April 13, 2025 – Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion [C]
By Fr. Drew Hoffman
Luke 19:28-40 + Isaiah 50:4-7 + Philippians 2:6-11 + Luke 22:14—23:56
Over the past few months, the iconic musician Bob Dylan has received increased attention thanks to the popular biopic, A Complete Unknown. While Mr. Dylan’s personal life has sometimes let much to be desired morally (as all of ours do), many of his songs transcend popular music and speak of deeper spiritual truths The great Bishop Robert Barron has been influential helping me see this strange but beautiful interplay. While I love many of Dylan’s most popular songs… Like a Rolling Stone, All Along the Watchtower, Blowin’ in the Wind… one of my favorites has always been the simple yet tremendous Gotta Serve Somebody.
Throughout the song, Dylan provides a litany of possible lifestyles for the listener: they may be an ambassador or a gambler, a state trooper or a landlord, a councilman or an heir. Regardless of what the person has or does not have, what they have achieved or failed at, one thing remains: You gotta serve somebody! Whether you are famous or a nobody, at the end of the day, you’re going to have to serve somebody. As Dylan aptly notes, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, you’re gonna have to serve somebody. Regardless of who you are or what you’ve accomplished, to think you can live a life where you don’t serve somebody is naïve and foolish. Something will always demand my attention; I will always end up tied to something.
As Jesus prepares for His Palm Sunday procession, He fulfills the Zechariah’s prophecy of the king coming to His people lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. To bring this prophesied donkey into His service, He asks His apostles to find a colt tethered on which no one has ever sat. Then, they must untie it and bring it here. Before he is in the service of the Lord, the colt is tied up. He is not a wild colt, running through the countryside and enjoying his wide-open spaces. No, he’s tied up, in the service of a master.
How often we hear the atheistic critique that to follow the Lord means to enslave ourselves to another and give up our freedom. Yet what do we mean by “freedom”? The truth is that we often flail in rebellion against service to the Lord while we are already in service to so many other things. We are tied to pleasure, notoriety, power, and money. We are slaves to influence, dominion, and popularity. Yet we are terrified to be in the service of the master who has need of it. At the end of the day, I’m going to have to serve somebody. It might be the devil… mediocrity and selfishness… or it might be the Lord. But we cannot be naïve and think we can live a life where we do not serve anybody. I can be untied for the Lord or tied up for the devil. But I cannot live a life where I do not serve anybody and just do whatever I want. It is simply not a true option.
Friends, where do I need to be untied? One space may be through a great Confession this Lent. In the Confessional, I name those things that are tying me up and I renounce them, offering them to the Lord and allowing Him to untie me for service to Him. Examining my conscience and offering my sins to the Lord are the best ways to switch our service from the things of this world to the Lord. We are going to have to serve somebody… will it be the devil, with his allusions of freedom and false pleasures? Or will it be the Lord who will incorporate my service into his procession to glory!