The King is Come (Palm Sunday) – Timothy Keller [Sermon]

passage on which the teaching space this morning is printed your bulletin it's matthew 21 we're doing a biography of jesus and uh as jeff just said we're celebrating palm sunday a little early this year but you know interestingly enough the palm sunday the triumphal entry which we're reading about today uh just begins the last week of jesus life but in john the chapter of john the book of john it comes in chapter 12 of 20 of chapters in matthew it's in chapter 21 of 28 chapters in mark it's chapter 11 of 16 chapters in other

words so much that the gospel tells us about jesus life is about that last week and therefore there's an awful lot for us since we're creating a biography here and we're looking at the life of jesus in these morning services there's a lot to talk about that happens between palm sunday and the death of christ which we will look at this month coming up to good friday and easter let's read this matthew 21 verses 1-17 as they approached jerusalem and came to bethpage on the mount of olives jesus sent two disciples saying to them go

to the village ahead of you and at once you will find a donkey tied there and her cult by her untie them and bring them to me if anyone says anything to you tell him that the lord needs them and he will send them right away this took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet say to the daughter of zion see your king comes to you gentle and riding on a donkey on a cult the fall of a donkey the disciples went and did as jesus had instructed them they brought the donkey and

the coal placed their cloaks on them and jesus sat on them a very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road the crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted hosanna to the son of david blessed is he who comes in the name of the lord hosanna in the highest when jesus entered jerusalem the whole city was stirred and asked who is this the crowds answered this is jesus the prophet from nazareth in galilee jesus entered the temple area and

drove out all who were buying and selling there he overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves it is written he said to them my house will be called a house of prayer but you have are making it a den of robbers the blind and the lame came to him at the temple and he healed them but when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did in the children shouting in the temple area hosanna to the son of david they were indignant do

you hear what these children are saying they asked him yes replied jesus have you never read from the lips of children in infants you have ordained praise and he left them and went out of the city to bethany where he spent the night this is god's word now what we've got here is the story of jesus trample entry and there are so many themes not only in the bible but in all of world literature really they come together in this passage that i just bow before it and with a certain sense of awe let me

let let's do what we usually have to do if you're going to study a passage of the bible you have to do a lot of noticing first you can't just say what's it mean you have to start noticing and there's always much more to notice than you can notice the first time through so let's do a little noticing and then ask ourselves what it means and let me point out three things that is very important to notice uh first of all let's take a look at that the context there's there's a crisis that uh that

is the context for this entire incident verse one says as they approached jerusalem and came to bethpage now we know right before this happened matthew records this in chapter 10 a pardon me in chapter 20. uh mark records it in chapter 10 right before this incident they're on this road and matthew tells us in chapter 20 the two blind men cried out to him and said lord son of david have mercy on us and jesus came to them and said what do you want to do what do you want me to do for you and

they said have mercy on us and he heals them now you might say okay a great miracle one more miracle on the way but you have to realize what this means for chapter 21 and the triumphal entry this is the first time that jesus christ has been given the messianic title and allowed it to be set in public who was the son of david when the blind men began to call out son of david everybody knew who that was the son of david was the messianic king that had been predicted for centuries the son of

david was the ultimate king the final king of the world and for the first time somebody cries out in public and calls him oh ultimate king oh final king of the world and jesus looks at them and says yes and everybody gasps and in particular the apostles would have gas because the apostles from the very beginning had wanted jesus to openly declare himself a king they wanted him to openly declare they knew about his power they saw what he could do they knew uh what he was able to do and they so much wanted him

to come out and publicly proclaim it because that would force the issue and now he does it and they gasp because they know what this means this is a crisis when jesus publicly proclaims himself to be the messiah the deliverer that means he now either has to triumph and he has to take the kingship or he'll be crushed by the authorities who would be forced to crush him i mean when the disciples hear the blind men say son of david and jesus say yes that's me this oh my you know the hair on the back

