The King is Coming Mark 11:1-11 I dream of the impossible: To be the beast the King once rode That never bore a common load, Untouched, indeed insensible To all that s filthy, foul and frail. But I m the one who loathed lamb s blood And slew his brother in the mud. Then drowning in the rain and hail, I beat upon the ark s closed door. Though freed from Goshen s slaver s shack, I longed for leeks and going back. I ve borne those loads and so much more. But then life s one foundation Stone Took all my lies, my lusts and loss And nailed them to a blood soaked cross That I might bear my Lord alone. There were two villages on the morning side of the Mount of Olives. The one nearest to Jerusalem was Bethphage. Just beyond Bethphage was a smaller town named Bethany. That is where Mary and Martha lived. It is also where their brother, Lazarus, lived and died and lived again. Lazarus and his two sisters were close friends of Christ. So when Jesus traveled to Jerusalem for Jewish feasts, He stayed with them. And so it was the last time our Lord visited the holy city. Jesus, therefore, six days before the Passover, came to Bethany where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. John 12:1 He arrived in Bethany just before sunset on Friday. The Sabbath began when the sun went down. And Jews couldn t even travel a half a mile until sunset Saturday. So the Redeemer rested and waited. Sunday morning, carpenters and craftsmen, bankers and bakers were on their way to work. They thought it was just another day. But they were wrong. It was the day the prophet Daniel predicted would come. Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the Ruler, comes, there will be seven sevens, and sixty-two sevens. Daniel 9:25 (NIV) The clock began ticking when Ezra and Nehemiah received permission from Artaxerxes to rebuild Jerusalem. Then for 483 years God s clock ticked away.
To the very day, those years ended that shining Sunday morning. And the prophecy recorded by Zechariah was fulfilled. 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. Zechariah 9:9 We call that marvelous morning Palm Sunday. And its message today is still the same as it was then. The King is coming! Receiving the King Jesus and His disciples waited outside Bethphage while two of them fetched a young donkey colt. That donkey was yet to be broken to ride and had no saddle. So the Master s men softened the animal s spine with their own cloaks. They brought the colt to Jesus and put their coats on it; and He sat on it. Verse 7 The Master was much more than merely well known in the twin villages on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives. He was famous there. A few weeks earlier, many of those same small town Jews stood weeping with Mary and Martha after their brother s lifeless body had been wrapped in spiced gauze and laid in a hillside grave. Four days after Lazarus death, the Lord Jesus arrived. And with a shout, He brought life back to His dead friend s decaying flesh. Everyone in the two little villages, indeed people all over Jerusalem talked of nothing else. The ruling Jews heard about the raising of Lazarus at Bethany, too. So Caiaphas, the chief priest, called a meeting of the ruling council about the matter. And although they all actively opposed the Carpenter, they didn t even try to dispute the truth of the miracle. So when our Savior started making His way toward Jerusalem, both villages emptied out and gathered around. At the same time, some in that crowd ran on down the hill, past the old olive grove into the eastern gate of the city to spread the news. The King was coming! And when our Savior started riding the donkey over the Mount of Olives, they all knew exactly what to do. And many spread their coats in the road, and others spread leafy branches which they had cut from the fields. Verse 8 Some people gathered straw from meadows. Others cut branches off trees or found palm fronds to soften the donkey s path down the hill. And still others spread their coats on the road. The people did not dream this up on their own, of course. It was a time honored way of welcoming a new king....each man took his garment and placed it under him on the bare steps, and blew the trumpet, saying, Jehu is king! 2 Kings 9:13 It was less than a week from Passover. So the Psalm Jews recited at Passover was on everyone s mind. And the praise they shouted out that sparkling Sunday morning was more than an echo of that Psalm. It was a direct quote. O Lord, do save, we beseech You; O Lord, we beseech You, do send prosperity! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord; Psalm 118:25-26 Those who went in front and those who followed were shouting: Hosanna! Blessed is He
who comes in the name of the Lord; blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David; Hosanna in the highest! Verses 9-10 The people that followed our Lord out of Bethany and Bethphage joined voices with the crowds streaming out of Jerusalem s eastern gate. And they all praised God together. They said it two times: Hosanna. That Hebrew word is straight from the Psalm. It was a plea to the Lord God meaning, Oh save! And that must always be first. We must start by receiving Jesus as our Savior. After all, that is the real reason why He came....the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many. Mark 10:45 I lay down My life for the sheep...for this reason the Father loves Me, because I lay down My life so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. John 10:15,17-18 God s Son came to this world to die as the pure and perfect, the full and final sacrifice for all our sins. But we must go beyond believing that. We must act upon it by confessing our sins and seeking His freedom and forgiveness. Only then can He be our King. And Christ must be our King. He cannot and will not be our Savior only. That is why the people welcomed the Him by proclaiming how blessed and praiseworthy the coming kingdom of David is. They were welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem as their King. And that is what we must do. We must not only proclaim Christ is our Savior. We must also receive Him as our King. As our all in all, He is not only the Lord who saves us. He is also the King who rules our lives in love. Responding to the King At the outskirts of Bethphage, Christ gave two of His disciples some very specific commands. He sent two of His disciples, and said to them, Go into the village opposite you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, on which no one yet has ever sat; untie it and bring it here. Verses 1-2 Joshua Norton immigrated to America from England and settled in San Francisco. And at the age of 41 in that city by the bay, he proclaimed he was Emperor of the United States. He dressed like a king. And people on the street laughingly bowed down to him. He issued orders too. But no one obeyed him. And there is no more fundamental right of a king than to be obeyed. That is why Christ calmly sent those two disciples into Bethphage on a simple, straightforward mission. The men were to go on ahead and bring back a donkey. That much they knew. But the Savior said nothing at all about the reasons behind His commands. That didn t bother the disciples, though. They were used to the Master giving them commands. And it was always the same. He issued orders and expected them to be carried out to the letter. So since Jesus was their Lord, they obeyed Him. And if we call Christ our King, He expects us to obey Him just as they did. He does not have to coax and cajole us to do as He asks by explaining His purposes or His reasons why, either. The disciples understood that. Obedience had become a way of life with the disciples. And after the Lord returned to His Father in Heaven, it served them well.
