PALM SUNDAY

Praise the Lord, I'm glad to have you this morning with us in worship. Sing along with us. God the uncreated.

The created one The author of salvation

Laws of space and time In fashion worlds to his design

The one whom angels most revere

Hung the stars like chandeliers Numbered every grain of sand

Knows the heart of every man He is

King forever He is King forever He is

King forevermore Fortress and our strength

The rock on which we can't again His majesty

His power and authority Sing this with me

Unshaken by the schemes of man Never changing, great

I am Kingdoms rise and kingdoms fall He is faithful through it all

Crown Him King forever Crown Him King forever

Crown Him King forevermore Forsaken by a traitor's kiss

Curse of sin and centuries

Did Christ the lowly prince Sing this with us

Lifted high the sinless man They crucified the spotless man

Buried by the sons of man But he was rescued by the

Father's hand Reign as King forever Reign as King forever

Reign as King forevermore Eternal God of grace

We crown you with the highest praise Let the shouts and saints adore

Your holy, holy, holy Lord What joy in everlasting life

When all is love and faith aside Justice rolls and praises rise

At the name of Jesus Christ King of kings forever

King of kings forever King of kings forever

King of kings forever

King of kings forever King of kings forever

Hey, welcome. Welcome to the gathering. The Lord's Day gathering is always a special time for us to come together but today is a unique Lord's Day in that we come together to celebrate our

Savior's triumphal entry into Jerusalem where He is openly declaring that He is the

King the King forevermore the King that reigns, the one that we sing of this morning and the church, the universal, all over the world at this moment is joining together and rejoicing and remembering how our

Savior Jesus while fulfilling Old Testament prophecy revealed that kingship entering into Jerusalem just as Prophet Zechariah prophesied centuries before as the

Savior of His people and now today we worship our

Savior and King because He's delivered us not because He's delivered us from external oppression or difficulty but that He has delivered us from the enemy which is sin and death

He has bought us and purchased us and made us heirs and joint heirs with Him as He reigns that's good news, isn't it,

Saint? that's why we gather this morning yet as all of us realize and we know deep in our hearts there's still this ongoing sin within each of us if we are in Christ today we've been delivered but this sin keeps pulling at us it has affected each and every one of us this week and this morning even as we prepared to come and gather sin that makes us feel as though we're unworthy to come into the throne room sin that we realize in our lives is not up to the standards of the

King and it draws our hearts and our minds away forgetting that He has once for all delivered us from the domain of darkness and sin and death we forget that so before we start our worship officially this morning in this gathering to start let us stop and let us go to Him in a prayer of confession and assurance a prayer for us to pray of Lord, we acknowledge our sin before You we know that we are sinners but we also know that we belong to You You've paid for even that let us pray oh dear

Heavenly Father we bow before You this morning acknowledging acknowledging our sin both individually and corporately

God, we know that we fall short in and of ourselves and in our flesh

God, we think the things that we ought not to think we do the things that we ought not to do we fall prey to the things that dishonor

You so often we're drawn away by our own desires and then enticed and then that gives birth to sin we forget to gaze upon You and to look to You and in doing so we look to other things and we fall, we fail we acknowledge that before You we lay it before You because we also know that even in those sins grace abounds not that we would go on sinning so that grace may abound as Paul says, certainly not but that we know that we fall short we are not

Christ, the perfect one and in this flesh that is warring against us we fail

You Obe, the King Jesus, You You have saved us,

You have delivered us You have taken on even that sin that we've committed this morning in our own hearts and minds and in our lives

You had taken that upon the cross and You took the wrath of God for us even for that sin and now

You have given us Your righteousness and we stand in that righteousness not a righteousness of our own but Your perfect righteousness and so when

I sin, God when we sin as a people we are no less loved by You than than the

Father loves the Son because Your righteousness covers even that thank

You thank You for Your grace and Your mercy and in light of it O Lord help us help us not to fall prey to sin help us to mortify and run from sin even more because we long to obey and honor our

Savior in Christ's name Amen Let's go to the

Lord in a call to worship one that would align our minds and our hearts to His truth and today's call to worship is actually adapted from Psalm 118 and as I read portions of this

Psalm your response will be Hosanna to God Hosanna in the highest this word

Hosanna comes from two Hebrew words actually one that means to deliver, to save and another that is a begging and a pleading it's an acknowledgement that salvation is only from God that He is the source of all good things and that we are fully and completely dependent upon Him with the

Lord on our side what can we fear?

what can humankind do? Hosanna to God Hosanna in the highest we shall triumph over those who surround us and stand in confidence in the

Lord our God the

Lord is our strength and our might the Lord has become our salvation Hosanna to God O Lord we rely upon You solely, we are dependent upon You and that's why we come and we worship