of their neck must have gone up at that point they must have been thrilled and terrified because they knew that this was do or die they knew that now he either had a triumph or be disma demolished smashed destroyed they knew that this was the final sprint for the top this was it everything happened now time was running out because they were on their way to jerusalem and he had openly declared himself to be the king and that's the first thing we have to see the great drama the tremendous a dramatic tension that uh happens

right before this passage the second thing you have to notice and this is something that is fairly new for me because i have not noticed this until i began studying this is that jesus christ is very much in charge in fact i'll i'll be careful when i use this word but i want to use it jesus christ arranges his his friendful entry jesus christ orchestrates his triumphal entry this is uh remember the gospel writers are all very concise people they do not spend a lot of time on things and six verses is given to jesus

christ arranging his triumphal entry now you know i i don't know about you but i know in my case i have always pictured it like this that jesus christ was sort of going to jerusalem and everybody came out and said hail the son of david and jesus looked around sort of you know and said oh shucks uh i'm speechless you know uh well okay uh sure i'll get up here and fine and i've always thought about that way have you listen jesus christ is absolutely in control and he arranges the triumphal entry now if you

want to see it look first of all he sends his disciples into beth page to get a donkey now beth page and bethany were two villages right outside jerusalem and they were very close to each other and jesus knew them intimately because bethany which is right next to bethpage was the home of mary martha and lazarus and first of all not only do we know and we've seen this as we've gone through this series that jesus spent a lot of time there and he knew the whole village very well so he would know where animals

were he knew who owned animals and he knew where they were tied and so forth then secondly there was probably no other crowd anywhere in all of palestine that understood the power of jesus the disciples did but if you're looking for a crowd they had seen the raising of lazarus they knew who he was they knew about his glory they knew the power there and no one else no other crowd had ever seen anything like that so you see when jesus sends his disciples in to get a a donkey and and it's cold people have

always assumed that's pretty interesting surely jesus might have made it must have made an arrangement with the owner you know people have always debated this over the years surely jesus must have had some arrangement i mean he wouldn't just go in and take it i mean they wouldn't do that it doesn't say that he made an arrangement as a matter of fact jesus christ very clearly expects that for the for them to walk on in and just grab a donkey people are going to say what's going on and jesus says make sure you let them

know that i'm going to be riding it now if you look carefully you'll see down in verse 8 we see the disciples went did as jesus instructed them and then what look verse verse 9 um a very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road while others cut branches the crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed were shouting and down in verse 10 we're told that when jesus entered jerusalem the whole city was stirred this crowd is not from jerusalem this crowd was gathered outside of jerusalem they went before and after and

where does this crowd arrive as soon as the donkey arrives why because it's from bethany and bethpage jesus christ has orchestrated this jesus christ is arranged in a sense he sent for the crowd not just for the donkey and he is in total control and he is forcing the issue and he's making sure he comes into jerusalem being declared as loudly as possible confronting jerusalem and the leaders of jerusalem with the claims of his kingship then the third thing we have to notice before we ask what this all means notice the choice of the steed

he chooses a donkey now let me let's put ourselves into the shoes of the disciples the disciples are finally happy that their master is finally doing something right jesus is very enigmatic about his kingship every time they start to say let's go let's take power let's take over you can raise the dead you can steal the storm we can we can kick these romans out like that and jesus is always making his enigmatic statements about his suffering and all that so finally finally he's doing something right and instead of getting a war horse you know

to ride in as a victorious general what is he doing you know here's the interesting thing the steed of a king is not a donkey who rides a donkey huh sancho ponza rides a donkey servants ride donkeys it is not the steed of a king it is the steed of a servant and we'll get back to that in a second but you can just imagine the disciples saying finally this is more like it but you know when we get to jerusalem we're going to have to hire master of spin meister he doesn't have good instincts

about this pr stuff this doesn't look right you know he's not sending the right you know that he's sending mixed signals here you know i mean is he coming in is this wandering guru this gentle you know uh servant heart or is he the general who's gonna kick out the romans uh you know we're gonna have to do something about this and so let's notice the fact that jesus is sending a very mixed message a very enigmatic message in the heart of all the celebration now what's it all mean here's what it all means verse