When those same men served as missionaries in far-flung pagan cities, they were already accustomed to walking in obedience to the Savior s Spirit. And that was not merely important. It was essential. During those difficult days, obedience often meant the difference between life and death. And there was no time to learn to follow Christ s commands without question. If Jesus really is our King, we must establish that same pattern of obedience. We must obey Christ s commands in the Bible. And we must learn to hear and heed His Spirit s directions to us. After all, days will come when obeying Jesus will be absolutely essential for us, too. Sometimes, our personal safety will hang in the balance. Other times, obedience will make the difference between whether or not a soul is saved. Then there will no time for arguments. We will simply have to obey our Master. That is why it is so very important to establish a consistent pattern of obeying our loving Lord now. As it happened, there were some complications involved with fetching the donkey. The disciples didn t know the animal s owner. So Christ s commands also covered that. If anyone says to you, Why are you doing this? you say, The Lord has need of it; and immediately He will send it back here. Verses 3 What happened next didn t surprise the Savior. The disciples didn t know the man who owned the donkey. But Jesus did. And Mark wrote the Master also knew how the man would respond when he was told his Lord needed something as valuable as his donkey. They went away and found a colt tied at the door, outside in the street; and they untied it. Some of the bystanders were saying to them, What are you doing, untying the colt? They spoke to them just as Jesus had told them, and they gave them permission. Verses 4-6 Our Savior knew He could rely on the man who owned that donkey. So we do not have to wonder if that man knew and trusted Jesus. His behavior tells us all we need to know. After all, the Master told the man neither why He needed the donkey nor when He would return it, only that He would surely send it back. Our Savior simply told His disciples to tell the man his Lord needed it. That was enough for that villager. If the Lord he loved needed something he owned, he offered it up without a word. If Jesus is our Lord, He is more than the King who commands us. He actually owns us, just as those villagers owned the donkey. That is the essence of Christian commitment. When we claim Christ as our Lord, we are Him giving everything we are and everything we own. And like the man who owned the donkey, we are to give our God whatever He asks of us whenever He asks. Indeed, we are to be delighted to do so. Rights of the King Even the little donkey knew Jesus Christ is Lord of all. Remarkably, our Redeemer described the donkey to His disciples as one on which no man had ever sat. Our Lord purposely chose a donkey that had never been broken to ride in a procession through the confusion and clamor of a crowd of excited worshipers. And there are several reasons why. For one thing, even pagans refused to use an animal for sacred ceremonial purposes that had plowed a field, pulled a cart or had been used for any other common purpose. And those who worshiped the God of all glory were even more particular. That reminds us that, as our eternal Creator, Christ even commands nature. On the Sea of
Galilee, He commanded winds and waves to be calm. And on Palm Sunday, He commanded a donkey to calmly carry Him through a noisy crowd that would have panicked other animals. That donkey had never been ridden. Nevertheless, it knew it could trust Jesus. And if we claim Christ as King, we must be every bit as willing to trust Jesus as that donkey was. After all, it is the right of our King to be trusted. And that is just what we must do, even when we do not understand what He is doing. So it is that the people praised as our Redeemer rode down the Mount of Olives past the old olive grove where our Lord would pray the night He was betrayed. At the overarching stones of the eastern gate, the procession ended. The Master dismounted. And the two disciples led the donkey back to its owners at Bethphage. Then Christ climbed the broad steps up to the temple courtyards. And there among the busy, bustling crowds, our Lord exercised yet another right as King. Jesus entered Jerusalem and came into the temple; and after looking around at everything, He left for Bethany with the twelve, since it was already late. Verses 11 The Master was much more than a tourist taking in the sights. He came to the temple as the Lord everyone there came to serve, to obey and worship. Christ came to His heavenly Father s house as the Lord and Master of that house. He came to examine it as the eternal Judge. On the outer courtyards, He saw moneychangers bickering with Passover pilgrims who had to change their foreign coins into temple shekels to make offerings. And He saw booths where precertified sacrificial sheep and doves were sold. He saw beggars outside the gate, too. And His great heart grieved that some people came to His Father s house with nothing on their minds but personal profit. Our Savior still grieves when those who are called by His name seek little more than money from God. And He would say to them what Peter said to Simon the magician at Samaria several years later. May your money perish with you, Acts 8:20 (NIV) Gloriously, God s Son also saw worshipers who were like a widow He once watched put two small coins into the temple treasury. And He still rejoices when we give to God, not out of guilt or greed or gain, but out of a heart overflowing with love. Jesus also watched those who came to worship that day. And He saw some who prayed and chanted and offered sacrifices out of empty obedience. They were like people the apostle Paul predicted will populate the believing world in the last days, holding on to a form of godliness founded upon neither powerful faith nor life changing love. At Sychar, our Savior sat beside a city well and told a forlorn, fallen woman exactly what the God of all glory requires....true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth. John 4:23-24 Our loving Lord examines the heart of each and every person who comes to Him. And He hungers to find people who praise Him out of overflowing love, obey Him out of sincere faith and serve Him out of heartfelt gratitude. Don t be misled. Our Savior doesn t search our hearts cynically hoping to find flaws. He looks for saints to whom He can say. Well done, good servant! Luke 19:17 (ESV)