Key Verses: 6, 8, 10, 17, 24, 33
Well,
if you are reading this, the world didn’t end! So much for the Mayans ability
to tell the future! Chalk one up for the foolishness and gullibility of humans
to believe even the most foolish things rather than believe the Gospel.
In an era when most people walked
everywhere, riding any animal would have been luxury. And donkeys are not the
most cooperative, and this is a young colt who would not have been trained to behave
when he carried a load. But Jesus is fulfilling Zechariah 9:9 in what He did. I
think Jesus did this to help point people to the truth of who He was and what
He was doing. Some people say that the writers, and even Jesus, either made up
connections to the Old Testament prophecies, or arranged events on purpose to
make it look like Jesus was the Messiah. I could possibly believe this if this
was the only thing I know about Jesus’ life, but so many other things over
which He had no control fulfilled prophecy.
Jesus enters Jerusalem on a carpet of
coats and palm branches. It must have been quite a sight. I wish I could post a
picture to Facebook. If I threw down my coat, I would hope the colt would pick
some other spot to ‘do its business’! And they are giving Jesus the entrance of
the Messiah. They are ready for Him to kick Rome out of the city and set up
David’s reign again. The people were desperate for freedom from oppressive
taxes and restrictions. (Sound familiar?) They wanted what they believed would
be an idyllic time of peace and prosperity, like the years when David was king.
But they left out the war parts of their dream, and the increasing taxes, and
corruption of that time.
You see, anytime humans get involved
in the power structures of this world it is almost impossible not to get
corrupted by its influence. Many would say it is the money in politics that
ruins it. I would say it is sin in the human heart that ruins it. The problem
is sin, not some external tool used for wrong reasons. We need to deal with the
sin problem before any other. It is the permanent solution to a temporary
problem.
And as usual, when Jesus teaches, the
religious leaders of the day don’t like it. He threatens the very core of their
power. The corrupt practices that have crept into the very physical center of
the Jewish faith and life are dealt with head on. He doesn’t make a politically
correct, carefully scripted remark that won’t offend anyone, especially His
opponents. If He were here today He would probably cut right to the heart of
the church and point at our apathy. He would point at Islam and cite the
violence and sexual perversion. In America He would point at the laziness of
some and the pride of others, both preventing responsible living. He would
label evil ‘evil’ and sin ‘sin.’
The authority of Jesus rests not in
what He did, but in who He is. Jesus points this out by using John the Baptist,
a prophet by every standard. John’s authority came from God. He did not claim
it for himself, unlike the religious leaders. And yet they were not willing to
acknowledge this simple fact, because John pointed out their sin and they
refused to repent. Jesus is calling them to account and they are again refusing
to repent. Jesus is calling us to account. How are we going to react?