The King: Kingdoms Collide

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What Jesus did that first Palm Sunday was he blew up everything people thought about how the world was supposed to work.

So that's what we're going to look at today.

And we're going to start by looking in Luke chapter 19.

Luke 19 · chapter mention

If you have a Bible, invite you to turn there.

We have some Bibles on the Rose near you if you don't have one, or you can follow along on the screen.

In the Bibles in the Rows, we're on page 878.

So Luke 19, beginning in verse 28, this is what Luke writes.

And when he, Jesus, had said these things, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem.

By the way, what Jesus had just said was he just told a story about a king and whether people were going to be loyal to him or not.

So Jesus, after he talked about this king, he went on to Jerusalem.

And when he drew near to Beth Page and Bethany at the mount that's called Alavet, he sent two of the disciples, saying, Go into the village in front of you, where on entering you will find a colt tied on which no one has ever yet sat.

Untie it and bring it here.

If anyone asks, Why are you untying it?

you shall say this, the Lord has need of it.

So those who were sent away and found it just as he had told them.

And as they were untying the colt, its owner said to them, Why are you untying the colt?

And they said, The Lord has need of it.

And then he just let them take it, right?

And they brought it to Jesus, and throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it.

And as he rode along, they spread their cloaks on the road, and as he was drawing near, already on the way down the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a louder voice for all the mighty works they had seen, saying, Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord.

Peace in heaven and glory in the highest.

And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, Teacher, rebuke your disciples.

And he answers, I tell you, if these are silent, the very stones will cry out.

The very stones will cry out.

What we see here happening together today is that Jesus on this very first Palm Sunday rides into Jerusalem, proclaiming the greatest of news.

And that news is that He's the King.

In fact, He is the King of Kings, ushering in not only a different kind of kingdom, but a kingdom that's better than any other kingdom.

So what I want to do today is help us to see how that's at work in the text and then talk about what that means for you and me today.

All right?

So what's happening as Jesus parades in the town, that's not the only kingdom on parade that day.

There are actually two other kingdoms that are not only at odds and colliding with one another, but these kingdoms are the kingdoms that Jesus has come to blow up.

The first is the most obvious kingdom, and that's the kingdom of Rome.

During Passover week, Jerusalem swelled from 50,000 to 500,000 people.

Can you imagine that?

Sugarland, for a week, all of a sudden ten times more people show up.

It's crazy.

So it's 500,000 people in the streets of Jerusalem.

And so that no one thought that anything they could get away with anything, Rome took this opportunity to flex its muscle, kind of a show of force.

Many scholars believe that actually it was on this Passover that Pilate kind of took charge of this province of the Roman Empire, and that while Jesus was making his triumphal entry down from the Mount of Olives, that Pilate was actually coming through the main gate.

Jesus comes in on a donkey, Pilate comes in on a big stallion with a legion of Roman soldiers.

The message was loud and clear.

Don't get any ideas.

Don't forget who's really in charge around here.

That's the Roman Empire, the ones that flex their muscle, and whether you like it or not, they make you do what they want you to do.

That was their idea of how kingdoms work.

Yet as we read the Gospels, what we read is that they're written, at least in part, to undermine this seemingly foregone conclusion that Rome was who was really in charge.

The clues are in how the language are in the language that the gospel writers use to actually describe Jesus.

Now let me give you a quick Roman history lesson.

I know it's spring break and nobody's, everybody's out of school mode, but I'm gonna help you get there sooner than later.

But just really quick.

So the way you've all heard of the Caesars, right?

Like there was Julius Caesar who was killed on the eyes of March, which was this past week, who was betrayed and stabbed 23 times.

Or you saw like the gladiator.

Who saw a gladiator?

That might help us a little bit, right?

So there's these Caesars that are the emperors of Rome.

Well, when an emperor would die like Julius Caesar, he was often declared, he was declared now a God.

He's now, he didn't just die, he got a promotion.

He's not just emperor, he's God.

And then his son would then take the role of Caesar and would be named the son of God.

So when Julius Caesar was killed, his son Octavian took over and became Caesar Augustus.

That's who that was.

Caesar Augustus was Julius Caesar's stepson, actually.

Um and then this is how it kind of all played out.

When Caesar Augustus died, um, Tiberius, his stepson, became emperor, and he was not only emperor, he was proclaimed the son of God.

