Through the Eyes of Hope (Zechariah 9:9-13; Matthew 21:1-5)

Abel, would you please remain standing for the reading of

God's Word? This morning I'll be reading

from two different passages, one from the Old Testament, followed

by one from the Gospel of Matthew.

I begin by reading the prophet Zechariah, Chapter 9, beginning

Zechariah 9 · chapter mention

with verse 9. 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.

The battle bows shall be cut off, and he shall speak peace to

the nations. His rules should 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've bent Judah as my bow. I've made Ephraim its arrow.

I will stir up your son's, O Zion, against your sons, O

Greece, and wield you like a warrior's sword.

Now the Gospel of Matthew chapter 21 beginning with verse

Matthew 21 · chapter mention

one. And when they drew new to

Jerusalem and came to Bethpage, the Mount of Olives.

Then Jesus sent 2 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. Untie them and bring them to me.

If anyone says anything to you, you'll say the Lord needs them

and he'll send them at once. This took place to fulfill what

was spoken by the prophet saying say to the daughter of Zion,

behold, your king is coming to you humble and mounted on a

donkey, on a colt, the fold of a beast of burden.

This is the word of Lord. You may be seated.

The story of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is

not a myth. It's not a folk tale, it's not a

work of fiction. It is history.

In fact, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is

the turning point of all of history.

And in the Bible, the Gospels record the eyewitness accounts

of the people who were there. Gospel of Luke begins this way.

This is Luke 1 verse one. Luke tells us in as much as many

have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that

have been accomplished among us, just as those who from the

beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word have

delivered them to us. It seemed good to me also,

having followed all things closely for some Thai past, to

write an orderly account. Luke tells us that everything

he's written in the Gospel of Luke and an Acts is an orderly

account of eyewitness testimony. It can be trusted because every

event actually happened. People were there and they saw

it with their own eyes, and they gave reports that were recorded

down for you and for me. The Gospel of John ends like

this. John 21, verse 24, Speaking of

John 21:24

himself, John says this is the disciple who is bearing witness

about these things and who has written about these things and

we know that his testimony is true.

What that means for us as we enter into yet another Holy Week

and we rehearse and we retell the story of the Passion of our

Savior Jesus Christ once more, it is essential that we remember

that everything we proclaim actually happened.

This is the true story of Jesus Christ, his life, his death, and

his resurrection. And there were witnesses, people

who were actually there, who saw it with their own eyes.

Can you imagine what it must have been like?

Can you imagine what it must have been like to have been

there that day nearly 2000 years ago at the first triumphal entry

when Jesus came into Jerusalem? Can you imagine what it must

have been like to have waved a palm branch in your hand?

To have strained your eyes just to get a glimpse of this man

that you've heard has done miracles and healed the sick?

To see him riding on a donkey and hear the people cry out.

Hosanna, hosanna. Can you imagine what it must

have been like for the disciples gathered in the upper room as

Jesus took bread and wine and said, This is my body, this is

my blood given for you? Can you imagine what it must

have been like to hear those words, be completely stunned by

them? Can you imagine what it must

have been like to have been with the crowds that day as people

yelled out Crucify Him, crucify him, give us Barabbas?

Can you imagine what it must have been like to have been

there when, in the middle of the afternoon, the sky turned black

and Jesus hung there on a cross, straining to breathe?

Can you imagine what it must have been like to have seen the

risen Jesus, to have put your fingers and the wounds in his

hands, put your hand in his side?

There were witnesses, people who are actually there.

And this Holy Week it is our prayer that we will see Jesus

for who he truly is through their eyes.

And as we begin this Palm Sunday, we're going to begin in

an unlikely place, not through the eyes of the disciples for

the those who are there that Passion Week, but we're going to

begin 500 years before the birth of Jesus with the prophet

Zechariah. And through his prophetic eyes,

as he set his hope on the coming Messiah, we will see what it

means for us to hope in Christ today, this morning.

I want to look at that in three ways.

