The Wrong Sort of King?

Thank you, choir, for a wonderful job today. They’ve spent many weeks working on this cantata, and I believe God was glorified in it.

Now, I don’t want to keep you all much longer, but I do want to say something about Palm Sunday and the glory that Jesus received as He came into Jerusalem on this day, so many years ago.

If you have your Bibles, please turn with me to .

Jesus, knowing that the time was upon Him for his betrayal and knowing that this would take place in the holy city of Jerusalem, was headed there anyway.

He and His disciples, along with a great crowd of people who were following Him, were traveling along the road from Jericho to Jerusalem by way of the Mount of Olives.

READ

Now this prophecy appears in the book of Zechariah:

Zechariah 9:9 NASB95

9 Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation, Humble, and mounted on a donkey, Even on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

Behold, your king is coming to you! He is just and endowed with salvation.

What a great message.

And salvation is just what the people of Israel were looking for. They were being oppressed by the Romans, and they were more than ready for the Day of the Lord that God had promised through the Old Testament prophets.

Read 11

Jesus came into Jerusalem to a hero’s welcome. The laying of coats on the road was a reminder of how the Jews had welcomed new kings in the days when their land was still a kingdom.

In John’s account, we learn that the branches being laid on the road ahead of Jesus were palm branches.

John 12:11–12 NASB95

11 because on account of him many of the Jews were going away and were believing in Jesus. 12 On the next day the large crowd who had come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem,

John 12:13 NASB95

13 took the branches of the palm trees and went out to meet Him, and began to shout, “Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel.”

We see here that the people were plainly acclaiming Jesus as their King. Their reference to “He who comes in the name of the Lord,” referred to the Messiah who had been long promised through the prophets.

Note that Jesus rode the colt into the city. As the Son of God and from the line of David, he surely could have chosen a more stately way to enter Jerusalem, but he came in humility, gentleness and peace.

Even this humble entry, however, had stirred things up in Jerusalem. In fact, that word, “stirred” in Verse 10, is the same Greek word that’s used of earthquakes and other apocalyptic events.

Some translations say the city was “thrown into an uproar.” That’s probably closer to what had happened.

But why?

Well, what we’re seeing here is the same range of reactions to Jesus that people have today.

Some people proclaim Him as King, and some people want to put Him to death, to take His name and His teachings and bury them in a tomb somewhere.

The people of Israel wanted a king, but they surely did not want one who came into Jerusalem riding a donkey’s colt. They wanted a king who would come into the city on a warhorse, ready to go to battle against their Roman oppressors. They wanted a king who would make their nation great again.

They did not want the Suffering Servant of Isaiah’s prophecy. They did not want the sort of king who would tell them to sell everything they had and give it to the poor, as Jesus had told the rich young ruler on His journey to Jerusalem. They did not want the sort of king who would overturn the money-changers’ tables in the temple, as Jesus would do when he visited the temple after entering the city.

In short, they didn’t want a king who would upset their way of life.

And that’s not so different from how much of the world responds to Jesus today.

The world loves the meek Jesus who said, “Suffer the little children to come to me.” But they hate the Jesus who promises to come again with great and terrible judgment for all the earth.

The world loves to remind us that Jesus chose not to condemn the woman caught in adultery, but it ignores the Jesus who told her to go and sin no more.

Even among those who profess to be Christians, we love the Jesus who died on the cross for our sins, but we’re not so keen about the Jesus who said, “Take up your cross and follow me.”

But we cannot take Jesus on our terms. He offered Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of mankind, but receiving that gift means sharing in His death. Following Jesus requires us to die to ourselves and live to Him. Following Jesus means acknowledging His rightful place as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

No king in history would allow blatant insurrection to go unpunished.

No king

And blatant insurrection is a perfect description of what sin looks like to the God who created us in His own image to represent His kingdom on earth.

Five days after what we now call Palm Sunday, many of the same people in the crowd that had proclaimed Jesus as king and Messiah shouted something different: “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!”

Jehu, like all of the other kings of the Northern Kingdom, was an evil king, but the people loved him.

The insurrection then reached its peak as the people the Messiah had come to save jeered and mocked Him as He hung on the cross.

But the insurrection continues today.

With the risen Jesus sitting on His throne in heaven, you have a choice to make: Will you accept the gift of His sacrifice for your sins? Will you make Him your King? Or will you continue to seat yourself on that throne?

Make no mistake. The same Jesus who allowed Himself to be led as a Lamb to slaughter will return. This time, he will come on a white horse, the kind of warhorse the people wanted to see Him riding nearly 2,000 years ago as He rode into Jerusalem on that colt.

But this time he will come in judgment. This time the insurrectionists who have not repented for their sin and submitted themselves to Him as their rightful King will be judged.

You can submit to the humble king who gave Himself as a suffering servant. Or you can submit to the one who will come with a robe dipped in blood and a sharp sword ready to strike the nations.

Either way, the insurrection will be over, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is King.

Which king will you see? To which king

The people of Israel hailed Jesus as king, and then five days later they crucified Him.

What will YOU do?