Palm Sunday: Focus on the meaning of Palm Sunday and not on just the Palm

Palm  Sunday, the beginning of Holy week for Christians

Palm Sunday is a moveable Christian feast that falls on the Sunday before Easter Sunday. It commemorates Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, where he was welcomed by a crowd waving palm branches.

In the Philippines, young coconut leaves are woven into decorative shapes to mimic the palm and olive fronds used in the Bible.

Some Filipino Catholics take home the palm fronds after the Palm Sunday Mass, in the belief that placing these on doors and windows can ward off evil spirits and lightning.

But that is not what Palm Sunday based on Biblical scripture represents for Christians.

Palm Sunday is the Sunday before Easter that begins the Holy Week. It is the day that Christians remember and celebrate the day Jesus entered into Jerusalem as Savior and King. As Jesus rode a donkey into the town of Jerusalem a large crowd gathered and laid palm branches and their cloaks across the road, giving Jesus royal treatment. 

The hundreds of people shouted "Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven!" 

On the heels of Palm Sunday, as Christians begin the Holy Week, may we constantly are reminded of its significance and value for our lives today. That very important day in history, when Jesus began His journey towards the cross, where he died for all of us, so that all could live .

A group of young school children in first grade, somewhere in a small rural town were told to write an essay after they were read the famous classic about the "Ants and the Grasshopper" which tells the story of the carefree life of a grasshopper compared to those of the always industrious ants . 

Where the Grasshopper has fun the whole summer, without collecting and storing any food for the winter, while the industrious ants collected food for the winter. Eventually, of course, that the ants make it through the winter and the grasshopper freezes to death. 

Anyway as the teacher of those first graders starts to receive the essays  of her pupils and reads them,  she finds that most of her pupils show real compassion for the cricket, many suggesting that some of the ants could give the cricket at least part of their food, so the cricket could probably survive and live through the winter.

One child's essay, however, stood out among all of the essays.  It was from a six year old girl who had been going to church regularly with her Mom, she suggested in her essay, that like Jesus, one ant could give all his collected food supplies to the cricket and die for him instead, so that the Cricket and all the other ants could lve. 

EU-Digest