5 there's a striking a striking phrase that i want to repeat over and over again till you get it until i get it too in verse 5 it says behold look your king comes to you gentle there it is in verse 5 it says behold see your king comes to you gentle now right there we know three things about the kingship of christ your king comes to you gentle first of all we learn here the confrontational nature of the kingship of christ secondly the paradoxical nature and thirdly the transformational nature that's not good english confrontational

paradoxical transformational i hope it's a good sermon i know it's not good english but right there we see it first of all confrontational your king paradoxical your king comes gentle transformational but he is coming he is on the way he is the king who's coming he's the coming king the one we've all been waiting for now look at these three things fairly briefly as we get ready to come to the table uh we're coming you see the king's coming to you and we're coming to him number one the confrontational nature if you understand this passage

the first thing you have to realize is jesus christ is forcing the issue jesus christ is not reluctant there's no ah shucks about jesus christ i'll put it another way jesus christ is tremendously humble but not at all modest when i read the scripture when you read the scripture you'll see incredible humility such sensitivity such compassion such tenderness but there is no way that you can call him modest the thing that's so unique about jesus and there's no one else like him never will be never has been and that is with regard to other people

unbelievably humble incredibly humble loving gentle tender serving asking questions incredible but when it comes to dealing with himself there's not a shred of modesty he is continually making incredible claims he says over and over again in this passage he says ultimate king of the universe yes see he goes to the temple what's the temple it's god's house he walks in to god's house and he says my house shall not be and he begins to rearrange the furniture the way only an owner has the right to do how can you go into god's house and say

it's my house he's saying he's god i mean listen on every page jesus christ is the most immodest person who ever lived he's always forcing his identity on you his kingship always confronting he's always arranging it he's always making sure you hear it he will not slip into jerusalem listen this is the first point jesus christ when he comes to any city or anybody he says crown me or kill me nothing in the middle jesus is forcing everybody's hand crown me or kill me now my suggestion to you is that that's what he does not

just to jerusalem he does that to any intellect and to any heart listen if he comes to your intellect he'll do the same thing he will orchestrate it so crown me or kill me uh reynolds price put it this way reynolds price was a duke university professor who of english who wrote a book called three gospels it's pretty interesting i think it's a his translation of mark and john and then his own version of jesus life plus long introductions very helpful book i find but one of the things he says about the gospel of john

but it could just as easily be said about matthew mark or luke listen to this he says if two thousand years of pious handling had not dimmed both this story and its demand his gospel would still be seen as the burning outrage it continues to be it is either a work of madness or blinding revelation hear that each of the gospels is either a work of madness or blinding revelation the acts it portrays the claim it advances from the very first paragraph demands that we make a hard choice if we take john or mark or

matthew seriously we must finally ask the question he thrust so flagrantly toward us does he bring us a life transforming truth or is it one gifted lunatic's tale of another lunatic wilder than he now look reynolds price knows it everybody who's ever really come to grips with it has noticed it when jesus christ comes to your intellect because of his claims because he says i'm the absolute king what he's doing is he's saying you can despise me horribly as a lunatic or you can throw everything over and serve me completely but there's nothing in the

middle no person with any intellectual integrity i will not allow you kill me or crown me nothing else so intellectually he comes like that but he not only comes to your intellectual intellectually like that he always comes to your heart that way if you come to him and say i would like some help i would like some uh i would like some some inspiration jesus you know if you come to him and say i would like you to be my consultant i would like to be my partner i would like to be my counselor you

know what jesus christ says jesus says oh i could be more than that i could be your shepherd i can be your brother i can be your guide i can be your friend but i won't be anything unless i'm king either i will be king or i'll be nothing i want all of you or i want none of you there's a very frightening place in the book of revelation where saint john the apostle says that he heard jesus once in a vision say this you are neither hot nor warm you're luke pardon me you're neither

