Palm Sunday 2024

In 1976 a British evolutionary scientist named Richard Dawkins wrote a book called The Selfish Gene. I believe that anyone who takes the Bible seriously should reject the idea that one kind, or family, of animal will ever be able to turn into a different kind or family, but that doesn’t mean that scientists are completely wrong in some of the observations they make. Dawkins correctly pointed out that information gets transferred from one organism to another through its genes, its genetic material.

Now, as a comparison, Dawkins pointed to a similar kind of transmission that happens culturally, not genetically. There are ideas and beliefs and behaviors that spread from one person to another, and it’s not a genetic process. If your kid likes the same sports team as you do; that’s not a genetic transmission. That’s a cultural transmission.

Dawkins wanted to create a new term for this kind of cultural transmission, but what would he call it? He wanted a one-syllable word that sounded like “gene,” and he settled on a Greek root that means “to imitate” or “to copy.” So, about 50 years ago, Dawkins referred to these units of cultural transmission as “memes.” He said a meme was something that carried information and could be replicated and transmitted from one person to another.

When we hear the term today, we think of internet memes, which isn’t what Dawkins had in mind, though there are some parallels. Internet memes are an interesting phenomenon because they typically assume you already have some kind of information. If you don’t have that information, you won’t “get it.” You won’t understand what’s trying to be communicated in the meme. There are memes you could show me, that wouldn’t impact me the way they impacted you, and vice versa. There’s some background information you need to understand.

I say this because as we focus our attention on Palm Sunday, which we just read about, there is background information that you need in order to better understand what is happening here.

And this background information is something that the Jewish people had transmitted from generation to generation. One of the ways that the Jewish people transmitted culture and values and faith to the next generation was through music.

Music is one of the gifts God has given us. In a general sense, music is part of God’s common grace, which means that even the unbelieving world can enjoy it.

Music is one of the ways a culture expresses itself emotionally and helps guide others. For example, there are songs we sing when we are happy, and there are songs we sing that can help make us and others happy. And the same is true with regard to sadness or anger or other emotions. Music helps us express our emotions, and it also guides our emotions and helps us pass them on to others. That can be done in a healthy way or in an unhealthy way.

In God’s special grace, the Israelites were given a book of songs intended to help them respond appropriately to various seasons of life. Some songs looked back on the past. Some songs expressed the present circumstances. And some songs were an expectation of the future. These songs are the Psalms.

One of the most tragic seasons in the history of Israel was when the nation was destroyed and taken over by the Babylonians. The city of Jerusalem and the Temple itself were completely destroyed while countless men, women, and children either lost their lives or were dragged away as slaves.

Even in a season like that, the Spirit of God provided songs for the people to sing. We don’t have the melody or the music today, but we do have the lyrics. I’d like to direct your attention to three of those psalms. These are psalms which helped shape the Jewish way of life for centuries.

The first is Psalm 74. You can turn there with me if you like. Psalm 74. The song was written as a corporate lament expressing great anguish and agony. The people felt as if God had abandoned them.

Psalm 74:1 says—O God, why do you cast us off forever? Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture?

How could God do this to them? Verses 3 through 10 say—Direct your steps to the perpetual ruins; the enemy has destroyed everything in the sanctuary! Your foes have roared in the midst of your meeting place; they set up their own signs for signs. They were like those who swing axes in a forest of trees. And all its carved wood they broke down with hatchets and hammers. They set your sanctuary on fire; they profaned the dwelling place of your name, bringing it down to the ground. They said to themselves, “We will utterly subdue them”; they burned all the meeting places of God in the land. We do not see our signs; there is no longer any prophet, and there is none among us who knows how long. How long, O God, is the foe to scoff? Is the enemy to revile your name forever?

Psalm 74 begins with no hope, but the second half of the psalm meditates on the faithfulness and power of God. The psalm ends by calling on God to act again for the salvation of His people.

Verse 20 says—Have regard for the covenant, for the dark places of the land are full of the habitations of violence. Verse 22 adds—Arise, O God, defend your cause.

A second psalm connected to the destruction of Jerusalem is Psalm 79. You can turn there as well, if you like. I’ll read the first four verses. Psalm 79:1-4—O God, the nations have come into your inheritance; they have defiled your holy temple; they have laid Jerusalem in ruins. They have given the bodies of your servants to the birds of the heavens for food, the flesh of your faithful to the beasts of the earth. They have poured out their blood like water all around Jerusalem, and there was no one to bury them. We have become a taunt to our neighbors, mocked and derided by those around us.

So again, we see the expression of anguish, but, yet again, the psalm ends with an eye toward restoration. Verses 11 and 12 say—Let the groans of the prisoners come before you; according to your great power, preserve those doomed to die! Return sevenfold into the lap of our neighbors the taunts with which they have taunted you, O Lord!

The final psalm I want you to see that comes out of this distressing time in Israel’s history in Psalm 137. Psalm 137. Remember, this is what shaped the Hebrew people. This psalm points back to the Israelites who saw the destruction of their land and were carried away as slaves to a foreign empire.