The first is this. I want you to know that Christ

has come for our salvation. I want you to look with me at

Zechariah 99. You can find it in your bulletin

or also invite you to open your Bible.

If you don't have a Bible this morning, please take the Blue

Pew Bible in front of you. That's our gift to you,

Zechariah 99. You'll find it as the second to

last book of the Old Testament. Zechariah writes this.

Rejoice greatly, oh daughter of Zion.

Shout aloud, oh daughter of Jerusalem.

Now before we get into Zechariah's prophecy of the

becoming Messiah, we must first get our bearings on who

Zechariah actually was and why he wrote this book in the 1st

place. Zechariah is one of the 12 minor

prophets. That's the last 12 books of the

Bible, and as I told you, it's actually the second to last

book. The book of Zechariah was

written beginning in 520 BC. That is over half a millennia

before the birth of Jesus. And yet Zechariah's prophecy of

the coming Messiah is vivid and it's specific.

He's not speaking in generalities, but he's giving a

very vivid description of the coming Messiah, what he is like,

and what he will come to do. Zechariah refers to him first in

chapter 3. He calls him the branch.

If you have your Bible open, you can turn back to Zechariah 3,

Zechariah 3:8

verse 8. Zechariah first describes the

Messiah this way. He says here now, O Joshua, the

high priest, you and your friends who sit before you, for

they are men who are a sign, Behold, I will bring my servant

the branch. You may notice in your Bible the

word branch is capitalized as if to say it's a title.

You know, I might be thinking, well, to describe the Messiah as

the branch seems like a strange title to give him.

But what Zechariah is doing, he's tapping into a title that's

already been given by the prophets to describe the coming

Savior King. This is Jeremiah 23 verse 5.

Jeremiah 23:5

Jeremiah says, behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord,

when I will raise up for David a righteous branch, and he shall

reign as king and deal wisely. He shall execute justice and

righteousness in the land and the days Judah will be saved and

Israel will dwell securely. And in this the name by which he

will be called the Lord our righteousness.

What Jeremiah is telling us is that a king is coming, a

long-awaited savior king, a king who will bring salvation and

righteousness. And he calls him the branch

because he is of the royal family tree of King David, this

long-awaited savior king from David's royal line.

Throughout the Bible, he's called the Messiah.

The word Messiah means anointed one in Hebrew.

In Greek, the word Messiah is the word Christ.

It's why Jesus is often called Jesus Christ.

When we say Jesus Christ, we're not giving his first and last

name. No, the word Christ is a title.

It means Messiah. Every time we say the words

Jesus Christ, we are declaring a statement of faith that Jesus is

the Messiah, the long-awaited Savior, King from the royal line

of King David. He is the branch.

He is the one to bring righteousness and salvation and

to rescue His people. And that is exactly who

Zechariah is talking about in Zechariah 99.

It's why he begins by saying, rejoice, praise the Lord, your

king is coming, look with me. At the end of verse 9, he says,

behold, your king is coming to you righteous and having

salvation as he humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt,

the foal of a donkey. Zechariah is promising that the

Messiah will come. Now, it's hard for us as 21st

century Western Christians to fully appreciate the role that

hope played in the life of God's people in the Old Testament.

That hope begins as early as the book of Genesis.

Hope that a Savior king would come to rescue them.

In Genesis 3 verse 15, as God brings a curse because of the

Genesis 3:15

sin of Adam and Eve in their fall, he also makes a promise.

God says, I will put enmity between you and the woman, and

between your offspring and her offspring, and he shall bruise

your head and you shall bruise his heel.

As early as the 3rd chapter of the Bible, we're given a promise

of this long-awaited Messiah in Genesis.

He is the snake crusher, the one who will come to defeat Satan

once and for all. And as the pages of Scripture

unfold, we learn that the snake crusher is going to come from

David's royal family tree. Second Samuel 7 verse 12, When

2 Samuel 7:12

your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your father's, I

will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from

your body, and I will establish his Kingdom, and he shall build

a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his

Kingdom forever. And God's people would wait, and

they would wait, and they would wait with hope that a king would

come from David's line, that would come for the rescue as the

prophets begin to promise that's king would come.