hot nor cold you're lukewarm and i spew you out of my mouth think about this that's true of most foods most foods are fine hot and even fine cold but almost nothing is good tepid and jesus says crown me that's fine or kill me at least if you want to kill me at least if you're screaming at me at least if you're angry at me at least you're listening to me crown me or kill me throw everything over and make me the supreme absolute monarch of your life or despise me but i will not be

light i won't be liked you know worship me kill me hate me but don't like me i won't let you like me crown me or kill me he orchestrates it the die is cast and that is the confrontational nature of his kingship and by the way christian friends listen we all know that there's a lot of people there's a lot of people in this room probably a few hundred of you that think that what i just said is very extreme you would like to admire jesus you would like to pray to him sometimes but you

really don't like this whole idea that oh he's got to be the very center he's got to be the whole my my i have to give him unconditional surrender or nothing at all you don't like that and i'm trying to point out that jesus christ comes to jerusalem he comes to everybody's heart and says deal with it jesus is a confrontational at this point he says deal with it nothing in the middle now there's a lot of people here who don't like to hear what i just said it's my i hope you're not mad at

me i hope you're mad at jesus that's what he's that's what he's trying to do but if there's anybody here you say well i'm a christian and i believe that in fact maybe you were cheering what i just said well thank you for the emotional support but let me suggest something to you don't let yourself off the hook i'm trying not to i was reading a very humorous story one of the funniest stories in the bible is in acts chapter 19. or in the book of uh it's it's uh in the book of acts where

paul is being very successful in ephesus he's planting a new church and there's seven men they're called the seven sons of siva the seven signs of siva here that this this jesus that paul is doing these great miracles in the name of jesus so they try to they say well maybe the name of jesus is a power let's try it out so they go to a demon-possessed man and they say this is very funny they say in the name of jesus you know the one that paul preaches in the name of jesus i cast you

out and the demon looks at at the demon for this man the demon looks at the seven sons and says hmm jesus i know and paul i know but who the heck are you and they jumps on him and beats the seven sons and they run away wildly but you know what here's what it's saying the power of jesus christ is not magic it's not mechanical it's kingly power unless you're submitting to his name there is no power and christian friends if you are asking for help if you're invoking jesus name and you're asking for

help and you're asking for strength but you're not enjoying him and you're not obeying him that's just magic see the the name of jesus is not mechanical power it's not abstract power it's not magical power it's kingly power it doesn't work without submission that's the reason why jesus will comes to a city and says unless i'm king i'm nothing to you i'm not savior unless i'm king i'm not i'm not helper unless i'm king i'm not brother unless i'm king i'm not transformer unless i'm king you see crown me or kill me he confronts number

two the paradoxical nature your king comes gentle now the thing we already made an allusion to was this whole thing about the donkey here's jesus riding a donkey and one of the reasons why he does it of course ostensibly the reason he does it and matthew points it out matthew points out that there were prophecies in the old testament that said that when the son of david the messianic king would come there would be he would be riding on a donkey now there's actually two very important messianic texts about that uh the one messianic text

is in genesis 49. and in genesis 49 it says the scepter will not depart from judah nor the ruler staff from between his feet until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of all the nations will be his he will tether his donkey to a vine and his cult to the choice branch he will wash his garments in wine and his robes in the blood of grapes and what that's saying is that that a great king will come in the future and when he comes all nations will bow to him and he will

put everything right and you know this that reference to washing his uh robes in the wine of grapes what is really saying is he will make things so right that we'll just be awash in prosperity no more thorns and vinegar there'll be wine in celebration there'll be so much wine flying you'll be able to wash your clothes in it and yet the trouble with this whole thing is what kind of king in general comes on a donkey how are you going to win how are you going to beat the oppressor and then of course in

zechariah 9 we have the same thing it's it's mentioned here see he say to the daughter of zion this is a zechariah this is an old testament quote see your king comes to you gentle meek and riding on a donkey he has to come gentle if he's on a donkey put it this way to ride in a donkey in spite of all this kingly stuff is to take the position of a servant and i'll tell you one other thing and this is certainly what the disciples knew any general who rides into a battle on a

