Byron Townsend

Jesus’s pilgrimage to fulfill the Passover promise.

Byron and his family have attended St. Alban's since 2018. He teaches our Sunday morning lectionary class and regularly participates in music ministries.

Today's devotional is based on:

“The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them; they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them. A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road.”

Matthew 21:6-8

Click here to read the appointed scripture for Sunday in the Sixth Week of Lent.

Devotional

Palm Sunday ain’t about the frond. It’s about reenacting and remembering the day Jesus of Nazareth entered Jerusalem to suffer under Pontius Pilate, be crucified and buried. Jewish pilgrims, including Jesus, gathered back then to celebrate Passover. Jesus, however, pilgrimed to Jerusalem to fulfill the Passover promise. Just as death “passed over” the Egyptian homes whose door frames were covered by the blood of a sacrificial lamb, so we remember liberation through Jesus, the Lamb of God, Who takes away the sins of the world.

Palm Sunday invites us into Holy Week to remember the deep cost of Love and to celebrate the immeasurable value of Grace. We pilgrim through life in a series of Holy Weeks wherein we suffer imperfections, die to self, and learn to be buried in Christ. The liturgy guides us: We pilgrim into the chapel. The Gospel reading pilgrims down the aisle, a reminder the Word dwells among us. We pilgrim to the altar to receive the Gifts of God. Finally, we pilgrim back into the world in peace, with strength and courage to love and serve God with gladness and singleness of heart; through Christ our Lord. Wave the frond, Hosanna in the highest!