The Church of Eleven22 - S01 E11 - The Triumphal Entry

Episode Date: April 6, 2020

In this episode Joby prepares our hearts for celebrating Easter Sunday and the life-changing, life-giving resurrection of Jesus Christ. And the crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” — Matthew 21:9

Hey church family, Pastor Joby here, ready for another week of Devo's. And I want to say, happy Holy Week. And holy moly, did any of us ever dream this is what the week leading up to Easter would be like? It is totally different for all of us, especially those of us that work at church. I mean, this is like the Super Bowl for us. And normally this week, we are preparing all of our facilities for all of the tens of thousands of people that would be flooding in to hear the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ that he is risen indeed. But instead, this week, one, we're going to be calling you.

So if you get a phone call from us, answer it. Somebody in on staff is going to call you if you're a part of 1122 official, and we're just going to be praying for you. So be thinking about what you need prayer for. And we've got a whole host of tech and video people that are getting us ready and our work. worship teams getting ready for this weekend because no matter whether you're quarantined or not, the tomb is empty. Jesus is alive and we need to get ready to celebrate that this weekend. So I thought what we would do this week in the Devo's is we're going to look at three different

events that happened during Holy Week that may help our hearts be ready to celebrate the empty tomb this weekend. The first one is the triumphal entry found in Matthew chapter 21. If you grew up in church, you would know this as Palm Sunday, and we're just going to dive right in. Matthew chapter 21 says this. Now, when they drew near to Jerusalem and came to Bethpage to the Mount of Olives, then Jesus sent two disciples saying to them, going to the village in front of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied and a colt with her. Untie them and bring them to me. and if anyone says anything to you, then you shall say the Lord needs them

and he will send them at once. This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet saying, say to the daughter of Zion, behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden. Now, by the way, when Herod came in, he would come in on a white stalued

with a whole bunch of pomp and circumstance. And now Jesus, the king of kings, and Lord of Lords, he is going to enter the city for the last week of his life before the crucifixion in the fulfillment of Scripture, which is really, really important, that there is not a wasted word in all of this scripture. And there may be some Bible verses back here deep in the Old Testament, and you think that they matter not at all. And yet Jesus is the yes and the amen and the fulfillment of every prophecy ever made about the coming Messiah. And the disciples they went and they did as Jesus directed them and they brought the donkey

and the colt and put on their cloaks and he sat on them. Now most of the crowd spread their cloaks on the road and others cut branches from trees and spread them on the road. Now the reason that they would do this is oftentimes when a king went off to battle and he was victorious on his victory march back in, then this is what people would do. They'd take off their cloaks, and they would cut palm branches,

and they would lay it down. It was sort of like rolling out the red carpet, but it was rolling out the palm branches. It would be the equivalent of like a ticker tape parade today. Like, can you imagine one day if the Jaguars ever won? You know, we'd all gather down down, and they would march down, I guess, Main Street, and we would be there hanging out the windows,

was throwing confetti, this is what was happening. You see, because people knew, people knew, people in Jerusalem, look, they knew this Old Testament. And they had been taught since a very, very young age, that there is a Messiah coming and that he is going to make all things new, that he is going to restore Israel to its rightful place, that he is going to make the lion lay down with the lamb, that in the deserts it is going to blossom, that he is going to change everything as God had intended. And because of Jesus' teaching, and I'm primarily because of the rumors of the miracles that Jesus did,

like walking on water and calming storms and making the blind sea and the lame walk and even bringing dead people back to life, many people begin to think that maybe this one is the Messiah. And so, since he is coming into Jerusalem, there's a whole bunch of pomp, there's a whole bunch of circumstance, except Jesus is not making much of himself. In a very humble way, in order to fulfill the scriptures, he's riding in on a donkey. Verse 9 says, and the crowds that went before him and that followed him, they were shouting,

Hosanna to the son of David, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest. Now, I don't know if you've ever been caught up in a worship experience, and you weren't even sure exactly what was happening, but you were caught up in the moment. This is what is happening here, that all of the crowd is saying, Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. The word Hosanna simply means, Lord, save us.

Now, on the surface, this looks great. I mean, Hosanna is a word that we sing and some of our very own worship songs. But the problem here is that I think by the events of the rest of this week that when they said Hosanna, they didn't just mean like, Lord, save us. They meant Lord save us.

In other words, that the us was the priority in that very short sentence. And the reason that they were cheering on Jesus so much is not because, for God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever would believe in him would not perish, but have everlasting life. But maybe the reason that they were cheering on Jesus so much

is they thought, finally, we're going to get what we want. You see, I think they thought maybe Jesus was going to come in and not forgive sinners of their sins, but that Jesus was going to come in and kick Rome out of Jerusalem and that they would be empowered again. The Israelites would be empowered again. In other words, I think what they were seeing, here is not, God, thank you for your plan and that we get to be a part of it, but it's more like,

God, it's about time you got on board with my plan and why have you been taking so long? And again, it's easy to get caught up in a crowd like this. I don't know if you've ever been to a football game or a sporting event. And maybe in the beginning, it wasn't even your team, but by the end of the game, you were just caught up in the hysteria that is going on. I think this is what's happening. And the reason I think it is this. It says, Hosanna, to the son of David, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord Hosanna in the highest. And when he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred up. The whole city was stirred up.