donkey is going to be slaughtered you'd be better on foot you'd be better on a steed but if you ride in on a donkey you're going to be slaughtered jesus christ comes in and with all due respect i'm trying to say jesus christ comes in riding like a servant and riding like roadkill riding vulnerable to be gentle means to be vulnerable to be defenseless why is jesus doing this and here's why he's doing this right here as usual we have in this passage in the passage that we've read today we have the gospel what's the

gospel well first of all you see where he goes into the the temple and he cleanses it now back in the fall we talked about the cleansing of the temple i'm not going to go into that at all again there's a tape if you weren't here some of you have your memory if you were but one thing we know is the reason jesus was throwing the money changes out was that they were taking advantage of god they were using god rather than god rather than letting god use them hear that they were using god they

were making advantage out of god they were using god instead of letting god use them and the reversal in the temple is the reason for the reversal on the road because this is the gospel would you like a gospel in a nutshell it's right here sin is servants putting themselves in the place of the king therefore salvation was the king putting himself in the place of the servant see sin is the servant putting yourself in the place of the king and salvation then is the king putting himself in the place of the servant listen listen

sin what's wrong with the world what's wrong with the world what can cause on the one end the holocaust and on the other end the fact that you're worried sick over something this morning i mean those are kind of extremes the holocaust is because people put themselves in the place of god the servant putting himself in the place of the king that's what causes the holocaust but on the other hand do you know why you're so worried you know why you're so worried sick do you know why you're upset this morning because you believe that

you know how your life has got to go you have all wisdom enough see you're putting yourself in the place of the king every problem all of our misery all of our fighting everything is caused by sin what is sin sin is the servant putting him or herself in the place of the king therefore what are we going to do about that what are we going to do about the horrible state of the world other religions say we send messengers and we tell people please stop putting yourself in the place of the king but the

christianity says that's like sending band-aids for a heart wound christianity says the king comes and puts himself in the place of the servant the king comes whereas sin is humanity putting itself where only god should be salvation is god coming and putting himself where we should be receiving the death penalty dying for our sins and don't you see what jesus is doing here and do you hear it jesus is saying to us he's saying to everybody he is saying when he's riding on this donkey instead of on this deed he's saying i'm the king but

not a king like you think what if i did for you from the romans do you realize if i freed you from the romans if that was the only liberation i gave you you would turn around and enslave somebody else you know why if i liberate you from the romans what are you going to do about your guilt what are you gonna do about that sense that deep sense of nakedness and spiritual emptiness that you have what do you do about the fact that you are desperately trying to prove yourself why are you what are

you gonna do about the fact of your real slavery why you are trampling down other races and other classes to prove to yourself that you're significant you've got a slavery that goes far deeper than the slavery of rome and if i if all i do is liberate you from rome what are we going to do about liberating you from death which is the thing which is running your life and what is causing all the breakdown in the world i've come to give you real liberation see the paradox and here's what's so beautiful about this if

the gentle king the gentle king the dying king the servant king the king that is higher than the heavens and yet comes so low the king on a donkey the k see if this king comes into your life he will turn you into a gentle king he will turn you into paradoxical royalty the whole point of the gospel is we're saved through weakness not through strength every other religion and every other philosophy whether you get it from something that's 2000 years old or whether you make it up yourself they're all the same what they all

say is i'm going to clean up my life and i'm going to do better i'm going to save through strength that's what the disciples want save us through strength jesus says no you can't be saved you see that you must die you see jesus christ comes and he dies in our place which means we're not saved by strength we're saved by grace we're not saved by our moral efforts we're saved by his grace and let me suggest this let me just give you a couple examples if you believe you're saved through strength and and surely

