Brandan Robertson's Holy Week Devotions

Hey OneBodyOneFaith, Brandon Robertson here.

I'm so honoured to get to spend Holy Week with you through providing a series of short devotions from Palm Sunday through Easter Sunday focusing on the theme of embodiment.

What does it look like for us as queer Christians and allies to embody the way of Jesus?

Each day throughout the holiest week of our Christian calendar, I'll provide you a short reflection on what was happening in the life of Christ on that particular day as a way for you to go deeper into the story of the last week of Christ's life and to contemplate what it looks like for you to be a follower of Jesus in this moment of our world's history.

I'm really excited and honoured to get to share Holy Week with all of you in this way and I hope you're signed up for OneBodyOneFaith's email so that you can get one of these devotions each day from Palm Sunday through Easter Sunday.

Brandan's Devotions will be available, daily, on our website from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday.

Click on Brandan's photo to view the video.

 

Palm Sunday:

t’s hard not to see Palm Sunday as a coming out of sorts. On this day, Jesus is declared to be the Messiah in public for the first time as he rides into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey as people declare Hosanna! Throughout the three years of Jesus ministry, there is a trepidation about his identity- he constantly is being revealed to be the Messiah and just as constantly tells people to keep his true identity a secret. There is a myriad of reasons for why Jesus acted in this way- he was fearful of the implications if he was found out to be the Messiah too soon, which could hasten his arrest or intensify his persecution. Perhaps he was unsure of his identity, as we see in the Garden of Gethsemane where he wrestles with if he is truly the one to accomplish God’s mission in the world, eventually declaring “Not my will but yours be done.” Whatever the case, on Palm Sunday, for the first time in his life, Jesus steps out into the world as the long-awaited Messiah and is met both with celebration and judgement. Many are inspired by Jesus’ boldness and the promise of his Messianic identity. Many others are fearful, because they do not understand how someone like Jesus could be the Messiah and what it could mean for the stability and norms of their religion and culture. If you’re a queer person, you might recognize that these are often the responses we receive when we step out of the closet and into the light of our true identity. Some will cheer us on and welcome us as we finally stand in the light of truth, but many will recoil in fear, judgement, and anger, born out of their own lack of understanding and unwillingness to have their conceptions of the world challenged. Yet in the face of such possibilities, we only have one real option- to step into our God-created identity and trust that while we may face loss, critique, or persecution, ultimately, God will bring about resurrection and new life as we live in our true selves. Jesus came out as Messiah on Palm Sunday, knowing full well what was likely to come in the days ahead. But instead of allowing fear to keep him locked in the closet, he knew that for his life to have the biggest impact, he needed to be true to who he was and what he was called to do. And thank God he did- his boldness and bravery led to the redemption of all the world. Our choice to live authentically, to refuse to pushed into closets of shame, to allow the world to see us for who God made us to be is also the path that leads to our own liberation and will liberate others as well. So, on this Palm Sunday, may we all commit to being the authentic people God made us to be, trusting that whatever comes, living in the truth will always bring about flourishing and renewed life. 

Holy Monday:

We don’t know about what Jesus did in the early parts of Holy Week. After his coming out parade on Palm Sunday, it’s likely that he did what so many of us did when we came out- spent time with his chosen family (his disciples) and experimented with what it was like to be out in the world finally standing in his true identity. I imagine Jesus spent time among the thousands of people who had gathered in Jerusalem for Passover, teaching, healing, and casting a vision for what the world would be like when God’s Kingdom was established on earth as it is in heaven. As people watched and listened to Jesus, now living out loud, I am sure that many people were astonished and inspired- a person who is fully themselves is a person that draws the attention of others and provokes them to throw of the masks of their own, allowing God’s light to finally shine fully through them. Similarly, living as a queer person is a constant provocation for transformation: it’s not just our coming out that provokes transformation, but our day to day choice to be our true selves, to refuse to recloset parts of our identity, and to keep showing up in ways that sometimes subvert the “norms” of our culture or context helps to inspire everyone else in our lives to reexamine the way that they live, the systems they perpetuate, and the ways they have conformed themselves to fit someone else idea of who they should be in the world. It’s not just queer people that need to wrestle with our identity- it’s all of us. Virtually all people have been conditioned and forced into boxes of someone else’s creation. Which is why it’s so important for queer people to stand, like Jesus, in our authenticity and allow that to teach others that there is a better way to see and be in the world. Our existence is radical, our lives are provocative, and when we commit to living out loud, we will ignite transformation in others’ lives, leading to a more diverse, expansive, and beautiful world for us all. 

