followHIM - Matthew 21-23; Mark 11; Luke 19-20; John 12 Part 1 • Dr. Keith Wilson • May 15 - May 21

Episode Date: May 10, 2023

How are the Triumphal Entry and a Hosanna shout connected? Dr. Keith Wilson explores Jesus’s glorious entry into Jerusalem and how modern-day disciples can honor Jesus Christ.00:00 Part 1–Dr. Keith Wilson00:56 Introduction of Dr. Keith Wilson04:44 The triumphal entry recorded in all four gospels07:56 We can do more to celebrate Easter12:15 Three things that influence the size of the multitude for the triumphal entry20:41 Symbolism during the triumphal entry32:53 Dr. Wilson shares a story about the symbolism of the hosanna shout 38:29 The lesson behind cursing the fig tree1:18:10 End of Part 1–Dr. Keith WilsonPlease rate and review the podcast.Show Notes (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese): https://followhim.coFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followhimpodcastYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/FollowHimOfficialChannelThanks to the followHIM team:Shannon Sorensen: Executive Producer, SponsorDavid & Verla Sorensen: SponsorsDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: Marketing, SponsorLisa Spice: Client Relations, Editor, Show NotesJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignWill Stoughton: Video EditorKrystal Roberts: Translation Team, English & French Transcripts, WebsiteAriel Cuadra: Spanish Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com/products/let-zion-in-her-beauty-rise-piano

Welcome to Follow Him, a weekly podcast dedicated to helping individuals and families with their Come Follow Me study. I'm Hank Smith. And I'm John, by the way. We love to learn. We love to laugh. We want to learn and laugh with you. As together, we follow Him. Hello, my friends. Welcome to another episode of Follow Him. My name is Hank Smith, and I am your host, and I'm here with my kingly co-host, John, by the way. Welcome, John, to Follow Him, another week. Kingly. I've been compared to a joker before, but the king, as part of the king's court, I'll take that. Yeah. John, we are in Matthew 21 through 23 this week, and also in Mark and Luke and John. We needed a Bible expert

to come with us, and he is here. Who's joining us? Yes, I'm so excited to introduce Dr. Keith J. Wilson, who we both know, but let me tell our listeners about Dr. Wilson. He was born in Ridgecrest, California, the fourth of 10 children. He came to BYU as an undergraduate, served a mission in Austria, where the hills are alive, we've heard. Came home, headed to medical school, but then took a study abroad teaching job, fell in love with teaching. He has a master's degree from BYU in German, a PhD from the University of Utah in educational administration. And he kind of focused on the university's roots and how many universities began as religious institutions, became secular institutions, and has some background and did his studies on that, which sounds really interesting. He has eight children and a foster son.

He and his wife, they have 35 grandchildren and two in the oven. That's amazing. Dr. Wilson actually started Wilson Diamonds, came back to teaching, though. He's been everything from a nursery leader to a bishop. It's remarkable how similar those two callings are. Just that's a joke. He served most recently as a patriarch he's now currently serving a mental health mission he and his wife at south america northwest area and we're just thrilled to have him our opportunities to have him may be limited as he could be heading

to south america soon so we're happy to have him. Now, I have to tell you, Hank, my personal connection. I have here my master's thesis, which has been read by approximately six people. And Dr. Wilson is one-sixth of them. So I have his signature here. The poor man had to go through this. So we became friends, and he's a respected colleague and mentor to me for going

through that process. So we're so happy to have you here, Dr. Wilson. Thank you for being with us. Well, thanks. It's an honor to be here and join you two in this podcast. Yeah, we are grateful to have you, Keith. Are you heading to South America? Do you know in the next couple of weeks? Yeah, we finally received our visas after waiting eight or nine months. We're scheduled now to head down there probably the mid to the last part of May. We'll head down to Lima. I'll get to practice my German slash Spanish. Keith, I've heard you say this before.

You're going as junior companion. That's right. For 40 years, I've been teaching religion, being a bishop and sitting on the stand. And my wife has prepared herself to assist missionaries with their mental health needs. When we signed up for the mission, she told them all my qualifications and they said, no, he'll not receive a special calling. His calling will be to be your assistant. And they knew it well because it's all hands on deck. The workload is so high. Right now, missionaries are challenged with the kind of the post-COVID scene, with the early age, with the daunting task of missionary work and

a mental health kind of counselor, support person really is essential in kind of the mission structure. And so we work 12, 14 hours a day, six days a week, just trying to help missionaries. And it's gratifying to see her touches with them, really uplifting. That's wonderful. Absolutely wonderful. All right, today we are going to be spending our time in all four gospels, Keith. I don't know if we could make this more difficult for you. In just a couple of hours, we'd like you to cover Matthew 21 through 23, Mark 11, Luke 19 through 20, and John 12. And the lesson, since I have my kingly co-host here, the lesson is called Behold Thy King Cometh. Thy King Cometh.