You the one that is worthy of praise this morning let us pray once again a prayer of adoration before we begin to sing to our great

God O Lord we bow before You once again we know that You are sovereign that You reign

You are our strength and our might You are our salvation You are everything to us

Lord You are the beginning You are the end You are the means in which we are sustained that we are saved that we are brought into glory we thank

You we thank You Triune God for who You are

God the Father that loves us has set

His love upon us before creation before time God the

Son who came and voluntarily redeemed us purchased us bought us from the wrath of the

Father and presented us to Him spotless by His own righteousness and God the

Holy Spirit who now seals us as a guarantee for that glorious day when we will be brought into perfect union with the

Triune God and works in us convicts us of sins draws our hearts and minds towards You awakens the dead souls and spirits that are at enmity with God and brings them into the light

O God You are a powerful, wonderful, amazing God and Your great love for us is overwhelming we only know love because God You are love

I pray that this morning our small sacrifice of praise would be a sweet smelling aroma to You I pray that we would be reminded of this this glorious act of redemption by a

Triune God in Christ's name Amen How great, how great, how great is

Your love How great, how great, how great is

Your love for us Through the darkness

You called my name to darkness

Your mercy came You called me up, lifted me up How great is

Your love Yes, You took my shame

Buried my burdens in fields of grace

You called me up, lifted me up How great is

Your love In the heights of heaven

You stepped down to earth Innocent perfection

Gave Your life for us And we are amazed

We stand in awe For we have been changed

By the power of the cross How great, how great, how great is

Your love How great, how great, how great is

Your love How great, how great, how great is

Your love for us You're the one who lifted me up How great is your love.

From the heights. From the heights of heaven, you stepped down to earth.

Innocent perfection gave your life for us, and we are amazed.

As we stand in awe, we have been changed by the power of the cross.

How great, how great, how great is your love.

How great, how great, how great is your love.

How great, how great, how great is your love for us.

There has never been. There's never been, there will never be

A God like you, a love so true

There's never been, there will never be

A God like you, a love so true

There's never been, there will never be

A God like you, a love so true

How great, how great, how great is your love

How great, how great, how great is your love

How great, how great, how great is your love

How great, how great, how great is your love

How great, how great, how great is your love

How great, how great, how great is your love for us Winter and death now bring sorrows

I've seen their loves grow Never my love, thou hast taught me to say

It is well, it is well with my soul

Oh, Satan, shut down Oh, child, shut down With this blest assurance to try

Christ has regarded my helpless estate

And has shed his own blood for my soul

It is well, it is well with my soul

It is well, it is well with my soul

I stand, oh

I stand, I am part of the whole

Into the cross, and I bear it no more

Praise the Lord, praise the

Lord, oh my soul My soul

It is well, it is well

My soul It is well, it is well with my soul

With my soul It is well, it is well with my soul

We will feast in the house of Zion We will sing with our hearts restored

He has done great things, we will sing together

We will feast and weep no more

We will not be burned, we are not consumed

I will bear and protect and gather up We will feast in the house of Zion We will sing with our hearts restored

He has done great things, we will sing together

We will feast and weep no more

In the dark of night, before the dawn

My soul, be not afraid, for the dawn is morning

Jacob, be my strength

We will feast in the house of Zion We will sing with our hearts restored

He has done great things, we will sing together

We will feast and weep no more

We will feast, right?

Until then, we are sojourners left here for kingdom purpose

And King Jesus has left us with an ordinance

That is but a taste of that feast It is also a symbol and a remembrance of what

Christ has accomplished In order to bring us into glory To bring us into union with Him It's the

Lord's table That He introduced there at that last Passover meal

With His disciples And so together today, before we get to the sermon

And as we typically do this at the end of the sermon We would like to go ahead and worship the

Lord Through the ordinance of the Lord's Supper So let us pray now

That God would be honored in our worship as we come to this table Dear Heavenly Father, we come to you once again

We thank you for that great feast For glory that you will bring us into one day That you have paid for our sins

And you've left us here with this table

This table that is meant to drive our hearts and minds towards you

And remembering the sacrifice of Christ The spilled blood and the body given over for us

To redeem us, to pay for us, to purchase us To bring us into union with you

I pray that you are honored in it as we partake together That we would know that this is not just wine and bread

But this is a symbol The blood and the body of Christ And that Christ Jesus, you express your presence with us in a unique way

As we come together, as we gather on the Lord's day For this, Lord, help us to see the glory of the

Gospel Search our hearts I pray that no one in this room would come to this table in an unworthy manner

For as Paul said, some are sick and some have even died for doing so We thank you for it