So the way it worked in the Roman world is Rome just kind of took whatever they wanted.

So when they would roll into town and they would take over, they would always spin it in this way.

They would say, good news, here's the gospel.

Gospel literally means good news.

The good news is the Son of God is now your king.

That's what they said in every town, every village, every nation they conquered.

So this was very common language in that day.

Everyone knew when Pilate was rolling into town, what he was proclaiming was Caesar is your king.

This is the good news.

Does that sound familiar to anybody?

See, when Jesus rolls into town, what he's saying is, I have a better good news.

And the better good news is that I'm king.

This is how Mark's gospel begins.

He says, the beginning of the good news of Jesus the Messiah, the anointed king, the son of God.

And then Mark goes on to tell from there how Jesus' coming was actually predicted by John, and how when Jesus was baptized by John, what happened?

This voice came out of heaven and said, What?

This is my son, in whom I'm well pleased.

And then Jesus himself declares, the time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God has come near to you.

Repent and believe the gospel.

Repent and believe the good news.

See, Jesus' triumphal entry is an in your face to the powers of an empire that rolled into town, announcing their presence with authority.

They just didn't know it yet.

So that's the first kingdom.

The second kingdom is the kingdom that's kind of being gathered by the religious leaders of Israel.

Now, if you know their story at all, Israel became a nation when God used Moses to rescue them out of slavery from Egypt.

So once they were rescued out of slavery, they were in the wilderness for 40 years, and God began to form them as a people.

And if you remember, during that time, Moses was not their king, was he?

They had one king, and their king was Yahweh.

Their king was God.

But after several centuries, once they entered the promised land, the people decided God wasn't enough for them as king.

They wanted to be like everybody else and have a human king.

So Samuel told them, Well, if you get a king, he's going to take your sons for soldiers, he's going to take your daughters for wives, he'll tax you to death.

Are you sure you want this?

They said, Yeah, absolutely.

We can't wait, right?

So first they get Saul, who looks like he's straight out of central casting, but he's not very good as king.

He actually fails miserably.

Then David comes along, he's a very flawed man, he's a man after God's own heart, but he makes all kinds of mistakes, yet Israel's kind of prominence grows.

And then his son Solomon follows David, and he's successful, but then he's like goes crazy in terms of all the sorts of decadence.

So Israel has three kings, all are kind of eh, at some level.

And finally, the whole king plan swerves into the ditch following a civil war and corrupt politicians, and then eventual defeat by Assyria, and then Babylon, who takes the entire country into captivity.

And Israel had no king for centuries.

And many in Israel during that time, many of the Jews wondered if they had blown it so badly that God had rightfully abandoned them.

They longed for God to come back and be their king.

They longed for God to come back and send his Messiah to lead them back to prominence.

So in Jesus' time, this longing for God to come back through the Messiah morphed into not just a desire for God to be king, but for Israel to now take the place of Rome, for Israel to be the ones in charge of the world.

And the Jews still believed that God would one day re-establish his kingdom on earth through them.

He would do it through a King David 2.0.

So whenever Jesus talks about the kingdom of God, their ears perk up.

That's what they're looking for, that's what they're listening for, that's what they're longing for.

And that's why it's so important all this is happening during the Passover feast, because the Passover was essentially the Jews' 4th of July.

Okay?

Where they remembered how God saved them from this superpower of Egypt and how they feasted in hope that God would soon deliver them from this superpower of Rome.

So that's kingdom number two.

So these are two kingdoms clearly at odds with one another, and then in the middle of that strolls Jesus and he blows everything up.

Jesus chose this Passover to make his move.

And you think about it, why?

I mean, the streets were swelled with 500,000 people.

He knew that the religious leaders were out to get him.

Jesus could have clearly snuck into Jerusalem and no one would have found him.

But that's not what he decided to do.

And the reason Jesus got on a cult and rode into Jerusalem and allowed people to sing his praises is because he was making the boldest of claims.

I don't care what Rome says, I don't care what the religious leaders say, I want you to know Jesus says, I am the long-awaited one.

I am the King of kings.

I don't care who sits on the throne in Rome, I'm the Son of God.

That's what Jesus was saying that day.

And this, by the way, as we fast forward through this week, is the ammunition that the Jewish leaders used to get Rome to kill Jesus.

Remember what the sentence on the cross says?

