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For Palm Sunday

For Palm Sunday

Last updated on: March 29, 2026 at 4:26 pm by Dan Peterson

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For Palm Sunday 2026-03-29T16:26:56-06:00 Dan Peterson

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Jean-Léon Gérôme, “L’entrée du Christ à Jérusalem” (1897)
Wikimedia Commons public domain image

Today was/is Palm Sunday, commemorating the day on which, according to accounts given in the New Testament, Jesus entered triumphantly into Jerusalem to the acclamation of large crowds, who spread palm fronds and robes on the ground before him to prepare his way, shouting “Hosanna!” Within just a few days, he was dead.

I would love to give credit for this, but I don’t know to whom the credit belongs. Anyway, I think it clear and useful.

We’ve now entered into Holy Week, and I’m very happy that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is emphasizing this season more than it traditionally has and is expanding the focus beyond Easter in isolation. Here are some resources that you might find helpful for today and for this week leading up to Resurrection Sunday, Easter:

“Holy Week Insight: President Holland Explores the Last Moments of Christ’s Life: Engage in deeper study during these sacred days with the Church’s Easter resources”

“The First Presidency’s 2025 Easter Message: ‘He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows … and with his stripes we are healed’”

“First Presidency’s Easter Message” (2026)

Officially from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: “Experience Jesus Christ’s Greater Love For You. Experience Holy Week.”

From the Church News: “Archeological insights and modern witnesses of Easter: Ancient findings and a living Prophet and Apostles help deepen understanding, says Richard Neitzel Holzapfel”

“What is Palm Sunday and why does it matter to Latter-day Saints? Palm Sunday commemorates Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem”

“Christ Appears in the Kirtland Temple,” by Walter Rane (legitimate use, I hope and think)

A year ago, I was struck by this report: “How Palm Sunday in New Zealand involved an Apostle and shouts of hosanna in a house of the Lord: ‘To shout hosanna to God and the Lamb on Palm Sunday is a singular experience,’ says Elder Patrick Kearon as he dedicates the Auckland New Zealand Temple”

Last year, Richard Winmill shared the quotation below on Facebook, and I’m reproducing it here. (I hope he’s okay with that.) With my wife and others, I was in the Kirtland Temple at about this time of year in 2025, and, while we were in the lower assembly hall, our guide, Elder Rory Scanlon (retired from teaching in the theater program at BYU, where he also served as associate dean for the college of Fine Arts and Communication), mentioned the significant fact that the temple’s dedication took place on Palm Sunday, 1836. Also, while we were there we sang “The Spirit of God like a Fire Is Burning,” as they did at the dedication of that first temple and as has been done at every temple dedication since. The chorus of that great hymn reads as follows: “We’ll sing and we’ll shout with the armies of heaven, ‘Hosanna, hosanna to God and the Lamb! Let glory to them in the highest be given, Henceforth and forever, Amen and amen!'” Here now is the quotation that Brother Winmill shared:

“A Latter-day Saint reading of the triumphal entry on Palm Sunday lays out yet another level of significance between Jesus’s last week two millennia ago and his future Second Coming. The dedication of the Kirtland Temple on March 27, 1836, occurred on Palm Sunday that year, and the appearance of the glorified, risen Lord to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery (Doctrine and Covenants 110: 1–10) occurred on April 3, which was Easter Sunday. This timing has led Robert Rees to observe the following: That entire week, in fact, seems to have been a holy week, for on Sunday, March 27, Joseph dedicated the temple and, at the conclusion of his dedicatory prayer, the congregation sang “The Spirit of God like a Fire Is Burning” and then partook of the sacrament. Joseph recorded, “We sealed the proceeding of the day by shouting hosanna to God and the Lamb 3 times sealing it each time with Amen, Amen, and Amen.” Although Joseph does not so indicate, this is the shout given by those who welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem on the first Palm Sunday.”

— Greater Love Hath No Man: A Latter-day Saint Guide to Celebrating the Easter Season, by Eric D. Huntsman and Trevan G. Hatch

“Christ Carrying the Cross” (El Greco, ca. 1580) (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

One of my absolute favorite pieces in the Latter-day Saint hymnal is this one, with lyrics by Karen Lynn Davidson (1943-2019), a one-time professor of English at Brigham Young University whom I knew slightly, set to music by Hans Leo Hassler (1564-1612) that was later modified by the great Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). It’s great at any time, but especially at Holy Week and on Easter Sunday:

1. O Savior, thou who wearest
A crown of piercing thorn,
The pain thou meekly bearest,
Weigh’d down by grief and scorn.
The soldiers mock and flail thee;
For drink they give thee gall;
Upon the cross they nail thee
To die, O King of all.

No creature is so lowly,
No sinner so depraved,
But feels thy presence holy
And thru thy love is saved.
Tho craven friends betray thee,
They feel thy love’s embrace;
The very foes who slay thee
Have access to thy grace.

Thy sacrifice transcended
The mortal law’s demand;
Thy mercy is extended
To ev’ry time and land.
No more can Satan harm us,
Tho long the fight may be,
Nor fear of death alarm us;
We live, O Lord, thru thee.

What praises can we offer
To thank thee, Lord most high?
In our place thou didst suffer;
In our place thou didst die,
By heaven’s plan appointed,
To ransom us, our King.
O Jesus, the anointed,
To thee our love we bring!

From left to right: Quinton Kappel as Heber C. Kimball, John Donovan Wilson as Brigham Young, Twyla Wilson as Mary Ann Young, and Ted Bushman (who is, by the way, the grandson of the historian Richard Lyman Bushman) as Wilford Woodruff, in a scene from the 2024 Interpreter Foundation film Six Days in August.

Just a reminder that the tenth installment of Becoming Brigham goes up tomorrow (Monday), and that a half-minute teaser for Episode 10 is already up. And that you can watch the nine preceding episodes at becomingbrigham.com.

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