Graphic by Illustrated Ministries

Kindred in Christ,

Jesus didn’t enter Jerusalem with dominating force. He came to show another way. And that way still surprises us today.

This Holy Week begins with palms and hosannas, but the story does not end there. In Matthew 21:1–11, Jesus enters Jerusalem on a humble donkey, more like a street protest than a royal parade. While empires rely on spectacle and power, Jesus shows nonviolence, humility, and radical love. That very disruption leads to his arrest and crucifixion. God’s love is not passive. It is courageous. It challenges injustice and invites us to imagine a different world.

This Sunday, we will gather for Palm Sunday worship, waving palms and joining the procession. We will then continue the movement by heading down to the lake for the baptism of M Bredl. In baptism, we encounter holy disruption: a letting go, a dying and rising, and an opening to the unexpected work of God.

Holy Week calls us to move from expectation into wonder and notice how God moves in quiet, surprising, and deeply subversive ways. That movement is not just something we remember—it is something we live together.

On Saturday, our wider community will gather for the No Kings Protest, standing against systems of domination and lifting up justice, dignity, and shared humanity. This echoes Palm Sunday, a public witness to another way of being in the world. You are invited to join me and others, see below for more information.

May we have the courage to follow Jesus this week—not only in celebration, but in the costly, beautiful work of love that transforms the world.

Alongside you,

Pastor Paul Ortiz