The sentence on Jesus' cross said what?

King of the Jews.

And remember, the Jewish leaders protested, like, no, he claims to be the king of the Jews.

And what did Pilate say?

He says, No, no, no, no, no.

I've written what I've written.

Jesus' sentence was actually a proclamation of the gospel.

The king of the Jews.

Jesus comes to show us what who he really is.

That's his proclamation.

And this entire screen screams that Jesus is king.

Just all these little puzzle pieces that when you put them together, it's so obvious.

I mean, the fact that Jesus begins his journey at the Mount of Olives comes straight out of Zechariah 9 and Zechariah 14, where it's prophesied that the Messiah that will come and return Israel to the glory days of David and Solomon will be revealed on the Mount of Olives.

So it's no mistake that this is where Jesus chooses to get on his horse.

And then the donkey or the colt that was tied and had to be untied, what that means is that it is a colt that has never been ridden.

This is straight out of Zechariah 9.

And then Jesus saying to the to his disciples, when you go get the colt, and if the owner questions you, saying, What are you doing with my colt?

Say, hey, the Lord needs it.

That's echoing back to first to this right that kings always had that they could just take whatever they wanted.

And when people recognize them as king, they're like, That's cool, you can have whatever you want.

And then you roll back to the fact that riding a horse into a city and people singing praises was very common for a king riding victoriously back into town.

It happened in the Old Testament, it happened in Roman culture.

Throwing cloaks on the colt and on the road was a way to welcome royalty.

It's kind of like rolling out the red carpet.

And then finally, the people are singing a very important song.

When they sing, Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, they're singing straight out of the Psalms.

Psalm 118 is the song they're singing.

And that's the song that was sung annually in ancient Israel to reaffirm the king's right to rule.

It's kind of like our hail to the chief.

So when these people are singing to Jesus on the road, they're singing hail to the chief.

It wasn't some random song.

See, Jesus is making an overt claim to be king.

He's saying, This, if you do life my way, then now you have a taste of what life can be when God's in charge.

Now the tragedy was the people who encountered him on that day didn't really get it.

Did they?

I mean, the religious leader's response was, hey, tell those people to stop singing hail to the chief.

You are not the chief.

What does Jesus say to them?

I love Jesus, by the way.

He has the best responses to every question ever.

He says, You guys don't get it at all, do you?

I mean, if they if these people don't hail me as the king, the rocks will.

You really are a dumber than a box of rocks, aren't you?

Let them sing.

Let them sing.

See, Palm Sunday is where this wicked pagan kingdom, this kingdom who fights against God and suppresses his people, and this failed Jewish leadership, and they're longing for a return to their own glory, and then God Himself, the king, who can do what no one else can do, they all collide.

And at this crossroads of competing kingdoms, the question on that day, and the question for you and me today is to whom will we pledge our primary allegiance?

Who is our king?

Who is my king?

I mean, really?

Who is our king?

Now, this can be hard for us because we don't live in a kingdom, right?

We elect the people who are supposed to be in charge around here.

And the monarchs that we're familiar with are figureheads who make more tabloids than they make decrees.

I mean, I was talking with Neil about this a week or so ago, and he reminded me of a conversation he had with a friend from Africa who said to Neil, Neil, I have it so much better than you.

And Neil's response, and you can imagine Neil saying this, was, you don't have two nickels to rub together.

How can you have it better than me?

And he said, as Americans, you think everything that Jesus asks of us is up for a vote.

He said, I grew up submitting to a king, and that helps me to live in submission to Jesus.

Helps me to live in a kingdom.

See, we struggle to imagine what it looks like to let someone else call the shots in our life.

We struggle with submission and authority.

I mean, I know I do.

I do.

I mean, it's been a struggle for me as long as I can remember.

I'm the oldest of four kids.

Um and my dad um was had MS my entire life.

He was in a wheelchair most of my life, he was a quadriplegic the last 30 years of my life, of his, yeah, last 30 years of my life so far.

And so the consequence of that, because my mom really had her struggles in dealing with that, rightfully so in many ways, was that I called the shots in my family from about the age of five.

Which sounds cool until you have to take orders from a five-year-old.

And so that's kind of how it worked in my family.

Where were we gonna eat?

I decided.

Well, how are we gonna do this holiday?

I just decided everything.