We thank you for this great act of worship that we get to partake in Towards you, in Christ's name

Amen Today we are going to partake together So guests, if you are not familiar with our process

We have a table on this side And a table over here Pastor Keith and Pastor Jeremiah are here

And can help you The way this works is you'll go out around the sides And get in line and take the wine and the bread

And then come back through the middle to your seats I believe we're pretty even this morning

So I think we'll be okay If some of you back in this back corner could come to this side I think that would help But we will take the elements

But don't partake of them just yet Go back to your seats And once everyone has them We are going to come together

We are going to read from Scripture From 1 Corinthians together And we are going to partake as a family

You're welcome to come to the table Over in 1

Corinthians chapter 11 Verse 23 The Apostle Paul says

For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you That the

Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed Took bread And when

He had given thanks He broke it O Lord we are humbled

We could not pay the price for our sins

Our body of flesh was corrupt It was at odds and enmity with the

Creator We had no righteousness None, none to offer

We were hopeless and helpless In darkness Under the wrath of God The righteous, just wrath

That we deserved Oh but your body was perfect Your flesh was sinless

You were not born in Adam You were the seed of the woman And you were the

God -man That never failed That fulfilled the covenant of works

That Adam failed to fulfill The one that carried out the law of God perfectly

Was the perfect spotless Lamb To represent us, your people

We thank you for your sacrifice In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen He broke it and said, this is my body

Which is for you Do this in remembrance of me In the same way

He also took the cup After supper saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood

Do this as often as you drink it In remembrance of me The perfect blood of Christ spilled on our behalf

Paul says, for as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup You proclaim the Lord's death until He comes

That's what we're waiting for, right? He's going to return And it's no longer going to be just a taste

We will feast in the house of Zion With King Jesus, Amen Let's keep singing, let's sing that song some more here

Together In the house of Zion To store

He has done great things We eat together

We will feast

In the house of Zion We will sing

With our hearts To store He has done great things

We will sing together And we know

For scripture reading today I'll be reading out of the book of Zechariah Chapter 9, verses 9 through 13

It's called, The Coming King of Zion Rejoice greatly,

O daughter of Zion Shout aloud O daughter of Jerusalem, behold your king is coming to you

Righteous and having salvation is he Humble and mounted on a donkey

On a colt, the foal of a donkey I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim And the war horse from Jerusalem And the battle bow shall be cut off And he shall speak peace to the nations

His rule shall be from sea to sea And from the river to the ends of the earth

As for you also Because of the blood of my covenant with you

I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit Return to your stronghold,

O prisoners of hope Today I declare that I will restore to you double

For I have bent Judah as my bow I have made Ephraim its arrow

I will stir up your sons, O Zion Against your sons, O Greece And wield you like a warrior's sword

You may be seated That prophecy that Pastor Keith just read

Had been given over 500 years before Jesus would come and fulfill it

It was such an important prophecy to fulfill That its fulfillment is one of a few accounts of Jesus' earthly ministry

That we find recorded in all four synoptic gospels We see it in Matthew 21

As a matter of fact, that's going to be our text today If you have a copy of God's Word with you, you can begin to turn to Matthew chapter 21

We see it in Mark 11, we see it in Luke 19 and John 12 You see its significance cannot be overlooked

If all of the gospel writers addressed this And this is one of the few accounts

Then there's something important here for us to notice As you're turning there to Matthew chapter 21

And as we look at Matthew's account here This brings us into the last week of Jesus' earthly ministry

Where we see this culmination of everything being fulfilled Everything that we saw introduced in Genesis 3

All the way back when Adam and Eve had fallen And there was signs of a coming

Messiah, the seed of the woman All of this is coming into fruition As a matter of fact, it's so important This last week of Jesus' earthly ministry

His ministry was roughly, what, three years? But now we have almost a quarter left in the book of Matthew That's just given to the last week

And as a matter of fact, I think in John I think it's almost half of John's gospel account That is given to just this very last week in Jesus' ministry

So again, this is vital So there in Matthew 21, let's start reading there in verse 1

It says, Now when they drew near to Jerusalem and came to Bethage, to the Mount of Olives Then Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them,

Go into the village in front of you And immediately you will find a donkey tied and a colt with her

And tie them and bring them to me If anyone says anything to you, 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

Here's that prophet that was just read by Pastor Keith Saying, Say to the daughter of Zion, Behold, your king is coming to you

They were humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt On a fowl of a beast of burden

The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them They brought the donkey and the colt

And put on them their cloaks And he sat on them Most of the crowd spread their cloaks on the road

And others cut branches from the trees And spread them on the road 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 When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred up Saying, who is this?