And some people said, who is this? They were part of the people that were all stirred up. Some of the people that out of their mouths, they said, Hosanna, and with their hands lifted and their cloaks laid down and the palm branches cut and laid, they did all the activities that everybody else was doing. The only problem is that they didn't know Jesus. Church of 1122, my deep, deep prayer for you is that you would not just go through the motions at church.

Now, I'm going to warn you, at a church like ours, it's easy to get caught up in the motions. Now, man, our worship leaders and our teaching pastors, I promise you, I mean, I don't know every man and woman's heart, I can promise you that it is from a pure heart that we are trying to worship God ourselves and then lead our people in worship of God. But around this place, man, the music can be so good. The miracles are so tangible.

The life change happens, like right in front of our face. That you can look around and you can see everybody just caught up in a moment. And it's my hope and my prayer. that you would not get caught up in a moment and yet say, who is this? And not even know Jesus Christ, the one that we are worshipping. And so especially this Holy Week, may you not get caught up in the distractions of sheltering at home. And may you not get caught up in the distractions of all of the news and information

that is coming your way. And may you not get caught up in the distraction of all the excitement with like online divos and online church and all that's going on there and miss out on Jesus. You see, this week is to remind us that Jesus came on purpose. And his purpose was to lay down his life so that sinners like you and I could be forgiven and adopted into the family of God. Please don't be a part of the crowd that says the right words with your mouth, that goes through all the emotions, that even feels all stirred up about what's happening, but deep, down, you don't know who Jesus is. And the crowd answered the question who is this with this answer.

This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth of Galilee. You see, here's part of the reason I know that this crowd just got caught up in the emotion of Jesus entering the city. You see, this happened on Sunday. By the way, if you've come to 1122 and you ever wonder why we don't do Palm Sunday the way the church you grew up in it with the palm branches and all that, is because Palm Sunday was an exercise in missing the point. The people were celebrating themselves and what God could do for them instead of celebrating him and his righteousness and his glory.

You see, it really is an exercise and missing the point. See, because this happened on Sunday, and then by Friday, when Jesus did not do what they expected him to do, see, they thought Jesus was going to come in and maybe kick Caesar out, kick Herod out and they would be in charge, then by Friday, when they didn't get what they want, many of the people in the same crowd, they gathered together. And when Pontchus Pilots asked this question, what shall I do with this man named Jesus? The same people that cried out Hosanna on Sunday

cried out, crucify him on Friday. See, in fact, Jesus did not come and kick Herod and kick Pontius Pilate out. in fact, what he did is he came and he kicked the religious people out of the temple. After he arrives on his donkey, and after the singing is over, the Bible goes on to say, in Matthew, in verse 12, he goes on to say, and Jesus handed to the temple, and he drove out all who sold and bought in the temple. And he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. and he said to them, it is written, my house shall be called a house of prayer,

but you make it a dinner of robbers. The church of 1122, this week is going to be a week of prayer. Somebody from our staff, if we have your information, if you've sent an email to us, if you've given, if you've checked a kid in, if we have any, if we have a record of you, then this week, one of our staff folks are going to call you so that we could be in prayer for you.

And again, the reason is, I don't want us to get all caught up in the emotions of everything that's going on and missed Jesus, but we want this house, this church, to be a house of prayer. And we know that this is a time of great need, and so we want to be praying for you as you pray for us. And one of the things that you could be praying for too is that there would be a whole bunch of people over our weekend services. and they would ask this same question. Maybe as they tune in and log on and see our band lead in worship and see some stories of life change and watch me unpack the final letter to the church at Laotasia,

that's going to be the sermon that we're doing to finish up our series. And as I lay out the gospel, maybe there will be some people that you invite to tune in and they will ask this question, who is this? And through the singing, through the reading of the scripture, and through the preaching of God's word, then they will know the answer. This is Jesus, the Son of God, who came and laid down his life for the forgiveness of sin. And maybe these people that we were praying for, then they would surrender their life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

So begin to pray right now, begin to pray that God will open their hearts for the good work that he will do. Get ready for somebody to call you and pray for you over the phone. and if you would, let me pray for you right now. Our good and grace is Heavenly Father, Lord, this is a crazy week, but Lord, I just confess in these crazy times, Lord, we know that you are sovereign. The Holy Spirit's not crazy, you're not crazy, you have not lost control. God, the disciples this week, when you came riding in on a donkey, they had no idea what lay before them and what to expect.

And Lord, neither do we. But Lord, we know that you're trustworthy. We know that you're faithful. We know that you're good. And, God, we know that you love us because we choose not to just look around at our current circumstances, but God, we choose to fix our eyes on the cross. And we know that you have proven once and for all your love for us.

Because while we were yet sinners, Jesus went to the cross on our behalf. God, I pray that you would continue to prepare our hearts this week. And Lord, when we cry out, Hosanna, that it's all about you and your glory, not us and ours. We pray it in Jesus' name. Amen.