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OPENING
Today is Palm Sunday.
Palm Sunday is the celebration of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem at the beginning of His final week leading up to His crucifixion and resurrection.
We often connect Easter specifically with His death, burial, and resurrection.
But His triumphal entry into Jerusalem is an important and integral part of the Easter story.
It is so important, that it is recorded in all four Gospels.
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all record different aspects of this moment in Jesus’ earthly ministry.
This morning, we are going to use Matthew’s account as our Scripture text, but we may pull some of the details from the other accounts as well.
So turn in your Bibles with me to Matthew Chapter 21.
SCRIPTURE
MESSAGE
As Jesus entered into Jerusalem riding on a donkey, some of those in the crowd in Jerusalem asked, “Who is this?
What’s all the excitement about?
Why all the shouts of praise and adoration?
Can you tell us more about this Man?
Who is He?
Who is this?”
And some in the the crowd replied, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth of Galilee.”
Many people still give the same answer today.
When they are asked the question about Jesus, “Who is this,” they might respond that He was a great prophet, or an amazing teacher, or a powerful healer.
And all of those things about Jesus are true, but I’m glad today that we know that Jesus is more than just a prophet.
He is more than just a great teacher.
He is more than just a healer.
There’s an old song that says, “He’s more than just a story, He is the King of Glory, I’m glad I know who Jesus is!”
I hope you can truly say this morning that you know who Jesus is!
I hope that you can say that He is more to you than just a story in the Bible.
I hope you can truly say this morning that He is your Lord, your Savior, and your King! That’s really what Palm Sunday and Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem is all about.
It’s about responding to the question, “Who is This,” by recognizing Him as our Eternal King!
The Preparation for Jesus’ Arrival
Jesus arrived at the Mt. of Olives, just outside Jerusalem, on the first day of the week (Sunday).
He immediately tells His disciples to go into one of the villages outside Jerusalem and find a donkey and its colt and bring them to Him.
Luke’s Gospel gives us a little more detail on this part of the story:
First, Luke tells us that the colt had never been ridden.
Then Luke gives us the conversation between the two disciples and the owners of the colt.
Mark gives us another piece of information regarding how the owners responded:
In other words, they willingly let the disciples take the colt.
This part of the story is significant for several reasons:
(1) This event is significant because it was a bold announcement by Jesus that He was claiming to be Israel’s Messiah and King.
The people would have known exactly what this event represented.
We read in the book of Kings where Jehu is anointed as king and rides into town on a donkey as the people spread their clothes along the road in front of him.
(2) This event is also significant because traditionally no one else was allowed to ride on a king’s horse.
This donkey had never been ridden.
That’s what makes the way the king honored Mordecai in the book of Esther so significant.
(3) Jesus riding in on a donkey demonstrated His humility.
He didn’t ride into Jerusalem on a large, powerful war horse, because He was not coming to Jerusalem to start a physical war or to establish a physical kingdom.
He had come to establish a spiritual kingdom.
(4) This event is also significant because traditionally the only person who had the authority to seize someone else’s property was a king.
So Jesus, by seizing this donkey’s colt and preparing to ride into Jerusalem, is announcing Himself to be the King of Israel!
(5) This was also a surprising move on Jesus’ part.
Up to this point, He had gone out of His way to keep His ministry as low key as possible.
Throughout His ministry, He often told people not to spread news of Him.
Why was He now willing to make such a public announcement of His claim to be King?
The answer is that Jesus knew His hour was now come.
He knew that it was time to accomplish what He left heaven and came to earth to do.
The Prediction of Jesus’ Arrival
This moment of Jesus’ Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem was not just an random event, it was the fulfillment of Old Testament biblical prophecy.
It begins in Genesis where it is embedded in the blessing Jacob spoke over his son Judah:
We know Jesus was descended from the Tribe of Judah.
He rode a donkey’s colt as a symbol of both His humility and divine royalty and then shed His blood on the cross.
Then we find the words that the crowd shouted that day prophesied in the book of Psalms:
The words “save now” here are the same as the word translated “Hosanna!” in the Gospels.
The crowd shouted “Hosanna!” or “save now!”
They shouted “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” fulfilling this ancient prophecy concerning the coming Messiah!
Then in Zechariah we find the very specific prophecy of the way in which the Messiah, the King of Israel, would enter into Jerusalem:
The prophecy said that the Messiah, the King of Israel, would come in humble means riding on the colt, or foal, of a donkey.
This had been prophesied hundreds of years before.
And if that is not enough, God recorded in Scripture a prophecy in the book of Daniel so exact that it predicts the actual day that Jesus would ride into Jerusalem.
We call it Daniel’s 70 Weeks Prophecy.
Daniel’s 70 Weeks Prophecy is complex.
We don’t have time to go through it all in detail here today.
We spent some time discussing in during a Wednesday night Bible Study a while back.
But let me just give you a summary of it to demonstrate the power of God’s Word.
In Daniel’s 70 Weeks Prophecy, each of the 70 prophetic weeks represents a period of 7 years.
So the total prophecy covers 70x7 or 490 years.
The 490 years is broken down into three separate periods: 7 prophetic weeks (49 years), 62 prophetic weeks (434 years), and the final prophetic week (7 years).
The “going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem” is told to us is Nehemiah Chapter 2. Artaxerxes issued this command on the 1st day of Nissan in 445 BC.
Converting that date to our current calendar system gives us March 14, 445 BC.
The completion of the work to rebuilt Jerusalem was completed exactly 49 years later in 396 BC (which fulfills the first 7 weeks of the prophecy).
Then there is an additional 62 prophetic weeks (434 years) until the coming of the Messiah for a total of 69 weeks (483 years) from March 14, 445 BC.
The total of the first 69 prophetic weeks (483 years), based on the Jewish calendar system, represents a total of 173,880 days.
If we add 173,880 days to March 14, 445 BC, we arrive at April 6, AD 32, which was a Sunday, and not just any Sunday, but Palm Sunday, the exact Sunday when Jesus rode into Jerusalem riding on the colt, a foal, of a donkey!
This prophecy of the arrival of the Messiah in Jerusalem to be “cut off” or executed was fulfilled in Jesus to the exact day!
There can be no doubt that Jesus is the Messiah!
He is the King of Israel and, more than that, He is the King of the Universe!
That’s powerful!
But if you say, well what about the final week of Daniel’s 70 Weeks Prophecy, or the final 7 years?
We’ll you’ll have to come back because we’ll answer that in a couple weeks.
The Purpose of Jesus’ Arrival
As Jesus rode into Jerusalem, the crowds took garments and tree branches (John’s Gospel specifically tells us they were palm branches), and covered the road ahead of Jesus.
It was like “rolling out the red carpet” for royalty, but in this case it was a green carpet!
And, as we’ve discussed, they shouted “Hosanna to the Son of David!
Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!
Hosanna in the highest!”
They were crying out for a Savior!
They were crying out for a Messiah to rescue them!
They wanted salvation, but they wanted to be saved from the oppression of the Roman government.
Their idea of a Messiah was an earthy king who would lead a military rebellion against Rome and re-establish the Davidic kingdom in Jerusalem.
They were now hoping that Jesus was the one they had been waiting for!
They were hoping that He would deliver them from Roman oppression and usher in a time of political peace and economic prosperity.
But that is not the type of kingdom that Jesus came to establish at this time.
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