For the prophet. Isaiah called him a light.

Isaiah 9 verse 2. The people who walked in

Isaiah 9:2

darkness have seen a great light, and those who dwelt in a

land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.

This messianic hope for a savior king to be the light of the

world. It's one of the dominant themes

of the Bible. People longed and they waited,

and they hoped that God would keep his promise, that Messiah

would come for their rescue. And so it is all of that hope

that people gathered nearly 2000 years ago, the Mount of Olives,

to get a glimpse of Jesus. Would you now please turn to

Matthew 21? You can find it as the first

book of the New Testament. You'll find it there in your

bulletin. Matthew tells us that the crowds

gathered, but he doesn't tell us.

But we know to be true. As they gathered with hope,

longing, messianic hope, they had heard of this man Jesus who

could heal the sick, who spoke with authority, who had done

signs and wonders. They're beginning to hope that

maybe this is the Messiah. Maybe God has finally kept his

promise. Maybe all of our hopes have been

realized in this man Jesus, and they've come to get a glimpse of

him, to see him. We're told that Jesus tells two

of his disciples to go and get a donkey for reading for this for

the first time. You think that's a strange thing

to tell his disciples to do? Even stranger, that Jesus knows

there will there will be a donkey waiting for him.

That's going to be fine for him to take it and use it as his

own. Why?

Well, Matthew tells us why verse four, that this took place to

fulfill what was spoken by the prophet.

Which prophet? Well, the very prophet we're

reading this morning, the prophet Zechariah Matthew then

quotes him in verse 5, say to the daughter of Zion, behold,

your king is coming to you humble and mounted on a donkey

on a colt, the full of a beast of burden.

Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey as a fulfillment of

Zechariah's prophecy that the Savior King, the Messiah, would

come. So all of the people who were

gathered that day put their hopes on him.

Later in Matthew 21, he tells us they be at the end to cry out

hosanna, which means save us. They waved palm branches in

their hand, which is a symbol of victory, and they're laid their

cloaks at his feet to honor him as king, royalty, victory,

salvation, three things that belong to long-awaited Savior,

King, the Messiah. They put all of their hopes on

him. And yet John tells us in his

gospel, the very words that we read together this morning, that

the disciples didn't understand it at first.

They even with all of their hopes, imagining Jesus to be the

Messiah, they didn't understand why, because they thought the

Messiah would come with an army. They thought the Messiah would

come for their liberation, to free them, not from sin and

death, from a very real oppression.

The Roman occupation that they lived under.

They expected a human king to rebuild a human Kingdom.

They did not yet fully see that this was no mere human king, but

he was fully God and fully man, the very Son of God, and that

the Messiah came to establish the Kingdom over every Kingdom

once and for all. So it's a second thing that we

see here in the triumphal entry. And as we look back on

Zechariah's prophecy, not only has Christ come for our

salvation, but he's come for our peace.

This long-awaited Savior king came not with an army, but on a

donkey. This donkey that Jesus rode in

on was not just a very specific fulfillment of prophecy, but it

tells us just what kind of Savior King He is, what He came

to do. He came not with a sword in His

first, but to lay His life down for you and for me.

We see this in Zechariah's prophecy.

Now Matthew only looks back at verse 9.

I think Matthew would have known that anyone familiar with the

prophets and the promises of the long-awaited Messiah would have

known all of Zechariah's prophecy.

And he continues after verse 9 into verse 10, once you look

with me, His prophecy of the Messiah continues.

I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the War Horse from

Jerusalem. The battle bow shall be cut off,

and He shall speak peace to the nation's.

His rules will be from sea to sea and from the river to the

ends of the earth. Now, all of these things should

be familiar for anyone waiting and hoping in the coming Savior

King that He would speak peace to the nations, that His rule

would be from sea to sea. What they were hoping and what

they were waiting for is for a king to come and rescue them and

give them peace. And just like we see in our

broken and fractured world today, the way that we

accomplish peace as human beings throughout our history is

through war. We fight war, we wage battle in

order to get peace. That's our own story as

Americans, so many who've died before us in order that we could

enjoy peace. It's always been that way.