that's what that's the universal religion of humankind if you believe you're saved by strength watch what happens when someone wrongs you if you're saved by strength you either feel very good about yourself you're bold because you feel like you're living up to standards or else lately you've been feeling like a favor favor of failure so you're you're you're humble but you're not bold if you believe you're saved by strength you'll either be bold and not humble because you think you're living up to standards or you'll be humble but not bold because you feel like you're

failing the standards and if somebody wrongs you you'll be too arrogant to forgive them or else you'll be too angry and bitter to forgive them if things go into your life that are really bad what if something terrible happens to you you see if you're living up to standards you'll keep you'll be mad at god you'll say you owe me a better life and if you feel like you're failing your standards you'll be mad at yourself you feel like i guess i deserve this but if you're a christian if you know you're saved by weakness

if you know you're saved by the gentle king you'll be a gentle king because on the one hand when things go wrong you'll say well i'm a sinner i don't deserve a good life but on the other hand you'll say but i'm loved by him i'm accepted by him i am freely welcomed by him and therefore this this thing that's happening to me is not a punishment god's got some good thing he's doing in my life through it you will move through life with royalty do you see that if you understand the paradoxical nature of

his kingship and if you understand that you're saved through weakness which is the message of palm sunday then that gentle kingship that paradoxical boldness and humility together something that's salvation through strengths can never give you you can either be bold or humble but you can't be both if you believe in salvation by strength but if you believe in salvation by weakness it'll be recaptured in you he'll recreate himself in you now lastly look your king comes gentle that's the confrontational nature and that's the paradoxical nature of his kingship there's one more thing i love the

fact that he comes it's in present tense i love it that means first of all he's not he's not away it's not doesn't say he will come but on the other hand it doesn't say he's totally here and one of the most wonderful things about this whole passage is the palms yes the palms do you know what the palms are all about the people probably didn't know it but in psalm 95 it says let the heavens be glad let the earth rejoice then shall the trees of the wood sing for joy when he comes to

judge the earth in isaiah 55 verse 12 it says you shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace then will the mountains and the hills break forth into singing and the trees will clap their hands what we're told is that when jesus comes back completely when he comes back totally when his kingship is absolute this world will burst into all of what it's supposed to be it was designed to be so much more than it is supposed to be and on that day the mountains and the hills will sing we don't know

what that means and the trees will wave and see the palm trees where the palm trees were foretaste portents of that great day when the king truly comes all the way back and here's what i want to ask you if when jesus comes back and his kingship is all in all if the trees are going to be singing what in the world are we going to be like see compared to what you are going to be you are right now nothing but a block of wood jonathan edwards says you know right now you've got five

senses maybe then we'll have 100 senses maybe they will have a thousand senses compared to what you're going to be right now you're a vegetable you're a piece of wood you're a mountain you're a rock what is promised to us is absolutely astounding listen behold he comes on the one hand his majesty and his might is infinite none can resist him on the other hand he comes gentle he takes in the lepers he takes in the blind he tapes in the lame he takes in the children he takes in the prostitutes what kind of king

is this this is the king that brings blessedness and if you listen to his confrontation number one and number two see however listen if you only get point one you're confronted give yourself to christ if you only get point one and not point two see that he's not just the king but he's the gentle king you'll just try to save yourself you'll try to be your own messiah you'll try to be your own deliverer if you let him confront you with his kingship and then meet him as the gentle king the one who's who saves

you through weakness then he will make you into something beyond anything you can imagine more than you can dare ask or imagine what is coming if the trees are going to be singing if the mountains are going to be tap dancing what will you and me be able to do blessed is he who comes in the name of the lord let's pray our father we ask that you would help us to see this gentle king and that when we take the bread and we take the cup now we realize that we're remembering how he saved

us through weakness how he saved us through brokenness and being poured out as we see that we are accepted through what he did that paradoxical royalty that boldness and humility that incredible majesty and yet unbelievable tenderness that infinite highness and yet incredible access that will all be recreated in us and we ask that you would help us to do that now in jesus name we pray amen thank you for listening today gospel life's ministry is supported by generous partners all over the world your gifts allow us to share the gospel message with millions of people

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