Keith, where do you want to start here? Well, you've started in a great place just with your introduction, Hank. And that is, it's not very often in the New Testament do you have a singular incident being reported in all four Gospels. There's just a handful of them. There's the baptism. There's the feeding of the 5,000. There's the trial and crucifixion, resurrection. And there's the triumphal entry.

That's what you have all four. And the reason behind that, I believe, is because everybody was reporting the things that to them were most important about the Savior's ministry. But these were the high points. These were the mountain peaks of importance in the Savior's ministry. The triumphal entry is just such a great one to zoom in on and to catch the importance of that. Awesome. We wanna start in Matthew. Do we wanna start in Mark?

Do we wanna start in Luke or John? I think what I'd like to start with is I'd like to kind of give you a little bit of an overview as to why this triumphal entry and the events that follow right after that are so significant. Let's do it, yeah. And the place where I'd like to begin is with this idea.

We all in life really thrive on positive reinforcement. Sometimes we don't get as much as we'd like, but when we get encouragement from those that we love and trust, it just makes all the difference in the world. It's the whole essence of community and family and loving other people. And I'd like to suggest to you that the triumphal entry is really one of those touches in Jesus's life where he gets encouragement. It's just, we tend to think of him, oh yeah, he's the son of God. He just kind of buckles up his belt and does his thing each day until he performs the atoning sacrifice. And yet we miss the personal side of him. We miss him when John the Baptist is beheaded, just wanting to have private space alone. He's hurting. We miss him smiling. We miss him

kind of disappointed at times. We miss him when he's a little bit upset. So to see this personal side of him, to see the fact that the father seemed to build in some events right close to when he would do the hardest thing of his whole assignment, that he built in some reinforcement. I just love that. It's like a mother when a little child comes, leaves her a little note and says, mom, I love you. And she just melts. All the 24-hour day stuff that she's doing. Or like a teacher when somebody comes up and thanks you for a lesson, you can tell they've got a tear in their eye and they're really sincere. And just a myriad of other places.

A businessman, when he says, you know, you made a difference. You were so kind and so generous. And you take it all across the spectrum. It's just, it's part of our nature and to be reinforced. I think in church terms, we call it tender mercies, places where the Lord touches us. The triumphal entry was a huge tender mercy for the Savior himself. Okay. And so that's kind of where I'd like to start us. Now there's a second kind of tandem thing that I'd love to accomplish as we talk about these chapters today, and that's this. As a people, as a religious faith,

we have been chastised over the fact that we don't do much to celebrate Easter. So I've thought often, long and hard, why? Why don't we as LDS do more with celebrating Easter? There's a statement by Gordon B. Hinckley that it was Christmas time. He said there would be no Christmas if there had not been Easter. And so Easter is obviously the high point of our religious celebration and commemoration of what happened during this time in the Savior's ministry. Why don't we? Why aren't we the top of the heap in terms of celebrating Easter? And I think there's two or three things.

One is we don't have any buildup to our Easter celebration. It's a one-day celebration. And the second is our general conference usually falls right in the same area. And we do have buildup for general conference. We all have been hearing the announcements in church and we anticipate that and there's special sales in the stores and everything else. And then the third one is that we never know when Easter is. It moves around. It's got a latitude of about four or five weeks. That's crazy. We know exactly when Thanksgiving and Christmas is. We need a good influential person to say, let's have Easter on this day and just fix the date rather than attach it to some lunar cycle and everything else. But so those are the three things.

In today's discussion, I want to hook you on the idea. I just want to, in a fisherman's term, I want to set the hook that we can do better with Easter and it will be largely because we begin to focus on Palm Sunday, triumphal entry, and realize that something huge is coming in our celebration. It's easy for me to get kind of cranked up on this because I see such importance with us commemorating in a very appropriate way the resurrection of our Savior, the greatest miracle physically to occur. That was great. Oh man, I just agree that not only would there not be Christmas without Easter, think of all the other things that wouldn't be. We wouldn't be sitting here. The churches wouldn't be sitting here. Christianity wouldn't make any sense without

the resurrection. That's the ultimate triumph of the whole thing. And so a whole lot of things wouldn't be without Easter. Maybe it wouldn't be the year 2023 since what? Since the birth of Christ. Why would we remember that if he were nothing but just another moral teacher? So yeah, everything kind of hinges on Easter. I like what you said. That's great.

