PALMS (2025-35)

"What is Palm Sunday?"

I raised my hand to the square as I faced our Primary kids. 

“Is it the palm of my hand?”

Most of the older kids shook their heads, raising their voices to explain that the palms were branches of palm trees waved toward Jesus the Christ as he entered Jerusalem for the last time.

We who are members of the Christian Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have always celebrated with joy and reverence the atonement and resurrection of Jesus Christ as central to our beliefs. We consider Easter to be the holiest of holy days. 

Where I perceive we have been lacking in the past is celebrating with reverence the physical, emotional, and spiritual power of the events of the Holy Week before the pivotal resurrection. I see this changing and am grateful for it. It represents the living nature of a restored gospel.

When I was a young teenager, I wanted to wear a cross necklace, mostly to represent to myself and others that I was a Christian and devotee of Jesus as the Christ. I asked some of our local church leaders why we didn’t have crosses in our churches, and why I never saw LDS people wearing crosses. Their answers always included the concept that we celebrate the resurrection more than we honor the death on the cross.

“But is there not some way to represent the resurrection then? Doesn’t the cross represent both?”

I ended up not wearing a gold cross on a necklace.

I do believe it would have been a unifying symbol to other Christian sects if we had embraced the cross as a universal symbol of Christianity rather than appearing to snub it as less than complete.

Now I regularly wear that antique cross I inherited from my forward-thinking mother. Fewer people consider it rebellious than even a few years ago. We are making progress as a people. I join my faith with others who proclaim Jesus Christ as the maker, Lord and Master of this world.

The intelligence and mindfulness with which the Savior of mankind approached the final week of his life and his impending horrific death is worth our attention and our deepest reverential gratitude. For so long he had been compelled to hold back on his power. A God in the form and environment of a human. It had to have been so hard to hold back and not shake peoples’ shoulders shouting, “Seriously! If you only knew!”

It had to have been, for Him, a relief and a deep sorrow to finally be able to profess the reality of who he was. The release would also be the downfall. He knew the path it would take, the blasphemy he would be accused of, the shaming and the requirement to submit to power lesser than his own. I can imagine how emotionally exhausting it was, besides the actual physical suffering. This is worth the waving of my palm. And it is worth the raising of my arm to the square, exposing my palm, making covenants with Him, not just to show my reverence, but to bind me to Him and Him to me.

Yesterday, Palm Sunday, just under two thousand years after the original event, we in the Somerset Ward Primary handed palm branches to our young Primary kids. They sang, “I’m Trying to Be Like Jesus” as they stood in two rows along the pathway of our Primary Room. Some of them chose to wave their palms. Some chose to lay them in the imaginary pathway where Jesus would pass. Grown up believers pretend-witnessed that they had seen him, and knew of his divinity. We welcomed these impressionable and intelligent young beings to embrace the wholeness of Jesus the Human, who is part of Jesus the God. 

The room was set up like a courtroom. Josh Simpson was Bailiff,
Dave Connors donned his judicial robes as judge,
Libby Hansen was the attorney. 
Each witness raised their palm to the judge and swore to tell the truth.

Rebecca (Tori Simpson)
witnessed she waved a palm before Him on his triumpha,l entry.

Peter (Matt Youngs)
 witnessed that he shared supper with Him,
received a new commandment
and Jesus washed his feet.

A soldier (Daniel Groberg)
testified Peter cut off his ear and Jesus restored it,
even while they arrested him. 

Mary the Mother of Jesus (Amy Lopez)
 witnessed she had known Him from birth to death

Mary Magdalene (Alisa Larsen)
wept when she saw the stone had been rolled away

Each child was given a plastic egg (new birth).
Then each witness gave them a token to put in their egg,
with a folded paper to remind them what the tokens represent.

Primary President Trish Hutchinson
adds her modern day witness. 

Jesus Christ, in reality, sacrificed with the same kind of feelings we other humans have. He understands us because he walked our earthly path. He knows how it feels to hurt, to bleed, to rejoice, to laugh, to sing, to weep. He condescended so all of us can rise. I imagine, if He perceived it to be my love language, he would raise his arm to the square and offer me a high five with the scarred palm of his own hand.

He knows how it feels to be afraid,

He knows how it is to be deeply wounded.

He anoints our suffering with his blood and makes us holy.

If you would like a copy of our script for this 40 minute presentation, email me at cori@coriconnors.com