Palm Sunday - Welcome the King

The week had finally come for which Jesus had been born - the week He would bear the penalty for our sin. The week begins with praise and a crowd affirming that Jesus was the Messiah. Jesus always did things deliberately, but now especially, this last week.

Matt, Mark, Luke spend 1/4 of their gospels on this last week. John spends 1/2. It tells us the importance of what is happening these 8 days. The long-expected King was coming to His people in their capital city.

Matthew 21:1-11

Jesus and all the Jews were preparing for the Passover the next week. It began with a weeklong festival called the Feast of Unleavened Bread and ended with the Passover. The Passover commemorated the deliverance of Israel from bondage. Passover was celebrated to remember that God had delivered Israel from slavery under the Egyptians. God instructed them to sprinkle the blood of a lamb over their doors. That night, the angel of death came over Egypt and took the firstborn of every house except for those whose doors had the blood of a lamb; they were saved. The whole of Israel was saved then too as they left Egypt and slavery.

What an incredible scene, Jesus, the true Passover Lamb, coming to celebrate the festival that foreshadowed His coming for 1475 years.

v. 1 - traveled east to west: Bethany, Bethphage, Jerusalem - took them over the Mount of Olives and through the Kidron valley, east of Jerusalem.

vv. 2-3 - Jesus demonstrated his omniscience, seeing a donkey and a colt. (The other gospels just mention the colt.) If Jess's knows what's going on with livestock, he knows every detail of you life.

vv. 4-5 - He came on an unbroken donkey, which was more symbolic than useful. 550 years prior to this event, Zechariah saw Jesus' coming to bring peace.

He rode in on a donkey because it was foretold that 1) He was the King who had been promised, the Messianic King. 2) not a king of war, but a king of peace.

He challenged the people and rulers of Jerusalem to either accept or reject him as their king of peace.

vv. 8-9 - An act of honor, respect, praise of Jesus as Messiah. From Psalm 118 - part of the Hallel Psalms (115-118) that were sung at the Passover meal to celebrate Israel's escape from slavery in Egypt.

"Hosanna!" which means "save!" The term became an exclamation of praise. Comes from two words:

Yaw-shah'; to be open, wide or free, i.e. (by implication) to be safe, to free:— to help, preserve, rescue, save. Carries the idea of freeing or delivering or releasing or liberating. It has a broad meaning. Save me from sin, from trouble, from suffering, from whatever confines me. Save my family from financial struggle, from illness, from broken relationships. Save my community from child abuse, absent fathers, violence, greed. Save the nations from oppressors, wars, famine, disease.

Anna – ah now! I beseech you. Oh now! Pray now! It is a plea for God to act to bring about His purpose, His salvation.

Psalm 118:25-26 "Now, Lord, save us, now, Lord, fulfill your purposes for us, now." There was an urgency in their praise of Jesus. They were praising and praying, "Lord, save us. We beseech you. Save us now!"

Vv. 10-11 Jesus' triumphant entry caused the eyes of Israel to be on him. It forced the Sanhedrin, the Roman government, and Israel as a whole to decide what to do with Jesus, to welcome him or reject him.

Do we welcome Jesus with that kind of urgency? Or are we half-hearted? "Jesus, come into my life - but not too far. Don't come into these areas of my life, just the parts I want you in. Stay out of my finances and my attitude about my wife and work

We like to keep Jesus at an arms length; close enough to help us when we need him but far away enough that we don't have to change.

Now, Lord, now, save us. Bring about all your purposes, not mine, yours.

Welcome the King. Welcome Jesus into your lives, families, community, world.