alleluia,” which means “praise God.” But “hosanna” is not an expression of praise or adoration, rather it is a cry that comes from a very different starting point. Hosanna means: “Save us!” This is the cry on the lips of the crowd on Palm Sunday, and it is the perfect word to begin our season of Advent. Save us! Just think about it for a moment. To cry out for salvation means there is something you need saving from, something you cannot deliver yourself out of. Hosanna, at its core, is to express the need for a savior outside of your own ability, outside of your own works. Hosanna is a word of desperation, longing, and hope.

We take a look around our world, scan our feeds on social media, or turn on the news and there we are greeted with complex systems of human organization, broken and twisted into structures of oppression and greed. We have governments colluding with corporations, influencing the masses, pitting one person against another for the sake of profit or power or both. We watch the unfolding tragedy in Gaza and quickly turn away as the images of suffering and death become too much to bear. We cheer on our chosen political party and demonize the other side in a desperate attempt to cling to hope for tomorrow. We ravage and destroy our planet just as we ravage and destroy one another. We have gotten good at exporting our catastrophes, hiding them in the cobalt mines in the Congo or the sweatshops in China. We are trapped and drowning in an evil and broken world. And from our ash heap we hear the cry, “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!”

But let us be honest, we do not have to turn our attention to the world “out there.” We do not need international news of tragedy and destruction to come face to face with the reality and ubiquity of evil. After all, we see it play out regularly in our own lives. It is a stunning thing to be confronted with the reality of your own sin. It is startling to acknowledge there are people in your life, people who are important to you, people you honestly like and even love, that you have hurt, wounded, and failed in profound ways. Our duties of fellowship, care, and compassion for one another fall short over and again. In fact, we easily move towards selfish deeds, at times not caring who we wound in the process. You can get so focused on justifying yourself, in your quest to be happy or content, that you overlook the destruction in your wake. But every so often you see it, you observe it clearly. You are not just victims in all the suffering of our age. No, you are perpetrators as well. “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!”

The problem we all struggle with is that this brokenness, this propensity to create suffering and embrace sin flows from deep within our own hearts. To echo what Saint Paul said, the good we want to do, that we know we should do, is not what we do… at least not completely or for very long, and especially not when it is difficult or distasteful. However, the evil we know we should not do, that we can consciously say we do not want to do, is the stuff we do. We do it over and again. The sin of this age is not just out there in the world, it is not something we watch from afar. Furthermore, that sin is not even kept within our own actions, as if we could simply make better choices and overcome it. No, the problem, the root of it is anchored in our very beings. Paul sees it as a war that is being waged within his own body. He ends up asking (Romans 7:24), “Who will save me from this body of death?” And today we hear, “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!”

Every time we attempt to correct or overcome or fix what is broken in our world, in our fellowship, in ourselves, we fail. It all falls short. At our best, we seem to only manage the chaos from the margins, stringing along in the hope that perhaps tomorrow we will have an answer, a way out, a permanent solution to all that is torn and hurting. But tomorrow reveals more that is broken, more that has fallen apart, more that is beyond our control. Our governments will fail, our political parties will fail, our corporations will fail, our good intentions will fail, and our hopes and dreams will fail. When we begin to realize this, it is terrifying. It is like we are sinking beneath the waves of hopelessness and suffering. And here, drowning in our nihilism, we hear the cry once again, “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!”

Advent is about the arrival of God. But He does not come just to demonstrate His glory, to reveal how powerful and mighty He is. No, what we are focusing on is how our God comes as the answer to the cry of, “Hosanna!” Jesus comes to save, to do what you could never do. He comes to bind what is broken and heal those who are sick, to forgive the sinners and love the unlovable. He comes to be the sacrifice in your place, to save you from your sin. God advents with His people so that He might live as they could never live and die the death they deserve. He advents with you to give true hope and assurance. For you have a Savior who will not let the waves sweep over you. No, He reaches down into your sin and certain death and pulls you up to life everlasting.

God has come, and He continues to come even now. He arrives in your life through water and word, bread and wine, confession and absolution to declare, “You are forgiven.” So, a better day does await you, a day without tears, suffering, and pain. For God hears your cry, “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!”