Regime Change? Challenging the things we hold dear
Preacher: Dr Matt Ward, Student Support and Experience Manager, University of Dundee
Readings: Philippians 2:5-11; Matthew 21:1-11
My battle to retain any sense of seasonality has been lost.
On Thursday I walked into our student enquiry hub and found a colleague putting up a Christmas tree. So I’d like to start with a prayer – the collect for the 3rd Sunday before advent.
Almighty Father, whose will is to restore all things in your beloved Son, the King of all: govern the hearts and minds of those in authority, and bring the families of the nations, divided and torn apart by the ravages of sin, to be subject to his just and gentle rule; who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of holy spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
It may feel odd to begin Holy Week with a prayer that sounds as though it belongs in another season. But perhaps that is exactly right. Because this week confronts us again with the question of what kind of king Jesus is, and what kind of Kingdom we are actually longing for.
As a prelude to a festival celebrating freedom from oppression a new set of oppressors stages a Military parade –
Soldiers in armour, weapons drawn march down the main street, an imposed governor watches from the back of his chariot. It’s a spectacle.
A show of power, asserting authority, imposing control.
The strategist would argue it was vital act in a city swollen to 4 times its usual population with pilgrims commemorating an ancient liberation from Egypt.
It was acceptable to remember that story, so long as no one got ideas about repeating it.
The display of force was there to make one thing clear. Rome was watching.
What Rome understands — and what every empire understands — is that power likes to be seen.
It likes ceremony, visibility, and the choreography of fear.
It wants to occupy not only streets and buildings, but the imagination:
[Pilate high is Zion dwelling, Rome with arms the world compelling. ]
Meanwhile on the other side of town….
… A man rides a donkey through a cheering crowd.
Maybe the crowd is alert enough to spot the prophetic sign …’Behold, your King is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey’
Our gospel writer certainly wants us to see it….
And the crowd cries out words from the psalms ‘Hosanna’ – ‘save us, we pray!’ – ‘blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’
Perhaps some knew enough of Israel’s story to catch the royal symbolism too: Solomon rode David’s mule when he was anointed king.
Or perhaps some were simply caught up in the electricity of the moment. Either way, Jesus’ entry is impossible to miss.
Was it political theatre? An anti-imperial demonstration? A satirical parody of Roman pomp? Or a prophetic unveiling of the true king?
Most likely, it was all of those at once.
Whichever way it was read, it certainly caught the attention of both the local religious authorities and the occupying imperial power.
It set Jesus still more firmly on the road to the cross.
[The dews of death are gathering round thee. ]
For all our talk of unprecedented change, it does not take much to notice how little has really changed in two thousand years.
Those who want control of the world’s resources still impose their will on others. And the easiest means remains force, coercion, and violence.
We are still drawn to the fantasy of regime change: the hope that if only the right people were in charge, if only the wrong ideas were swept away, then the world would finally be put right.
We hear it in the sound bites of a President.
We see it on the news feed pushed at us by the algorithms that shape what we see and reward what provokes us.
We feel it as we approach an election – whether that’s for a new government or a student exec.
From the global to the local, and from the local to the personal, we are often tempted to imagine a world reordered around our own assumptions, our own preferences, our own sense of what would make things right.
Too often, that is a distorted perception. We want a Messiah who will defeat what we fear, vindicate what we value, and leave us unchanged.
But Christ does not come in domination, spectacle, or force.
He comes in humility, self-giving love, and obedience.
And that is difficult for us, because spectacle is often easier to trust than humility. We are drawn to what looks effective, decisive, and unmistakably strong. We like the idea of problems being solved cleanly, of enemies being exposed, of history being pushed in the right direction by sheer force of will.
But Jesus refuses that script.
He does not come to satisfy our appetite for victory on familiar terms. He comes to show us a different kind of power: not the power to crush, but the power to heal; not the power to dominate, but the power to bear, to serve, and to redeem.
Palm Sunday is not only about recognising Jesus as king. It is about asking whether we are willing to follow the kind of king he is.
As Philippians reminds us, he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant. And so the beginning of Holy Week asks something personal of each of us: will we let the mind of Christ be formed in us?
Whether we’re students, academics, professional service, chaplains, or anyone else, that may mean asking uncomfortable questions.
What sort of success am I chasing?
Where am I curating an image?
Where do I want control?
Who do I find easy to dismiss?
What would servanthood look like in my workload, my friendships, my activism, my disagreements?
For some of us, that may mean loosening our grip on the need to appear impressive.
For some, it may mean paying attention to the person who is consistently overlooked — in the seminar room, in the office, in the corridor, in the flat.
For some, it may mean resisting the habit of turning other people into obstacles, rivals, or instruments of our own success.
For some, it may mean allowing our convictions to be shaped not only by anger at what is wrong, but by compassion, patience, and the refusal to dehumanise.
And for many of us, especially in a university culture that prizes achievement, it may mean remembering that our deepest worth does not rest in productivity, performance, or polish, but in belonging to Christ.
Holy Week does not ask us to become impressive. It asks us to become attentive: attentive to Christ, and therefore attentive to those among whom Christ is found — the overlooked, the burdened, the anxious, the lonely, the scapegoated, the exhausted.
Our Gospel reading shows a crowd hoping that the brutal and unjust world they inhabit will be decisively overturned, and that a new order, more recognisable and more satisfying to them, will quickly take its place.
But there’s a mismatch between their outsized expectations and God’s apparently small answer –
The king riding on a donkey does not come to overthrow military power by unleashing ‘overwhelming violence’. He does not meet spectacle with spectacle. He does not answer domination with domination.
Instead, he gives God’s strange answer: an upside-down kingdom. A kingdom in which greatness is shown in service, authority in self-emptying, and victory in surrender. That is why Christ can seem so underwhelming to us at first glance.
We want transformation on our terms. We want visible power. We want quick resolution. We want history to bend dramatically and unmistakably in our preferred direction.
Instead, Jesus comes gently. He comes vulnerably. He comes in a way that can be missed, or dismissed, or mocked. And yet this is the way God chooses to reign.
At the start of this Holy Week, perhaps the invitation is not to imagine ourselves only in the crowd shouting “Hosanna,” but also to ask where Christ is coming to us now — quietly, disruptively, humbly — and whether we are willing to receive him.
Whether in our studies, our friendships, our politics, our conflicts, our ambitions, or our hidden fears, the call is the same: to have the mind of Christ formed in us.
Not a life of passivity. Not a retreat from injustice. But a life shaped by the crucified king: courageous, truthful, self-giving, and gentle. That is not an easy calling.
In the words of Benedictine nun – Sister Ruth Marlene Fox:
“May God bless us with discomfort — discomfort at easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships, so that we may live deep within our hearts.
May God bless us with anger — anger at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that we may work for justice, freedom, and peace.
May God bless us with tears — tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, hunger, and war, so that we may reach out our hands to comfort them and turn their pain into joy.
And may God bless us with foolishness — enough foolishness to believe that we can make a difference in this world, so that we can do what others claim cannot be done.”
That is not the foolishness of naivety. It is the foolishness of Holy Week: to believe that humility is stronger than pride, that mercy is stronger than violence, and that love is stronger than death.
As we follow the king on the donkey into this week, praying for the grace not only to praise him, but the courage to allow ourselves to be shaped more and more into his likeness.
Amen.