Thanks, Keith. So you're saying Palm Sunday should be the beginning of our Easter celebrations? Yeah, a little bit like Christmas Eve is to Christmas Day. And the cool thing about Palm Sunday is we know that it was the first day of the week. That then defines this, what we call in Christian terms, the Passion Week. So there's seven days kind of that are generally seen in the Passion Week, and Palm Sunday is the first of those. Palm Sunday is just a huge thing. Look at all four gospel writers report on it. And the church has done quite a bit of work. You can go to their website now, and they'll have all seven days and things that families can do. And the

Ensign for March of this year, Brother Huntsman and another colleague published a thing about family traditions and things you can do during those seven days. And I just think, man, the more of that we can kind of internalize, the more appropriate our worship of Easter will be in this greatest miracle. Awesome.

So out of the four gospel authors, which one do we want to look at for the triumphal entry? Keith, we're going to look at multiple or we're going to hone in on one? Well, I think we can certainly blend them. And there's some very distinctive differences between John's account and the other three synoptics, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. But I like to use Matthew because Matthew seems to be setting up a stage and sort of framing it a little more tightly than some of the other authors. So I'm going to stay with the Matthew outline there as he puts it forth. Okay, let's do it. Matthew 21, right? Right. You'll notice right off the bat, a real important thing is that this triumphal entry

is huge. It's just huge is the only way you can say it. It talks about in Matthew, you know, a very great multitude spread their garments, see in verse 8. And then in verse 10 of Matthew 21, all the city was moved, saying, who is this? Now, what contributes? Because this is an important thing. In Jesus's ministry, most of the time, he's seen by Jerusalem, which is the heartthrob of Judaism at his day, he's seen by Jerusalem and those that control things as being just some wacko up there in Galilee. Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?

Come on, give me a break and things like that. And now we have him coming into town and it is huge. Now, there's three things that if you read carefully contribute to the size of the triumphal entry. Maybe we could mention one of the good commentary Bibles actually says that they estimated that there was somewhere close to 100,000 people. If you've ever been over to Jerusalem, you'll know it's a pretty tight little city. And for 100,000 people, it just would be teeming and crawling and jam-packed with people everywhere.

Because the scholars estimate that Jerusalem at the time of Jesus is probably 10,000 people, maybe five to 15 are some of the estimates that you'll see, but still a fairly small city compared to our modern cities. But then in ancient times for that to swell to 100,000 and a few scholars go way off the edge and say a million plus people. So this thing is big.

So what causes it to be so big? So if you read there in John 12, verse 10, but the chief priests consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death. The chief priests are so upset with Jesus taking control and being so much in charge. So one of the things that contributes to this is the raising of Lazarus. And you've done a nice job of talking about that already, this raising of Lazarus. Now it's only reported in John, so it's nice that he brings us the aftermath of it here too.

But it had a big impact probably just a week before this. And it's right in Jerusalem's backyard. It's in Bethany, which is just up over the hilltop. Number one thing that contributes to the size is Lazarus. I've often thought that maybe the raising of Lazarus is the Savior's, when it comes to his mortal ministry, it's his crescendo moment. He's been building to this moment and building and building. And then the raising of Lazarus is too much for anyone to look the other way. It's his big moment, which leads to his triumphal entry. Am I seeing that right? I think so. Now, it certainly did not sway everybody in the crowd

that saw it. Some started to disbelieve, but it was so, I mean, those that had any kind of a heart that could be penetrated were just blown away with Lazarus just coming out there. Lazarus is the first thing that seems to do it. A second is the Passover itself. This is a pilgrimage festival in the Law of Moses. And this was the, there were three pilgrimage festivals, feasts, in which people were supposed to travel to the temple and offer sacrifices. And yet this one was the granddaddy. It was the equivalent parallel in our culture of Christmas. That was Passover for ancient Jews. That's a big thing because Jesus comes right during Passover, right at the start.

In John's record, it says six days later is Passover. So there's a big one. Now, the third one, though, you have to catch kind of systemically from the whole of the Savior's ministry in the scriptures, and that is his ministry is crescendoing. He started to get even a large following in Galilee with things like the feeding of the 5,000 and others. And word is spreading just like wildfire. There's a guy that can do these things and things like that. You'll notice six months before the triumphal entry, as far as we can determine, is the Mount of Transfiguration and what we call the Feast of Tabernacles that just precedes that. And in that, John chapter 7, when Jesus is