And the crowd said, This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth of Galilee And Jesus entered the temple

And 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 den of robbers And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple

And he healed them But when the chief priests and the scribes saw The wonderful things that he did

And the children crying out in the temple Hosanna to the son of David They were indignant

And they said to him, Do you hear what these are saying? And Jesus said to them, Yes, have you never read

Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babies You have prepared praise? And leaving them, he went out of the city

To Bethany and lodged there This is the reading of God's word

Let us pray once again, would you pray with me As we ask the Holy Spirit to guide us

And illuminate our hearts and minds to the truth Lord, we ask that you would be honored

In the proclamation of your word We know that it is oftentimes difficult for us

Not to read ourselves into the text Difficult for us to understand the perspicuity

And precision and exactness and clarity of your text Because of our flesh

And so we ask this morning that you guard our hearts and minds From untruth Open our hearts and minds to your word

That we would see the glories of Christ Lord, that we would be overwhelmed by your greatness

And the prophecies fulfilled And the imagery that is given So that we may have a strengthened faith

Knowing that this is not just a blind faith This is a faith based upon fact

Help us, Lord Guard my lips from error In Christ's name,

Amen You know, just as I prayed, we often read these accounts And we miss the significance of fulfilled prophecy

Of imagery that is interwoven Into, particularly, things like this

Narratives An account given of something that actually happened And in doing so, we misunderstand its great meaning

We overlook it and we consider lesser things Leading us to read them as Sometimes as just good moral life principles

For example, I once heard this very text taught And you know what the main takeaway was?

It seemed to me the main takeaway, as the person taught this Is, well, if Jesus is humble enough to ride on a donkey

Then so should I be I should be humble, you should be humble And though that is not altogether inaccurate

Jesus is our example of humility We are to follow his example

But it is most certainly not the purpose that Christ set out to accomplish In accounts like this

So I would like for us to spend some time looking at the significance Of what Christ has accomplished here

And near the end, I want to show you How every person, every person in this room

Every person that's ever lived Every person in all of creation Falls into one of three categories

When presented with the reality of what Christ was declaring With his triumphal entry into Jerusalem And so the first thing that I want us to see

Is there in verse 1, look at it with me And it says, now when they drew near to Jerusalem Well, so Jesus has set his sights on Jerusalem, has he not?

This is where he's headed, Jesus has purpose If you notice, everything Jesus does is perfectly intentional

Read the gospel accounts Every step that Jesus makes is intentional He's never just shooting from the hip, he has a mission

He has a plan Jesus doesn't just enter a town Or take a path that isn't strategically timed

And sovereignly orchestrated Every person that he comes in contact with Was in the exact moment, in the exact time

So this, of course, is true here And what do they do? It says And came to Bethphage, to the

Mount of Olives Now, if you like the map section of your

Bible Some of you may look at those maps and see the layout It kind of gives you the visual of what's happening in scripture sometimes

But if you look at that map, you see that the Mount of Olives Is just east of Jerusalem And this town,

Bethphage, is there on the Mount of Olives And as we see in verse 2,

Jesus And we'll look at that in a moment But Jesus, of course, he has purpose for being there

For going to Bethphage, to being on the Mount of Olives As he directs his disciples to go and retrieve a donkey and a colt

However, Jesus could have chosen any town or any path And provided that need

You realize that, right? It didn't have to be Bethphage, it didn't have to be the Mount of Olives He could have chosen any direction, in any way

And provided the need of the donkey So why this particular one? Why this particular town?

It's because this particular one has been a long time in the making Eternity, to be exact All of this had purpose from the very beginning

When the triune God made a covenant of redemption Amongst the three persons of the

Godhead That they would create a people and deliver a people to himself All of this was planned out

But specifically for our purposes in prophecy 619 years before this

Before this very entering into Bethphage Right before the destruction of the first temple that was carried out by Babylon If you like Old Testament history

The prophet Ezekiel He gives us an account of something that he sees

He sees the glory of God Depart from the temple

And go to the east To the mountain That's significant

He sees the glory of God leave the temple And now as Jesus is getting ready to publicly reveal who he is

He has sovereignly chosen this path to finally descend from the east

Because Jerusalem is not his primary location of arrival You realize that, right?

