There is a time-honored story about a little boy who was sick. It was Palm Sunday and the children waved palm branches to open the service. But this young man stayed home from church with his mother.

His father returned from church holding a palm branch. The little boy was curious and asked, “Why do we wave palm branches on Palm Sunday, Dad, and why do we call it Palm Sunday?”

“You see,” his Dad explained, “when Jesus came into town, everyone waved palm branches to honor him, so we got palm branches in the worship service today.”

The little boy replied, “Aw, Shucks! The one Sunday I miss is the Sunday that Jesus shows up.”

Well, I’m confident that Jesus will show up today, even though we will not be able to welcome him with quite the excitement with which the crowd in Jerusalem welcome…