coming back, and that's another one of these pilgrimage feasts, when Jesus is coming back to Jerusalem for the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles, he sends his disciples in ahead of him, and he comes in discreetly. See, his ministry then is taking off, and he doesn't want for it to come crashing down prematurely. He sends his disciples in, and then he kind of sneaks in through the back door. And that's just indicative that he's getting more and more popular and things. The triumphal entry is kind of the crescendo of that popularity. So it was just huge. One thing, John, that I don't know if we've discussed very well that we probably ought to is a point Keith is making here. And that is that Jerusalem and Judea and Galilee, where the Savior

did a majority of his work and miracles and ministry, they're far apart from each other. You might think, oh, they're right next to each other. Word is spreading. But you've got Judea in the south. You've got Galilee in the North. That's a good three-day journey if you're going to make the trip from one to the other. And you've got Samaria right in between. Am I saying that right, John? Yeah, that's the way I understand it. And how is this news traveling? Is this all word of mouth for travelers going back and forth? Yeah, I would think so. And when the Savior, he comes to Jerusalem, sometimes I think before I went to the Holy Land, maybe both of you can

identify with this, but before I went there, I saw Galilee and Jerusalem as close to one another, not realizing how far apart they were and that Jesus doesn't actually spend a lot of time in Jerusalem. He just travels down for these pilgrimage feasts that Keith was talking about. There's three of them every year. And then he returns home to Galilee. So the miracles are happening in the north and the people in the south are hearing about them. Although, according to the gospel of John, he has done some miracles in Jerusalem. Am I getting that right for both of you? Yeah. And the separation, I think you can highlight that quite a bit. You said three days. Oh, it's 75 to 90 miles, depending on which route you take. This is a good week, maybe even 10 days

if you've got a lot of baggage and things. There's a real barrier there. I think that's an important part because you're thinking, well, if the chief priests have seen all these miracles, well, they likely have it that they've only heard of a couple in Jerusalem and maybe heard of a lot of them in Galilee. That's helpful. So Jesus dies away from home. Yeah, he really does. Yeah. First we have the size and just what an incredible outpouring it is. And I'd like to depict it sort of as Jesus' day in the sun. And I find that fascinating. At the Mount of Transfiguration, Moses and Elijah come, and Luke records to speak to him concerning his death. And then Joseph Smith adds his death and resurrection. Well, what's going on that heavenly messengers have to do that? I like to interpret that as they were encouraging him because he's

coming up to this greatest of his assignments. And he's like most of us, we have daunting things in our lives. And I believe it begins to weigh upon him. He'll make statements to that effect. Okay, an hour is not yet, but is nigh. And so it's a big thing. And specifically, there's a couple, two or three things in which he is just framed right here in the sun as the Messiah. So we need to talk about those. Talk about them. I think you're right about the Mount of Transfiguration, Keith. If I remember right, I'm opening up to the Bible dictionary, Transfiguration Mount of, in one portion in the second paragraph, there's three paragraphs, it talks about how these beings, Elijah, Moses,

even John the Baptist, here it is. The event was important in many ways. Priesthood authority was conferred upon Peter, James, and John. The significance of the Savior's work was emphasized and the unity of various dispensations and the close relationship of Jesus and his prophets was demonstrated. So I can second witness that, that I think a lot of these angelic beings are there to encourage him, which is the way you started us out today, which was wonderful. He needs that encouragement just like all of us do. One of my colleagues described the Mount of Transfiguration as a celestial correlation meeting to encourage and to make sure that he was still willing to go through with this. So now we're at the doorstep, literally, of him doing that with the triumphal

entry. Now, let's talk about the ways that the people respond and the symbols that he employs in the triumphal entry, because that's also something that every family ought to incorporate into their Easter celebration. You'll notice in Matthew chapter 21, it talks about when they drew nigh unto Jerusalem, or come from Bethphage and the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples saying, go ye over into the village. Now, so we have this idea or this event of Jesus asking them to bring him a colt or a young donkey, an ass, and there aren't two animals there. That's probably something that an editor made a mistake in the reading of Matthew because you can compare the other ones and all

of them are just a singular and it makes no sense for him to kind of be trying to straddle two animals or something in this triumphal entry. He's supposed to do that. Now, why? Do you remember what he's doing there? He's fulfilling prophecy. And the prophecy is Zechariah 9, verse 9. John, do you want to go to that and just read it for us?

You got that one memorized, John? Zechariah is a beast. It's hard to find right there at the end. Yes, Zechariah 9, 9. Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, thy king cometh unto thee. He is just and having salvation, lowly, and riding upon an ass and upon a colt, the foal of an ass.

