Some of my favorite gifts have been donkey paraphernalia.
Once I received a set of donkey facts for my birthday, I’ve kept that list in my important documents tab for some years now.
Recently on a particularly rough day a dear friend slipped something in my hand, it was a donkey. I drew strength from that wooden donkey effigy and in the weeks following I slipped that donkey in my pocket and would rub my hand over it when I needed a bit of reassurance. I place him on the bathroom counter next to a tiny Jesus and look at them each and every day.
On really hard days I take the donkey with me and leave Jesus to stand firm.
My love of donkeys began about the time my children were the age where they acted like donkeys. Donkey became a part of the Martin lexicon as noun, adjective and an adverb.
As I’ve aged and my children have as well I’ve come to love and appreciate donkeys for the beautiful creatures they are and it all harkens back to one day, this day, Palm Sunday.
That first Palm Sunday morning the King rode on a donkey into Jerusalem, a sign of coming peace. There were shouts of praise and accolades, knowing in less than a week’s time those same fickle folks would be shouting “Crucify Him!”
I think about that donkey from time to time, the one that had never been ridden, the one that fulfilled an over four century old prophecy, that baby donkey that wasn’t too far from his mama but was charged with the responsibility that would literally mark all future donkeys thereafter. I think about how he ushered in the single most significant event in all of history, in all of mankind, and in all of the world.
Did that singular donkey have any idea what his act of obedience and service would mean for all of humanity?
Do any of us donkeys for that matter?
Palm Sunday was just the beginning, the beginning of out with the old and in with the new, the beginning of a new way of healing, a new way of living and a new way of being.
Palm Sunday was the countdown to the completion of the work that began way back in the Garden. A setting right what our Mom, Eve and our Dad, Adam got so messed up. Palm Sunday was so much more than palm fronds and donkeys, Palm Sunday is the day humility wins, servant-hood prevails, and the evidence is put forth that the donkeys of this world really do make a difference.