Holy Tuesday:

During Holy Week, Jesus continued to teach in the Temple Courts and around Jerusalem where thousands of pilgrims had traveled to observe Passover. Jesus knew what was likely going to happen as he spoke his truth- it would provoke others who didn’t understand or didn’t want to understand, yet he kept speaking. Holy Tuesday is an invitation to us to not give in to the loud voices in our culture that are spreading lies, not to believe that our voices will never be heard or have the ability to overcome the voices of fear. Jesus’ voice wasn’t loud. He was not a popular or famous Rabbi. The people who listened to Jesus during holy week were those who didn’t know who he was and had no reason to trust his words. But he continued to speak, continued to teach, continued to show up and promote that which was true in the face of dissenters, threats, and critique, because he knew that truth mattered, no matter how loud it was spoken. On this Holy Tuesday, may you be encouraged to keep speaking your truth in whatever sphere of influence you have. Keep showing up for those who are being marginalized and oppressed, keep shining a light on the better way forward, and keep being authentic to who God made you to be. Jesus didn’t know that his words would transform the world, but he spoke anyways. When we speak the truth and trust God with the consequences, we will be astonished at the lives that can be touched and how the world can transform right before our eyes. Keep speaking what is true. The truth always wins in the end. 

Holy Wednesday:

In many traditions, Holy Wednesday is a day for reflecting on the woman who comes to Jesus and pours out a box of perfume upon his feet, offering her best to Jesus because she believed that even as a person with little to offer in the eyes of her world, God could give her life purpose, meaning, and a new start. As queer people, the language of repentance can often be triggering, since we’ve so often been told to repent of who God made us to be. However, the idea of coming to God and giving all that we are, giving our best in surrender, and asking God to use us in all of our uniqueness and with all of our flaws to bring light and love to the world is one of the most transformative steps we can take. We’re conditioned in our world to believe that we need to orchestrate our entire lives- we need to make a plan and follow it, avoiding mistakes or failures or else our lives will unravel completely. Jesus taught the very opposite- his invitation is to come to God in authenticity and to surrender, saying “May your will be done.” The unnamed woman who surrenders to Jesus, offering the most costly perfume she has is a symbol of complete surrender to God, trusting that God will forgive and redeem our pasts and take the best of who we are and use it to bring about God’s kingdom in the world. Surrendering to God and following God’s guidance is not easy, and it will sometimes be costly, but it also ensures that our lives will be live authentically and filled with purpose, impact, and wholeness. On this Holy Wednesday, may we follow the example of this remarkable woman, pouring out our lives to Jesus and inviting him to take us in our authenticity and use us to bring about healing and redemption in the world. 

Maundy Thursday:

On Maundy Thursday, Jesus does something astonishing- days after he has fully revealed himself to the be the Messiah, gaining the excitement and devotion of his disciples, he does an act that challenged his disciples understanding of how transformation would come to the world and powerfully demonstrate the message he’d been preaching to them for the last three years. One evening as they gather together in a friends flat, Jesus gets down on his hands and knees and begins to take their dirt covered feet, one by one, and washes them. This was an act that was usually reserved for servants or was only done as a show of deference and respect when a respectable individual entered your home. This was certainly not something that one would expect the Messiah, the King, to be doing to common people like the disciples. Yet Jesus had a message he wanted to imprint into their heads- that the path towards true transformation of the world does not come through power and strength, through hierarchies and power. No, true transformation- of the human heart and of every other part of our world can only come through loving our neighbors as ourselves- Jesus key message. For Jesus to stoop down and wash the feet of his disciples was a demonstration of his deep love for his friends, but also a profound display of how he understood God’s ordering of the world. In this moment, I can imagine Jesus’ words ringing in the ears of the disciples as they witness this scene- “The first shall be last and the last shall be first”. In front of their eyes, the one they believe to be the rightful ruler of the world is washing their feet. This was the mission they were called to live; this was the way that God was going to bring about renewal and redemption in the world. Not through conquering others, not through political power, not through demonizing their enemies, and not through rigid social hierarchies. No, the way that God in Christ was going to transform the world was through one subversive act of love and service at a time. And indeed, this is the message that we too are called to remember in this period of human history especially- to not put our hope in politics and power, but in service and love. This is how God is transforming the world, and this is the invitation for all those who follow Jesus to join God in this transforming work. To embody the way of Jesus, not just in our words, but in everything we do. 

Good Friday:

On Good Friday, Jesus willfully gives his body and soul over the systems of this world, exposing them for the brutal, death-dealing mechanisms that they are, all the while embodying the true path of salvation and liberation for humanity. This is the profound mystery and power of the cross. It is at once the scene of gruesome violence directed towards an innocent man for his willingness to cast a different vision for how to order the world and a profound symbol of what true love looks like- a willingness to give ourselves fully for the good of another. So much of Christian theology glorifies an abusive image of the cross- either that God willingly sacrificed his son, turning in shame at the hour of Jesus deepest need, or promoting the idea that willful sacrifice of our lives and wellbeing is necessary to secure God’s forgiveness. Both ideas pervert the true message of the cross. 