Isn't that interesting? I feel pretty certain that Jesus knew his scriptures well enough in the way that he studied and recites the Psalms and things that he was aware of this. And he specifically directs them to go and get an ass, a young donkey for him to ride into town on. This also is reminiscent of Solomon when he was crowned king of ancient Israel. Instead of riding on a horse or anything, he specifically summoned a donkey and he rode an ass into town. And that became the symbol kind of a king, lowly and humble, but still a kingly kind of entrance. Kind of a symbol of being a peacemaker. Exactly.

If he'd been conquering the town, he would have come in, of course, on a horse. But he comes in on a donkey, a domestic animal, a burden of peace and things. I actually have in my margin written here, he's coming lowly on an ass versus coming on a war horse in Revelation 19 at the second coming. So I think it's interesting. The animal is a symbol of what kind of message is coming at that point. So that's a great point. Yeah. Now, as you continue reading there in Matthew, so he mounts this colt and they set him on it. And the multitudes that went before that followed cried, saying,

Hosanna to the son of David. Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. So now we have the second two symbols that are very prevalent in this triumphal entry. He's sitting on this donkey riding into town. They put their clothes in front of him. Now, the clothes was a sign of great respect. And you can imagine back in ancient Israel,

even when Jesus is crucified, the soldiers try to decide who gets his clothes because clothing was so hard to weave and to procure. And you probably only had one set of clothes and things like that. But they take their clothes, their cloaks, and they put them in front of him. So that instead of riding on the dirt or cobblestone or whatever the surface was, he's riding on something softer, something that's cleaner. And it's become really the welcome for the red carpet treatment and a kingly kind of royal welcome.

So there's the first big symbol that they do. Then the third is they use tree branches. Okay, it says they put tree branches in front of him. Now, John of our four authors is the only one that defines those tree branches. John, do you remember what he says about those? Are those the palms? Exactly. They're palm branches.

And John says that specifically in his. That's kind of interesting that John would pick up on that. Because John has Jesus in a very, what we call, high Christology, where he sees him very closely connected as the Son of God. In the other Gospels, you see a little bit more of the mortality of Jesus. But John has him more connected as the Son of God in that sense of divineness. The fact that they do palm branches. Now, what's the palm branch represent?

And why was it so specifically not just a tree branch? In the ancient Middle East, the palm tree was seen kind of associated with kings and sort of shade, and they used it for a lot of things. Shade was kind of symbolic. Also, it's fibers, ropes, and writing using parchment from palms and things like that. But the symbol that seemed to co-opt it the most was Greek mythology. Nike was the athletic kind of god, nike was symbolized by a palm branch so it became kind of the sign of victory in competition and things like that it's just

interesting you have these three symbols now i have a slide here that i'd like to show for those that are watching with the video but in that there's these three symbols, the donkey, the clothing, and the palm branches. And here's the symbolic interpretation of those. Remember, they're putting their clothes down because he's royalty, so the prince of peace, he's riding the domestic animal of peace, rides into the city victorious. Isn't that cool to see the three, the convergence of these three symbols? Now, as a family, do you want to know what we could take

from this on our Palm Sunday observance? We should reenact the triumphal entry and use branches and things like that to just kind of symbolize. And then the great shout, which they made, which was the capstone of everything. And it really set the Pharisees and chief priests and everything on edge. And that was Hosea Anna is the way that they'd say it in Hebrew, Hosea Anna. And that was coming from Psalms 118.

That was where the word was coined. And in Hebrew, it meant save us or save us now. We beseech thee. Salvation is now. When they say that, and that's a messianic psalm from the book of Psalms and David's kind of prophecies, when they use that phrase, oh, that is the final deal. That seals the deal. We are accepting this man as the Messiah, the promised Messiah.

And you can see the Pharisees are just beside themselves. In some of the accounts, it says, don't you see how the whole city is moved and we are nothing? And they come back at Jesus and say, verse 15 of Matthew 21. And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying in the temple and saying, Hosanna to the son of David, they were sore displeased. And said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea,

have ye never read, Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise? Okay, so do you notice something here? Jesus just kind of throws this back in their face. It's like he gets to say, isn't this great? They're acknowledging me as the Messiah and the chief priests and everything are beside themselves. Now, he does one thing there that just really draws the chief priests into the argument and wanting to bring him down. And that is Matthew has him cleansing the temple on the very day of the triumphal entry. Look at verse 12. Jesus went into the temple and cast out all them. And then look at 13 and said

unto them, it is written my house. Now in the book of John before at the start of his ministry, he goes into the temple and cleanses it. But there he refers to it as whose house? Do you remember? He said, my father's house. Exactly. And so now he's taking direct ownership of the temple. Do you know how threatening that would have been to the Sadducees and the Pharisees?