It's not Jerusalem that he's necessarily after It's what's in Jerusalem Look at verse 12

What does Jesus do? As soon as he enters the city Jesus entered the temple

He goes directly to the temple The place where the glory of God once met with his people 619 years prior to that The glory of God with his people in the temple

But has now been turned into a den of thieves, hasn't it? That's what the passage says

That's why Jesus goes in and turns the tables over and runs them out It's turned into a den of thieves And so what does

Jesus do? He cleanses the temple And once he's done with that Look down at verse 17 And leaving them he went out of the city

It wasn't Jerusalem he was after It was the temple that he was going to What is the imagery of what

Jesus is doing here? The glory of God had departed By way of east of the city into the mountain

And now Jesus As John says in John 1, 14

And the word became flesh and dwelt among us Speaking of Christ And we have seen his glory

Glory as to the only Son from the Father Full of grace and truth This is Christ Jesus The glory of God Revealed to man

The glory of God once again As I said Descends out of the east From the top of the mountain

Back into the temple But notice something

It's not to dwell Jesus doesn't go to the temple

The glory of God And back into the temple To dwell there As he once did But to declare

He has purpose in this He had already previously hinted At the fact that he himself

Is that temple, hasn't he? He said that it would be destroyed And rebuilt in three days

And of course his disciples Didn't fully understand this They had a slightly distorted view

Of what Christ was here to do They did not fully understand it

He wasn't there to restore that temple How do we know that? Well, later on Look down at chapter 24 of Matthew Chapter 24

Remember he's already Entered into the temple The disciples still don't get What he's doing They don't fully understand this

And in verse 1 of chapter 24 Jesus left the temple He was back at the temple

But left and was going away When his disciples came to point out to him The buildings of the temple

It's almost as if They were game planning, weren't they? In their minds Man, the

Messiah's here Jesus is obviously the Messiah The Messiah Man, when he finally takes over And he kicks

Rome to the curb And we get this whole place back Man, look, Jesus Look, we could do this over at the temple

We could restore this Over here at the temple It was almost like a game plan, right? They were like, man, we're going to be

We're going to be in the upper echelon With Jesus right here We've been following him the whole time Like, we're going to reign here

But look at verse 2 But he answered them You see all these? Do you not? Truly I say to you

There will not be left one here One stone upon another That will not be thrown down It's like Jesus was saying

Yeah, I'm going to decimate all that Into ruins I'm going to replace it with the real thing

Something that you're not fully understanding And grasping in the moment And as he begins the final week

Of his earthly ministry He begins to reveal these things more openly We see this right before chapter 21

As he walked by the two blind men The very last paragraph in chapter 20

We see these two blind men That are sitting on the side of the road And they said there in verse 31

Lord, have mercy on us And they make a statement here They give him a title

They say, Son of David Lord, have mercy on us Son of David You see, he had been called

The Son of David before Yet this is the first time He acknowledged it Look at what he says

Verse 32 And stopped Jesus called them and said What do you want me to do for you? Before, he would ignore the title

Now, he's just answering to it You see, before this Jesus was concealing his identity

He had even ordered his disciples To keep quiet We saw that back in Matthew 12 We see it in chapter 16

When it says Then he strictly charged his disciples To tell no one that he was the Christ He was concealing it from the world

He was not publicly open about it But now all of a sudden He's answering to it Publicly claiming it

For him to acknowledge this title Son of David Is him publicly acknowledging

That he is truly the Messiah We see this same title

Being attested to him As he enters in the city Look at verse 9 there of 21 And the crowds that went before him

And that followed him Were shouting Hosanna to the Son of David And this is the thing

That enraged the religious leaders the most This is what set them over the edge

And why is that? Because they knew what this title meant They knew what was being said

When he's given the title Son of David Look at verse 15 But when the chief priests and scribes

Saw the wonderful things that he did Okay, so he's seeing miracles They're seeing the same miracles

That everyone else has seen The people that are declaring Hosanna, Son of David These religious leaders

They're seeing the exact same miracles, right? They saw it The wonderful things that he did And the children crying out in the temple

And this is what sets them off Hosanna to the Son of David There it is again

The children are even declaring this And it says They were indignant Angry Enraged This pushed them over the edge

This made them so angry And they said to him Do you hear what these are saying?

Do you hear what these children Are saying about you? They're giving you the title Of Son of David But basically

You better stop this This is blasphemy Again, because they knew what it meant

And how does Jesus respond? Jesus said to them Yes, have you never read

And then he quotes Psalm 8 Out of the mouth of infants And nursing babies You have prepared praise

Jesus is doubling down Jesus, man

He hit right to the core He's so intentional With every word

And every movement He's like Yeah, I hear it And it's true

And the whole of the Old Testament Attests to that So what is it about this title

That has everyone in a tizzy? Has everyone Clawing to get their way to Jesus?