So they expected that this Savior king would wage war,

would fight a battle, would come leading an army.

But notice what it says here in Zechariah 910.

It says I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim, the War

Horse from Jerusalem. The battle bow shall be cut off,

and he shall speak peace to the nations.

In other words, the Messiah is going to come and bring peace in

a way that you would least expect, not with Chariots, not

with war horses, not with a battle bow.

And in fact, later in Zechariah's prophecy, he says,

actually now God's people will become his chariot.

God's people will become his arrow.

He's come to fight our battles, to establish his Kingdom, but

not through war. But he will make peace through

the blood of his own body on the cross.

Jesus rode into Jerusalem that day with palm branches of

victory amongst the hopes and expectations that he would lead

them into battle, and instead he came to lay his life down.

He came to be arrested, to be beaten, to be scourged, and to

be nailed to a cross in order to die in our place.

He came to fight a battle far greater than any human

oppression, but he came to set us free from sin and death.

He came to establish no earthly Kingdom, but to establish the

Kingdom of God so that he might be seated on the throne as King

of Kings and Lord of Lords, all of this bringing peace.

And this is no kind of just earthly peace.

It's not simply the absence of war or the absence of

oppression, but peace. In the Bible, the kind of peace

spoken of here in Zechariah 910 is Shalom.

It's the word that's used, not the absence of war, but the

presence of God. And where he reigns and rules,

his people flourish. They have the fullness of peace

in his presence. And Jesus established this peace

through the cross. Not just peace for God's people

over their enemies and over evil in the kingdoms of darkness on

this earth, but a peace far greater and far deeper that

every one of us needs. You see, people could not have

imagined his disciples, could have never understood that of

all the enemies they faced, their greatest enemy lied

within. Apostle Paul tells us New

Testament that because of our sin, we are enemies of God, the

true battle that lies before us. Yes, of course it's all around

us and it will be till Christ returns.

But there are wars around us because there is a war inside of

us. We are not at peace with God.

And everyone who has sinned, everyone who's turned their back

on God, everyone who's said I will disobey him and I will

follow my own way, has committed treason against the King and his

Kingdom. We are not at peace with God

because of sin, and yet Jesus came for our peace.

He came to make peace between US and God, to reconcile us to our

Father, that we who once enemies might now be called sons and

daughters. The apostle Paul put it this

way. Ephesians 2 verse 12.

Ephesians 2:12

Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ,

alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers, the

covenant of promise, having no hope because we and our sin are

enemies of God. We are hopeless strangers to the

promises of God that we are talking about even this morning.

But Paul doesn't stop there. Verse 13 But now, but now in

Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near

by the blood of Christ, for He Himself is our peace.

Jesus rode into Jerusalem not to lead Chariots and war horses,

but he laid down his war bow, and he died on the cross, and he

shed his blood in order to make peace for us before God.

It was our sin that nailed Him there, His death that we should

have died and his blood that now grants us peace.

The 3rd and final thing that Zechariah's prophecy teaches us

that we see fulfilled the triumphal entry that Christ has

come for the restoration of all of our hopes.

Zechariah's prophecy continues Chapter 9 verse 11.

He says, As for you also, because of the blood of my

covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the

waterless pit. Through the prophet Zechariah,

God is remembering his covenant, his promises to his people

Israel. A covenant that we are reminded

here is made in blood, kept in blood, the blood of bulls and

goats that were sacrificed for the sins of the people of

Israel. But here is Jesus now fulfilling

this prophecy, coming into Jerusalem, not to shed the blood

of bulls and goats, but his own blood in order to set us free.

Free not from Roman occupation or human oppression, but free

from the shackles of sin itself. The Gospel of John, chapter 8.