The Pharisees are there to kind of show their purity and things, but the Sadducees are running the temple. It's a cash cow for them. It's the national bank of ancient Judaism, and he's taking possession of it symbolically as he comes in. It's like throwing gasoline on the fire. This just causes such animus towards him. But this is the one day when he just kind of says, I'm not worried about what you think. I am here to present myself because this is my assignment. It's a really cool setting. You know, most of the time,

Jesus doesn't ever get to be the guy that the crowds cheer for and things because there's not crowds. But this one, the crowds are cheering for Jesus. Maybe 100,000 people cheering for Jesus. Yeah, that's beautiful. Have any of you ever been over to Jerusalem at the Easter celebration and the Palm Sunday? I've never been there for Easter. It is quite the thing. Usually about 30,000 to 50,000 Christians assemble over on the Mount of Olives, Bethphage and things right there. And then they do the processional up. It's just such an incredible kind of fun thing as a Christian

community to celebrate Easter that way and reenact the triumphal entry. We'll have to go there on Easter, John. You know, one of the things I've always wondered about the triumphal entry is, were they expecting the Messiah of popular expectation, as we've heard it coined sometimes, that he's going to deliver us from the Romans? He's the redeemer of Israel, meaning political Israel. Or were some there knowing he was going to deliver us from death and sin? And I wonder if Jesus knew, what kind of welcome was he getting? Were they welcoming him as the political Messiah or as the spiritual Messiah? What do you think?

And John, I believe that they would have known the psalmic verse 118 there closely enough that they would have sensed that that was referring to their salvation. And it was beyond just their physical deliverance. Now, he did a couple things to let them know. Now, the cleansing of the temple could have been seen still as a political Messiah come in and overthrow him. But then what did he do? Matthew records in verse 14, and the blind and the lame came to him in the temple and he healed them. Right there in the temple, he heals them. Okay. And how that must have been such a moment in which there is no doubt as to what kind of Messiah he is. Yeah, I think you're right. On the surface, some could have just said, oh, this is a big phoneme that's coming in

to town and it's a circus act and things. But at its core, it was messianic. It was salvific. He makes that point again and again. Now, we have an interesting parallel in our own LDS worship today with the triumphal entry that I'd love for families also to capitalize on, and that is we have the Hosanna shout in one of our own religious rituals or practices, if you will. When does that occur? Tell me a little bit about that. That's temple dedications, right? Exactly. And now with the church doing kind of this closed circuit temple dedication, everybody, whether they live close to a temple or not, pretty much has the opportunity to experience temple dedications. I'll never forget the first time that we, as a family, went to one of the temple

dedications. It happened to be a while back. It was the Palmyra Temple dedication, and it was a beautiful service. We all dressed up. They canceled church that day, and we drove to the stake center, and we were there early early and there was quite a reverential feeling with the with the music the prelude and everything and then the service commenced and uh it was just it was just everyone in white and the temple itself was spectacular and the talks and the singing the spirit of god like a fire is burning and i just had a i had a real deeply moving spiritual experience and and as the as it ended we quietly left our stake center as a family we got in the old family van

and started to drive home and i just want my kids to remember the moment and so i said so what did you like most about the temple dedication today and they piped up with oh daddy was beautiful to see the chandelier and to see everybody in white and singing the spirit of god was so cool and the talk that president hinkley gave and they went on and on and then they kind of trailed off but they hadn't hit the one point that i was hoping that they'd remember and i said primed the pump a little and said what about the hosanna shout and there was dead silence in my big old van as we drove. And then my oldest daughter, also my most outspoken probably, she piped up from the back of the van,

Dad, it was weird. It kind of was a shock to the heart. But then I realized that I hadn't taught them anything about the historical significance of the Hosanna shout and the fact that anciently people were accepting Jesus into their lives, into their city, acknowledging him as their Messiah, and that I'd fallen short with that. And all my daughter saw was just kind of this ritual waving of a hanky, kind of in a robotic way and things like that, and not realizing that it was the hanky kind of in a robotic way and things like that and not realizing that it was the hanky and the waving was to say, we welcome you into our lives, into our hearts, into the center of our city. So that one's always kind of stuck with me. So if families,

as they celebrate the triumphal entry, can incorporate that in, I think it will tie two things together, our temples with the fact that we're entering the house of the Lord as he entered the city. What I think is also unusual about that is the idea of shouting. I mean, we have the kids sing, the chapel doors seem to say to me, be still. What's that joke, Hank? We spend the first two years teaching our children to walk and talk and the next 16 telling them to sit down and be quiet. To actually have something where we are supposed to shout is unusual. It reminds me of a spirit of God, like a fire is burning, we'll sing and we'll shout with the armies of heaven. So this is a good point. We need to teach