Psalm 137 says this—By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion. On the willows there we hung up our lyres. For there our captors required of us songs, and our tormentors, mirth, saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

This taunt by the enemies was like salt in their wounds. The Jews were robbed of their homeland, but those ruling over them ask for a happy song about Jerusalem.

Similar to the previous psalms I mentioned, Psalm 137 ends with an eye to salvation, but the tone is not a happy one. It ends up being a psalm of justice anticipating a gruesome destruction of the Babylonians. That desire for justice came out of a heart that was completely broken by tragedy.

This was the sentiment that Israel carried on for centuries. They knew they were called by God to be a glorious, powerful, and influential nation in the world, but instead, they were under the authority of foreigners. In Luke 21, Jesus refers to this as “the times of the Gentiles.” Jews are under Gentile control.

Almost 50 years after Jerusalem was destroyed, the Babylonians were conquered by the Persians. The Persians allowed the Jews to return and rebuild the city, but Israel was still under the control of a foreign nation.

After two centuries, the Persians lost the war to Alexander the Great, and Israel was conquered by the Greeks. Alexander’s goal was to create a “world culture” based on Greek philosophy and law and politics. In doing that, however, he was erasing the language and the traditions and even the religions of the nations in his rule. And the faithful Jews resented it.

After about a century under the Greeks, the Romans came onto the scene. At times, the Jews gained a little bit of autonomy and independence, but Rome was always quick to remind them who was really in charge. Israel couldn’t govern itself; it was placed under the rule of a so-called “king” chosen by the Roman Empire.

Through all this, the cry of the Jews was the cry of the Psalms we read—How long, O Lord? How long is this time of trouble and oppression going to last? When will salvation and deliverance come? When will we be rescued and restored as a great nation?

This was the spiritual and political climate when Jesus began His ministry in Israel. You can turn back to Mathew 21 now. The people were waiting for their King. The political unrest led to a growing despair and frustration and resentment. But it also came with a longing for salvation and freedom.

And for about three years, Jesus came giving the nation a glimpse, or a preview, of what life would be like in the Kingdom of God. Demons were cast out. Disease was abolished. Death was undone. Jesus was the answer to the problem Israel had faced for centuries.

But despite all the good Jesus did, and the teaching He brought to the people, the Jewish leaders rejected Him. They asked him questions, not out of a humble desire to learn, but out of a wicked craving to oppose Him. The Jewish leaders didn’t like all the attention Jesus was getting from the crowds, and they Him eliminated.

What was their problem?

They wanted to maintain the system they developed where they stood above everybody else because of their obedience both to the biblical law and to their traditions. In their system, sinners got what they deserved. So, they resented Jesus’ message which was that anyone could be part of God’s Kingdom if they repented of their sins, and that included the religious leaders. But they would not accept Jesus as the Son of David, the rightful King of Israel. They would not accept a system that condemned them for sin.

So, enraging the Pharisees even more, Jesus’ message and Jesus’ healings are directed to the outcasts. In the chapters leading up to Matthew 21, Jesus affirms the value of children. He receives and heals the sick. And Jesus welcomes any sinner who repents. Those are all expressions of Jesus’ identity and authority as the promised King of the Jews.

As we finally, come to Matthew 21, we are going to see three more affirmations of Jesus’ royal authority. This is what Matthew wants his readers to realize.

First of all, Jesus affirms His royal authority by ordaining events. He ordains events.

Let’s read verses 1-3 one more time—Now when they drew near to Jerusalem and came to Bethphage, to the Mount of Olives, then Jesus sent two disciples, [2] 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. [3] If anyone says anything to you, you shall say, ‘The Lord needs them,’ and he will send them at once.”

Jesus perfectly ordains two things here. First, he ordains the timing of His visit. While the crowds are getting ready to select a Passover lamb to sacrifice later that week, Jesus was getting ready to present Himself publicly in the city of the King, in Jerusalem. This is all working out as it had been ordained.

But more than that, secondly, Jesus is also working out the details related to how He is going to enter. There’s not indication that Jesus had formally planned this with anybody else. But He tells two of the disciples, “Go get me a donkey.” And it’s not any donkey; it’s a specific one that He knew would be available. “No one is going to bother you,” Jesus says, “because you are doing the work of the Lord. You’re coming in the name of the King.”

That is Jesus’ authority in ordaining these events. That’s the first expression.

The second expression comes in verses 4a and 5. Jesus affirms His royal authority by fulfilling Scripture. Jesus ordains events, and He fulfills Scripture.

In verse 4, Matthew adds his own commentary. He writes—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.’”

Jesus knew exactly what He was doing as He came into the city on a donkey. He was fulfilling Old Testament prophecy which said that a King would come. I know that we typically associate a donkey with Jesus’ humility, and there’s some truth to that. But the imagery here also includes victory, power, and authority. Jesus is going to rule Israel and judge her enemies.