On Good Friday, as we gaze at the cross of Christ, we see Jesus being killed because of his devotion to living the truth- he refused to conform to the unjust systems of the empire that had been oppressing his people for decades, and continued to teach that there was a better way. Jesus dies because his truth threatened the injustice of the empire. It inspired the oppressed to believe that there was hope for them to create a new and better life and world. And at the moment of crucifixion, the full deception of the empire becomes clear for all to see- it’s not a path that leads to flourishing, but to death, and all of Jesus’ followers experienced that in the horrific scene of his death. 

This is a scene that queer people are far too familiar with- so often, we have seen our own people sacrificed at the hands of religion and society that fears difference, that fears authenticity, that fears any other way of being that doesn’t conform to what is “traditional”. And so, they react with violence, abuse, and fearmongering, which has far too often resulted in the suffering and even loss of life of beloved queer children of God. In these moments, the cross becomes a powerful symbol: a reminder that God is with those who suffer for embodying their truth, and a reminder that the systems of this world that value conformity over authenticity always lead to destruction. As we experience Good Friday, let us take time to express the grief that we have for the brokenness of our world- letting our bodies feel the heaviness that we often try to repress- while also knowing that somehow and some way, God is with us in the darkest moment of suffering.  

Holy Saturday:

Holy Saturday is one of the most often overlooked but one of the most “real” days of the Christian calendar. On this day, the disciples do not know who they are, what to believe, and what is going to happen. They are full of exhaustion and grief after seeing their beloved teacher and friend murdered by the empire, but somewhere, deep within them, there is a seed of hope that Jesus himself planted that perhaps the story is not over yet. Holy Saturday is a liminal space, the space between mourning what was and having our world turned upside down by what emerges. Frankly, most of our life is lived in Holy Saturdays- in between spaces, spaces of regret or looking back to what was, while also hoping and dreaming for what might come on the road ahead. This is what most people do on Holy Saturday- look back, look forward- but the invitation is actually to do neither. The invitation is to be present with what is. To feel in our bodies the mixed emotions that we have as we face loss, transition, dashed dreams, and glimmers of hope. To allow the silence to speak to us, to allow our true thoughts and feelings to arise within us, and to allow the still, small voice of God to whisper words of healing and truth to our souls. Far too often we rush from grief towards hope, from Friday to Sunday, and this feels satisfying, but in doing so we bypass processing the grief and pain that we have. When we do this, we ensure that it will continue to pop up in unpleasant and unhelpful ways on the road ahead until it finally gets us to stop and be present with it- to feel it deeply, to sit in the discomfort- and then to move forward in wisdom and healing that only comes through walking through the fires of our pain. So on Holy Saturday, don’t rush to Sunday. Sit with the grief of Friday, the pains of your past, the wounds of your childhood- sit, like the disciples did, with others who have walked the similar road, and allow what you feel to simply be felt. Healing is coming, hope will arise with the morning light- but now is a time to feel and to process, knowing that God is with you even in the valley of the shadow of death. 

Easter Sunday:

We’ve made it, dear friends. Easter Sunday is the affirmation that the broken systems of this world will not have the final word, that hate and fear can never vanquish the power of love, and that liberation will truly triumph over every force of oppression. This can be hard to believe, though, can’t it? This is why Easter is a day that requires faith and trust that even when we might not be able to see how love will win, how truth will vanquish the lies, how healing will emerge from the wounds that we carry, that the way God has ordered the very structure of the universe is such that new life will always emerge out of death, light will always overpower the darkness, and the cold harsh winter will always be defeated by the bursting beams of the sun dawning on a spring morning. This is the way that reality works. This is the message that Jesus came to embody. His disciples hopes were dashed as they watched Jesus be murdered at the hands of the empire. Yet Jesus constantly taught that in order to bring about his renewed world, he’d face the wrath of the empire, but that God would have the final word. But this is hard to understand, hard to believe, until it happens. Easter is the proof that it will happen. Jesus emerges from death pulsating with life, proving that the empires power was an illusion- true power comes from living in truth, beauty, goodness, and love. As we celebrate Easter, may your faith be stirred within you, may you believe that God will not abandon you or our world, but is working to bring about new life and redemption out of the pain and fear. This is a day to walk in faith, to celebrate that which we might not be able to see or imagine right now, but that is promised to us by the good news of the Jesus- the Kingdoms of this world will be transformed to the kindom of God. May we continue to strain towards making that a reality in faith, hope, and love on this day, and every day.