them this is an appropriate time to shout for joy. And as you said, to welcome the Savior and to say, Hosanna, teach us how to be saved. Teach us or come and save us. So I'm glad we talked about this. I don't want them to say that was weird. This is a fun thing for a family to do. And it's just so appropriate on Sunday, the triumphal entry or the Palm Sunday, weave these things together in your family worship. And then everybody's looking forward to the culmination of

that, which is the following Sunday and the resurrection. And so you have a great way to start it. Now, in the scriptures, it's difficult to tell which day which things happened in Matthew chapter 21, 22, and 23, even Matthew chapter 24. The next real strong marker we get is Passover. And we usually assign that to Thursday, even though there's some scholarly discussion about that. But so the first, second, and third days, they kind of meld together. Now, the writers themselves, you'll notice in Matthew, he says in verse 17, he left them and went out of the city into Bethany, and he lodged there. First off, let's stop just to take that specific point. Why would he go back to Bethany? Didn't he like the Golden Arches Hotel in Jerusalem? I mean, because Bethany's a good

couple of miles out of the city and up over a steep hill. Why Bethany? Maybe he wanted to check on Lazarus, make sure he's still feeling well. That's very good. In fact, that's where he stays. Yeah. I wonder if he's trying to get away from not being taken, arrested. Exactly.

And the way you can see this is there's such vitriol, and in some of the accounts there, it says when he says things that are really pointed towards the pharisees and the leadership chief priests and scribes it says they they sought to lay hands on him they want to take him right then and bring him down it's not the moment even though it's close in which he'll turn himself over to them he still has some things to accomplish the crowds are his buffer because all the crowds are with him. So then at nighttime, when everybody dissipates, he's got to be out of sight or they'll arrest him prematurely. So he goes out to Bethany and seems to lodge there each evening.

I imagine every time he comes to Jerusalem, if he's staying in Bethany, that he brings a big entourage with him. And that would, I can see why Martha is saying, I've got a lot of work to do whenever you come here. Good point. Now you'll notice then in verse 17, so he goes out to Bethany, that's Matthew 21, verse 17 at the end of the day. And then when he's coming back in the next morning, he curses the fig tree when he wants just something to pick a piece of fruit off of that because he's hungry. But that sequence is different in the book of Mark. So Mark has him cleansing the temple on the second day. So it's hard to tell sometimes what happened

on which day. But do your best to do that. Remember, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. That just because all of the four accounts aren't completely harmonious on each detail, that's the function of human memory. We remember things differently. And that's the beauty of it. To me, it says this really is a real event because people remember it differently. And they're not just copying the same text. Generally, from Matthew's lead,

we have the cleansing of the temple, and then we go into the day two and day three. Two and three are very hard to differentiate between the two of them. In fact, there's no clues in Matthew 22 and 23 which one happens on which day. But here's the overarching thing that I'd like you to remember on these chapters, and that is Jesus is portrayed and acts very messianically. He is in control, and he fields questions from them, and he will poke right back. He'll put parables out there that are so scathing, and the Pharisees and Sadducees, they know that he's talking right to them and condemning them. Okay. But they can't do anything because of the crowd.

So he's very messianic in his teachings and the way he fields questions. He gives them a couple of entrapment parables in Matthew 21 where they condemn themselves. Kind of like with David and Nathan, what we studied last year, he tells them about the two sons and the one about the wicked husband and the wicked renters who kill anybody who come to take the rent. And both times they answer the question. And then in verse 45, it says, and when the chief priests and the Pharisees heard these parables, they perceived that he spake of them. That's great. He's talking about us. I don't think he's talking about us.

Yeah. Yeah. Now, a think he's talking about us. Yeah. Yeah. Now, a couple of little notes on that. If you combine the three accounts on this wicked husbandman, both Mark and Luke refer to him not as his son only, but as his beloved son or his well-beloved son. Oh, look at the similarities of that. This is my only begotten son. This is the beloved son.

And it's no wonder that they get it. They know exactly that he's jabbing at him. And the parable of the two sons, Matthew's the only one that records that parable. It's in chapter 21 there, but it's just so apparent that he's saying to them, you've been commissioned and agreed, and now you're not coming. And then the other. So he really goes after him. Now, just a quick comment about before we leave it there on this morning of the second day when he curses the fig tree. Occasionally you'll have people, Bible readers,

various scholars take a shot at Jesus and say, oh, he was angry. A tree that doesn't have fruit. He just wants to beat up on it and things like that. And so you have to think through that. Brethren, do you want to give some reasons why he might have done this other than just a temper tantrum when he's hungry? Yeah, I doubt Jesus is just hangry here. It's fun to kind of make a list over the things that the Savior demonstrated he had power over.