Has others wanting to kill him? Why? Well, this again is prophecy

In the Old Testament Back in 2 Samuel 7 In verses 12 and 13

Of 2 Samuel 7 It says When the days are fulfilled And he's speaking to David right now

King David And when your days are fulfilled And you lie down with your fathers When you die

And you're buried I will raise up your offspring after you Who shall come from your body

And I will establish his kingdom He shall build a house for my name

And I will establish the throne of his kingdom Forever All of Israel Have held to that promise

All of Israel Have believed That that is going to come about They knew the seed of David Would be the

Messiah The one to establish his kingdom Forever That's why

Matthew starts out his gospel With a genealogy You realize that? Have you ever wondered Why does Matthew start out

With just a bunch of names Begat who and begat who and father It's because Matthew is starting

The whole gospel account off With this very fact That here's David We can tie it to the line of Jesus here

He's the lineage of David You see the problem was though That these religious leaders

Were holding to a promise That they didn't understand They had distorted this promise

They thought that this Messiah Was going to be Like David An earthly king

A powerful king One that would deliver them From the oppressors like Rome Essentially just another

David They wanted earthly power Earthly reign Isn't that what we all

In our flesh desire? The here and now The circumstances now

The children of Israel Are no different Especially the religious leaders Jesus exposed this

As a matter of fact Over in Mark chapter 12 You can flip over there with me If you'd like But Mark chapter 12

Verses 35 through 37 The religious leaders there

You know always confronting Jesus It says there in 35 of chapter 12 of Mark It says and as Jesus taught in the temple

He said how can the scribes Say that Christ is the son of David There you go you see it

They held to it The scribes believed this They believed that passage Back in 2

Samuel They knew that God had promised From the seed of David And they held to it But Jesus says

How can the scribes say That Christ is the son of David David himself

In the Holy Spirit declared And then again quoting Psalm 110 This is

David's words The Lord said to my Lord Set at my right hand

Until I put your enemies under your foot Jesus says in verse 37 he says

David himself called him Lord So how can he be his son What's Jesus doing here

He's pointing out that the Pharisees Did not understand this title That he is more than the physical son of David Later on in Revelation chapter 22

In verse 16 Jesus declares Jesus himself says I am the root and descendant of David What's he saying

He's saying I am the creator And the descendant of David Something far far more spiritual and great

As Paul said in Romans 1 He says concerning his son Who was descended from David According to the flesh

Is what Paul says And he says and was declared To be the son of God In power according to the spirit of holiness

By his resurrection from the dead Jesus Christ our Lord You see the two together

He is Lord he is king He is the spiritual reigning king And he is the descendant of David In his physical form

So when the religious leaders Hear him being called the son of David They know that title is reserved for the

Messiah Yet they have no clue As to who that Messiah is And what he's actually going to accomplish

Because even though miracles are being done Prophecies are being fulfilled They can't see past their blind idolatry

Of what they want in a Messiah Do you see that They see the same miracles

They see the prophecies being fulfilled Yet they can't see their blind idolatry

What it is that they want in a Messiah They don't care what God has in store for a

Messiah They want what they want in a Messiah And so when they read the Old Testament text They see it through the lens of their

God Their idolatry Theirselves Look back with me at our passage in Matthew 21

The last part of verse 1 says Then Jesus sent two disciples And into verse 2 says saying to them

Go into 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 If anyone says anything to you You shall say the Lord needs them And he will send them at once And now here's that prophecy being fulfilled

This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Saying and there's that passage that Pastor Keith read a moment ago from Zechariah Say to the daughter of Zion Behold your king is coming to you humble

Mounted on a donkey on a colt The fowl of a beast of burden You see as I said earlier

Everything Jesus does is intentional He knew where to find these animals didn't he He knew exactly where they'd be tied up He was sending them ahead of him

And he says hey they're right there And he has sovereignly ordained That they would be in that exact place

In that exact time And he had already even prepared

The hearts of the people looking on He'd already prepared them

He knew that they themselves Would gladly give their livestock To the need of the Lord Because those people that they would come in contact with In that town

Jesus already knew that they saw him as king And you gotta understand back in this day

One of the prerogatives of a king Was that he could commandeer your livestock At will

He could come onto your property And say that horse is mine That cow is mine That goat is mine

And just take them And you have nothing to say about it And so as they enter in there

He has already told them Tell them that the Lord needs it And they will willingly do that He had already prepared that And this is what he would ride

Into Jerusalem Now think about that The religious leaders

Knew that prophecy They had read that passage Yet I can only

Imagine that it bothered them They probably thought

And explained it away as Well that's just imagery That can't be

A true prophecy of Of actually what's gonna happen With a donkey After all our king

Doesn't ride on a donkey This can't be right This is a proud bunch

Remember A very proud bunch After all everyone knows A king rides on a gallant steed

He doesn't enter into the city on a donkey He enters on a beautiful large horse

With power and with might With fanfare This donkey riding

Son of a carpenter can't possibly Be it Even though the prophecy was clear

Their idolatry Blinded them They couldn't see it

The imagery doesn't even stop at the donkey It gets clearer Look at verse 6 The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them

They brought the donkey and the colt And put on them their cloaks And he sat on them

Most of the crowd Spread their cloaks on the road And others cut branches from the trees

That's why we get Palm Sunday, right? Palm branches from the trees And spread them on the road

As Jesus makes his Triumphal entry into Jerusalem A red carpet of sorts

Is laid beneath him A carpet of coats and branches A declaration This has kingly significance

So much so That it gets the whole city's attention Look at verse 10

And when he entered Jerusalem The whole city was stirred up Saying, who is this?