John 8 · chapter mention

Jesus reminds us that everyone who practices sin is a slave to

sin. And this morning, as you think

about your own sin and temptations, those things that

seem to rear their ugly head in your life again and again and

again, those parts of you and your heart, they're continually

at war against God, even though you come this morning, just like

me and praise his name. It doesn't take long to

understand what Jesus is talking about.

We're slaves to sin. Though we strive as hard as we

can to withstand temptation, though I think genuinely so many

of us who follow Jesus long to be obedient.

We're shackled to sin. We're enslaved by it.

That's why sin so often like an addiction.

As hard as we want to follow Jesus, we find ourselves again

and again and again turning back to our sin and giving into

temptation. But notice again the promised

Zechariah gives us. Because of the blood of the

covenant, God will set us free. Because of the blood of the

covenant, because of the blood of Jesus, we have been set free.

When Jesus died on the cross, it wasn't just our death that died,

but our sin died with him. And this is the glory of the

gospel that we proclaim this Holy Week again, that all those

who trust in the blood of Jesus for their salvation have been

set free from sin and death. Paul expands on this, the book

of Romans, Romans 6, this Don't you know that if you present

yourself to be anyone, to be obedient slaves, you're slaves

of the one who you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or

of obedience, which leads to righteousness.

But thanks be to God that you who want slaves of sin have

become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to

which you were committed, and have been set free from sin to

become slaves of righteousness. What Paul says is because of the

blood of Jesus Christ, you now have been set free from sin, and

now your shackles have been opened, but now you are bound to

Christ. It's an amazing image, isn't it,

that our shackles to sin have been set free and now we are

shackled to our Savior by His blood.

Same language that we see here, the prophet Zechariah 500 years

before. Notice what Zechariah then says

in verse 12. In light of being set free, He

calls all God's people to return.

Return to your stronghold, he says.

Then notice the title he gives us.

O prisoners of hope, you are no longer a prisoner of sin.

You are no longer a prisoner to oppression.

You are no longer a prisoner to death.

But you have now been set free, and now you have been imprisoned

by hope. Hope has bound itself to you,

and now this side of heaven. As we look back 2000 years ago

on those events of Christ's passion through his death and

resurrection, we find ourselves longing once more.

As we look back on his death and resurrection, we are also look

forward to his return. And just like the people who've

gone before us in the Old Testament, we are still filled

with messianic hope, longing, waiting for Christ to return, to

make all things new. But just like them, if we're

honest, hope is hard, isn't it? You know much of the story of

the Old Testament. You see, often the people would

become hopeless. And when they became hopeless,

they would once again turn to idols and other gods and go back

to their sin. Today we call it cynicism.

It's the opposite of hope. Cynicism is borne by

disappointment and doubt. Cynicism is a self protection, a

way of us to guard our hearts when we don't want to be let

down. Have you ever felt that way?

That God has let you down, the more that we feel God has LED us

down, that causes us to be cynical, hopeless.

If that describes you this morning, I want you to hear the

words the promise of Zechariah. Because of the blood of the

covenant, we've been set free and we are now prisoners of

hope. So as we enter into this Holy

Week, set your hope on Jesus. He rode into Jerusalem on a

donkey for you in order to die on a cross for you.

And the great hope that we have is that he did not stay dead.

But on the third day he rose again to conquer sin and death.

And one day he will come again. And when he comes, it won't be

humbly mounted on a donkey, but it will come in triumph on a

White Horse. And John tells us that his name

will be King of Kings and Lord of Lords, our long-awaited

Savior, King the Messiah, the Christ who will come to make all

things new. Let's pray.

Father in Heaven, O Lord, as we come into Holy Week, we pray

that we would abound in hope that you, Lord Jesus, even this

morning, which set us free from the bondage of sin and death,

and that we would be bound to hope this morning.

May we walk into Monday of this Holy Week as prisoners of hope,

longing and waiting, just like those who have come before us,

for our Savior King to come again.

It's in his name that we pray. Amen.

Let's stand and let's sing together.