Men, yes. Women, yes. Children, yes. Animals, yes. And here we have plants. The weather, yes. And all of these things, I think, demonstrated, of course, first his compassion and his love for people, but secondly, it demonstrated who he was. And I think to have this fig tree come out in the

Institute, the Religion 211-212 manual, it says, the leaves on the fig tree indicated that it should have had fruit, but it did not. With its misleading appearance, the tree symbolized hypocrisy. So he was being a teacher. And its fate perhaps represented what awaited those who professed righteousness, yet plod the Savior's death. And my understanding of fig trees, and it might be fun to mention, how did you say it? Bethphage? Beth, how do you say that? Bethphage, yeah. Bethphage means house of figs. So take your PH and change it to an F, house of figs, Bethpage.

So that was a common symbol around there. But my understanding is with a fig tree, the leaves and the fruit grow at the same time. So if the leaves are there and there's no fruit, this is kind of a symbol of you're all leaves and no fruit. What's the Texas phrase? You're big hat, no cattle. So there's a look of hypocrisy to the tree itself. So Jesus used that as a symbol. So that's how I've always understood it.

What do you think, Hank? I think so too. I've always thought as an object lesson, I even told my students, Jesus probably knocked all the figs off that tree the day before. He's prepping his classroom for his object lesson. Right out of the manual, the Come Follow Me manual, first paragraph, the Savior was hungry after traveling from Bethany to Jerusalem, and a fig tree in the distance looked like the source of food. But as Jesus approached the tree, it bore no fruit. In a way, the fig tree was like the hypocritical religious leaders in Jerusalem. Their empty teachings and outward demonstrations of holiness gave no spiritual nourishment. I've also thought too that in about

less than a week, he's going to be hanging on the cross and people are going to say, he has no power, right? He has no power to save himself. I think the disciples who see this are saying, no, I've seen him. He has the power to destroy. I know that. I've seen it right in front of my eyes. So he's choosing not to destroy when he's hanging on the cross. In one of the accounts, Peter comments back and says, as they pass the fig tree that's been all withered up, he says, wow, Lord, look what happened to it after you cursed it. And here's another interesting thing. That fig tree would have been on the Mount of Olives there, Mount Scopus and everything. And as they came back down into the city each day, just like you said, the manual pointed out, it was symbolizing the hypocrisy

and the form of religion without the conversion of the heart. Without the fruits. Exactly. And the breezes, the sea breezes come in and that's how jerusalem stays kind of cool and temperate with the warm temperatures year-round is you've always got a breeze but when you kill a tree mid-season okay and the leaves are on it the leaves don't fall off they stay attached so the breeze with the attached leaves would have been almost like an audio reminder. Even a visual audio thing there, the leaves are rustling as they go by, kind of warning them, you're going into an area here that is full of form without content. Now, another thing too, what time of the year is it?

It's April. It's Passover. Does fruit come on a tree in April? I'm a small little orchardist and I have about a hundred trees. That's my avocation. I love it. But I can guarantee you the earliest fruit around here is cherries and apricots and they're still July. And the real fruit season is September. Apples, plums, peaches. You just go down the line. They're all on then. Why? Because the tree uses the growing season to put fruit on and make it sweet, put sugars and things into it.

So why is Jesus expecting it? The fig, like John pointed out earlier, is an anomaly. It's what they call an early leafer, and it puts out its starchy fruit just right with the leaves. It wouldn't have been the most succulent fruit, but it still would have been edible. That's what Jesus is going for. He's not having a temper tantrum over a tree that shouldn't have even had fruit on it at that time of year. The fig was an exception. Like you pointed out, it was showing his power over all things. It was just such a multifaceted symbolic thing that he did there. It's far, far from Jesus having a temper tantrum because he's hungry. So rather than saying, oh, Jesus was angry, it's no, he's always a teacher.

He took another opportunity to use something right in front of them and teach. That makes me go, oh, yeah, he's always teaching in a beautiful way. So messianic, isn't he, in this last three days here? And then he goes really into hiding, not hiding, but he celebrates the Passover with just a few people. And then Gethsemane, three people are aware that he's there suffering. This is his messianic kind of pulpit, if you will. He's standing up and just doing things to teach them right here at the last, the multitudes. I was going to say, Matthew 21, 21,

I've always laughed when Jesus says, if you have faith and doubt not, you can also kill trees. That's the dream right there. And you can remove mountains. Please join us for part two of this podcast.