Who is this that's being lauded As a king? You gotta think, these people in Jerusalem They're just confused at this point

The surrounding cities that have seen These miracles And all of the amazing

Some of the people in this town Is the very town where he had risen Lazarus from the dead

So these people have seen the power of Jesus They're following him to Jerusalem They're laying their coats on the ground

They're putting palm branches on the ground They're singing Hosanna to the son of David Declaring and shouting these things

And the city's like What? What is happening? Who is this?

Because everyone knew the significance of the coats They knew when they saw coats

Laid on the donkey to be set on And they saw coats laid in the road Oh they knew what this meant

He may not be riding On a gallant steed He may not be on a giant beautiful horse

He may be on a donkey But the significance of the coats gave them Pause to realize

This is kingly kind of stuff Because we see back in 2 Kings Remember wicked king

Ahab? His reign is coming to an end

Because of the wicked paganism And idolatry He was a wicked

Terrible king Always seeking the life of the prophet Elisha And so what does

God do? God replaces him With Jehu Remember the story? In 2

Kings 9 .13 Says then in haste Every man of them took his garment

His cloak And put it under him On the bare steps And they blew the trumpet

And proclaimed Jehu is king God was replacing The wickedness

The wicked reign And replacing it with a king That would be a shadow of the substance

Of the king to come And so as these people are laying Their coats on the ground

They're declaring kingship And everyone knows it Jesus' disciples

They're saying the same thing And while the religious leaders Looked on with disdain and hatred

This is definitely not our Messiah In their minds The onlookers were confused

Who is this? And why are we treating him like a king? But neither understand What the Messiah was coming to do

Completely missing the point They knew there was a king That was going to come They knew that God had promised

The seed of David was going to come And a Messiah is coming And we're waiting at any moment And he's going to deliver us But this can't be it

Even though the prophecies Are being fulfilled All the while Followers were shouting out there in verse 9

Hosanna to the Son of God Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord Hosanna in the highest

Many of those Who did not even know What they were declaring Had a small glimpse

Some of them Very limited As I said at the beginning of our service

And our call to worship Hosanna is a pleading A cry for deliverance

A begging For a deliverance And some were crying out For a temporal deliverance

From circumstances and oppression They were tired of being oppressed by Rome They were tired of not being

The world's powerhouse And reigning And conquering They were tired of it

They were tired of struggle They were tired of difficulty They were tired of the work They were tired of all of it

What they didn't know Is that Christ wasn't there for that He was there for something far greater

Than temporal deliverance As they're declaring these truths

Even the truth comes out Of misunderstanding Of misunderstanding Because they were asking for deliverance

They were pleading For deliverance Deliverance from what? From sin

From their own flesh Not from external circumstances

From themselves We need someone to deliver us

From us His disciples are living proof of that That he wasn't there to deliver them

From earthly circumstances They of all people Suffered greatly in this world Once Christ left

They were even killed For the sake of Christ Their life wasn't easy

It wasn't rainbows and sunshine Jesus didn't solve All their financial problems

Did he? But they had been given something far greater

New life and life abundant Life eternal Something of value This life is a blip on the radar

Suffering is good for us Difficulty is good for us In this broken world Because To live is

Christ And to die is gain In order to do that Christ had to accomplish what he came to do

He was there to be their representative To suffer And take the wrath of the father

On their behalf To sacrifice himself For he is the true

And better David Even David is as good an earthly king As he was And how he was lauded by the people of Israel We just want another

David He was not willing to die for his people Oh but King Jesus Voluntarily did so He marched into it

Boldly orchestrating it This entrance into Jerusalem Shows us his great love

For his people Knowing Knowing what he's What he's come to do

Knowing what was to come For him this week That even many in the crowd that are shouting

Hosanna Hosanna in the highest Would in less than a week be shouting crucify him

And he knew that And he voluntarily Walked into it Boldly And I believe this is why there at the end

Of the passage we read in verse 17 We read it a moment ago A part of it It says in leaving them he went out of the city

To Bethany And lodged there Pastor what's the significance of that?