That phrase about the daughters of Zion comes from Isaiah 62:11. The context is talking about God’s might and the salvation He will bring. Isaiah 62:11-12 says this—Behold, the Lord has proclaimed to the end of the earth: Say to the daughter of Zion, “Behold, your salvation comes; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.” And they shall be called The Holy People, The Redeemed of the Lord; and you shall be called Sought Out, A City Not Forsaken.

The bulk of the prophecy Matthew cites comes from Zechariah 9:9. Zechairah’s message came during the time of Zerubbabel to a group of Jews who had left Persia hoping to rebuild Jerusalem. The broader context is a prophecy saying that God will destroy Israel’s enemies.

In one sense, that prophecy was fulfilled when Alexander the Great came destroying those nations. But even that was simply a foretaste of a greater, future judgment to come on Israel’s enemies.

Here’s the broader context of the passage in Zechariah 9. Here’s what the Israelites who knew their Bibles had in mind—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.

Just a few verses later, it says—On that day the Lord their God will save them, as the flock of his people; for like the jewels of a crown they shall shine on his land. For how great is his goodness, and how great his beauty! Grain shall make the young men flourish, and new wine the young women.

What’s the image there? It is total conquest and total restoration. This is what the people were waiting for. And this is what Jesus affirms as He enter into the city. He is the King who will fulfill the word and the promises of God.

Now, in response to this, we get our third and final expression of Jesus’ kingship. Number three, Jesus affirms His authority by receiving worship. By receiving worship. Jesus ordains events. He fulfills Scripture, and lastly, here, He receives worship.

Let’s read one more time how the crowd responds starting in verse 6—The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them. [7] They brought the donkey and the colt and put on them their cloaks, and he sat on them. [8] Most of the crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. [9] 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!” [10] And when he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred up, saying, “Who is this?” [11] And the crowds said, “This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee.”

The crowd understood the statement Jesus was making. And just like they had in mind the psalms that lamented their burdens, they also had in mind the songs that anticipated their salvation. This is what had been transmitted to them from previous generations. This is what had been passed on to them: A King is coming to free the people.

The word “hosanna” is a Hebrew term pleading with God for salvation. It comes from Psalm 118:25 which says—Save us, we pray, O Lord! O Lord, we pray, give us success!

Psalm 118 is a beautiful song remembering God’s eternal kindness and faithful love. There is an element of distress, but the tone is one of joy.

Earlier in Psalm 118 it says—Out of my distress I called on the Lord; the Lord answered me and set me free. The Lord is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do to me? The Lord is on my side as my helper; I shall look in triumph on those who hate me.

In verses 21-24, pointing to the coming King, it says—I thank you that you have answered me and have become my salvation. The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

A lot of people know that last verse I just mentioned, but they don’t always know that it was used, not to point to today, but to the day that God’s King will bring final salvation to His people. On that day, in a distinct way, His people will rejoice and be glad in it. They will say, “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” That verse comes from Psalm 118 as well.

This crowd is visibly acknowledging the reality of who Jesus is. All their expectations are tied up in Christ, and so, they praise Him. And the energy of that crowd grows and grows. And there are people there who don’t understand what’s happening, so they ask, “Who is this?” And the people tell them, “This is the prophet Jesus of Nazareth.”

With that closing description, Matthew ends his account of Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem. He leaves us there with a palpable tension between the people excited about Jesus, and the Pharisees who are enraged at everything He does. With this entrance, Jesus sets into motion the Jewish leaders ultimate act of hatred, which will be turn the crowds against Jesus and put Him to death. But that story is for another time.

Today, Matthew’s goal is for all of us to see and to recognize that Jesus is the true King. That’s the truth. That is reality. The question is: Have you accepted that reality?

Some of you might be here with the heart of the Pharisees. You reject Jesus. You might be polite in the way you do it, and we’re glad you’re here. But in your heart, you reject the authority Jesus has over your life. You live life your own way.

Others of you might be more like the Jewish crowds. With your words you praise Jesus. But it’s only skin deep. It’s fake faith. The crowds loved Jesus because they expected Him to complete specific promises of God. And He was going to do that. But before that could take place, Jesus was going to die for the sins of His people. He needed to pay the price for sinners to enter into God’s kingdom. That’s not what the Israelites wanted. They only accepted Jesus if He came on their conditions. That’s not an authentic citizen of heaven.

The true acceptance of Jesus as King is to completely surrender to Him. It is to recognize your own sin, humbly pray for salvation, and trust in His death and Resurrection on your behalf. And then, you wait on His perfect timing.

Life is not going to get better all of a sudden. But by faith, you recognize that Jesus is in control of everything that’s going on. In everything that happens politically—everything that happens financially or physically in your life—Christ is King. And your goal is to obey Him. You study His word. You learn His heart, and you live for Him.

In doing that, we as a church know that what He has also called us to do is to proclaim His message to those around us. We teach it to our neighbors and our coworkers and our community. And we especially pass that truth along to the members of our own household. This is the legacy we want to see transmitted to our children and to the next generation. This is what we want to pass on. We want them to know that Jesus is the King who saves us from our sin and who will save all His people from death forever. Jesus is the King.