Last week Helen and I went to see Kylie Minogue at the huge O2 arena in Greenwich. Kylie puts on a spectacular show involving incredible outfits, flying angels, fountains, scores of dancers, hundreds of lights and a dance beat that seemed to go right through you.
We were up in the gods and, as the warm-up act did their thing, Helen and I tried to estimate how many people were there. Our best guess was 20,000 and I ruefully calculated that it would take over a year of capacity congregations at St Stephen’s to match that!
The adulation of the crowd, however, is a fickle thing, as we remember each Palm Sunday. This morning we will process round the Kingswood estate, accompanied by donkeys and a samba band. As we do so, we will remember how the crowds welcomed Jesus to Jerusalem with palm branches and shouts of ‘Hosanna to the Son of David!’ Maybe they had heard that Jesus healed the sick, perhaps they had heard rumours that he had raised Lazarus from the dead, or possibly they hoped he would overthrow the Romans. Whatever their thoughts, they didn’t go very deep. For by Friday, they were baying for his blood and shouting that he should be crucified.
In a democratic society with a free press and a TV culture, popularity can be a powerful thing. But as pop stars and politicians know to their cost, a week is a long time. Perhaps that is nevermore so than in Holy Week. This week Jesus will win no popularity competitions and yet, abandoned by the world, he will be vindicated by God.
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