There's imagery in all that Christ has done You realize that Bethany That city the meaning of that name

Is house of sorrow He chose That place

To go Showing that Jesus Christ Came in as a reigning king

Hosanna in the highest But he must suffer He must go

And he must suffer for the sake of his people His children You know

I mentioned at the beginning Every person falls into one of three categories When presented with The reality of what

Christ was declaring With his triumphal Entry into Jerusalem And I want to I want to mention those three to you now

There's the person Who like the religious Leaders can't see the clear prophecies

Fulfilled Maybe you're here today

You've heard and seen the evidence You've seen the same passages That we've all seen this morning

You've heard them Yet you were blinded By your sin and idolatry

It's just foolishness to you It's a stumbling block

It means nothing You just don't see it You're blinded in your sin

You're dead in your trespasses It means nothing All the prophecy in the world

Fulfilled right before your eyes You don't even notice it

You excuse it away Because it doesn't fit Your Understanding of your

God The second person

Like many in the crowd See the prophecies wrongly You shout out

Hosanna in the highest Deliver us For you

Our God Because to you Jesus is a conquering King who is going to deliver you

From your woes And your circumstances Someone led you to believe that Jesus Will fix all of your earthly problems

That Jesus will help you with your financial Struggles, that Jesus will help you In your marriage, that he'll fix it

That Jesus will fix your children That Jesus will Make sure that you don't lose your job

That Jesus is just Going to fix all the stuff Around you

And so you worship him You're willing to Worship that God as long as He's your genie in a bottle

You ask He delivers He delivers So a famous rapper

That a few years ago claimed to Come to Christ Saw this week in an interview

He was holding worship services And everything just a couple of years ago And now in the interview he says

You know I asked Jesus to show up And fix some things in my life

And he just never did So now I've realized I'm my own

God That's an exaggerated Form of what many

Today believe when they Come to Jesus And they worship him

They are the seed that Landed on rocky soil Sprouted up for a moment

But never produced fruit And was burnt out by The sun and the weather

And the thorns They are the one that Came to Jesus for what

Jesus Could give them It was just idolatry It was just It was their own

God Stealing the name of the One true God Finally and thirdly

The person who sees the glory of Christ In these fulfilled prophecies Remember Everyone falls in one of these

Three categories The person who sees the glory of Christ In fulfilled prophecy

If you have truly tasted And seen that the Lord is good You have become painfully aware

That your problems are not your problem Your sin was your problem

And it was a problem you most certainly Had no power to fix So you shouted

Hosanna Hosanna to the Son of David You knew who that was

You knew that God had promised there In Genesis 3 that the seed of the woman Would crush the head of the serpent

You knew that he would clothe you In his righteousness You knew he was coming and that's him

I've seen him I plead with him Save me

Deliver me from myself Deliver me from the wrath

Of God That is due me That I deserved

That I will undergo And be under the wrath For eternity and still never be able

To scratch the surface of fulfilling it Oh That he has paid for you

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord Which one are you?

You fall in one of those three categories Are you indifferent?

Are you looking to Jesus For what he can give you? Or have you seen the glory of Christ?

Has he paid for your sin? Did he on that cross

When he said it is finished Take the wrath of the Father upon himself

For you Hosanna Hosanna Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the

Lord This is what Jesus Was proclaiming as he Made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem This is why we

Church Universal celebrates Palm Sunday What a beautiful Picture of fulfilled prophecy

Amen Amen Amen Amen Let's pray

Oh dear heavenly father Oh thank you Thank you for all that you have done

For us For we were helpless and hopeless Our father Adam Had sinned against you

And At that moment we were all stillborn In sin Born in iniquity

In an enmity With the creator But you You redeemed us

Your children Brought us in as heirs And join heirs with Christ himself

Our savior Our redeemer Our messiah Salvation belongs to the

Lord You are the one that gives it Lord we pray this morning That if there are those in this room

That are in those first two categories This morning that are indifferent to it And or seeking out after the

Jesus Of their own mind God I pray that the Holy Spirit Would awaken them Breathe life into their spiritual

Deadness that they may see the glory Of Christ They would repent and look to Christ As lord and savior

Reigning king We thank you We pray this morning as we take up the offering

Father we pray that you Would be honored in our Act of worship of giving We pray that That these resources would be used

For your glory that they would not be used For selfish gain or Used unwisely

Father these are kingdom purpose Things God help us to Be good stewards of what already

Belongs to you God as we give Lord as each one of us Gives as you've laid on Our hearts

We thank you We thank you for what you are doing in our midst And we pray that you would continue

To be honored in our lives As we continue our worship now Through giving in Christ name