And finally, when I was, I think, in middle school, my one of my younger brothers got so fed up with me and says, Who died and made you king?

And I very seriously just said, No one died, I was born the king.

And the sooner you get used to that, the easier your life will be.

Right?

And that sounds funny now, but I actually meant it.

That's kind of how my life worked.

And then Jesus got a hold of me a few years later, and he's been transforming me ever since.

It's been really hard to live that down with my family.

Every time I go home, I deal with all the baggage that that created.

But I began to realize when I was a junior in high school, Jesus got a hold of me and says, No, you're not the king I am.

As a matter of fact, I bought you.

You belong to me.

So my life, the past 30 or so years, has been this journey of learning what it looks like for me to really believe that Jesus is the king and I'm not.

And now I've moved back to the Republic of Texas, which makes it even harder.

Right?

I I lived here before, I lived here for 12 years before.

Being where Texas, I get it, independence, being my own king, that's a birthright here.

Right?

Don't mess with Texas.

I'm not sure, but I think you're not the boss of me started with some middle school Texan, right?

That's how that works, I think.

But the truth is, no matter how independent we may think we are, every person in this room has a king.

We all have a king.

Everyone answers to someone.

We answer to ourselves, which I would just ask you to reflect on how well that's working out for you.

I mean, if you're the king, does everything go the way you want it to go?

You're not a very good king, are you?

Neither am I.

Or we answer to our desires, or we we answer to our bank balance, or some outside force like Rome that intimidates the snot out of us, or some person or organization like these religious leaders who use legalism and fear and guilt and shame to get us to do what they want, or there are others we we answer to who may use attention and affection to bend our will to theirs.

Right, guys, we may be the head, but the woman is the neck.

You kind of heard that before.

Or we bow to seemingly innocuous cultural forces that bombard us every waking moment with their definition of the kind of person we should be and the kinds of things we should buy and the kinds of things we should do.

We all have a king.

We all have a king.

We are all citizens of one kingdom or another, whether we like it or not.

So the question is: who will be your king?

Who will be my king?

See, the good news of Luke 19 is that Jesus is the king of kings, ushering in a kingdom better than any other.

And if Jesus and his kingdom is better, that means I don't have to be the king.

Nor does any other power vying for my allegiance.

Instead, with the Spirit's help, I can learn to relax, submit, trust, and actually live like Jesus is the king in my everyday life.

So, what does that look like?

Let me take a couple minutes just to kind of paint a picture of how we step into this life, and Jesus is the one who tells us how.

Back at Mark chapter 1, verse 15, Jesus says, the time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God is at hand.

Mark 1:15

Repent and believe in the gospel.

Repent and believe this good news.

So to make sure we're on the same page, let me define a few terms for us.

First, kingdom of God gets used a lot in churches.

I know I'm confident in saying that what I mean is what gets has been described around here for years before I ever got here.

But kingdom of God is simply about the rule and reign of Jesus.

It's not about geography, it's about who's in charge of my life.

So when we talk about the kingdom of God, we're talking about Jesus' way of life and submitting to Jesus as our King.

And then there's this idea of repentance.

Now, a lot of folks in churches think repentance is all about feeling sorry and groveling because we're such horrible people.

That is like a given, isn't it?

We're all, we all don't get it.

We all mess things up.

Repentance is actually changing how we think from how we think things should go to agreeing with God about how he thinks should go.

To repent is simply to agree with God.

Which means if I'm going to agree with God, there are times I have to conclude and own that I'm wrong.

I'm wrong.

And actually realizing that I'm wrong can be really good news, can't it?

I mean, I might want to fight it, I might want to, I because I never want to be wrong, but what why would I want to stay wrong?

One of the best gifts anyone could give me is to show me where I'm wrong.

So repentance is God by His Spirit showing me where I'm wrong and then showing me what he says is actually true here.

What's true about him, what's true about what he's doing in our world, and what's maybe true.

About me, that either I've forgotten or I've kind of kicked to the curb or I just maybe never knew in the first place.

So to repent is to agree with God.

And then there is believe.

Believe is more than understanding or intellectual agreement.

To believe in the Bible is to actually live like what God says is true.

To live like what God says is true.

See, if you don't live like it's true, you don't believe it.

It's just all head games at that point.

It's like saying, I believe airplanes fly, but somebody giving me a ticket to go visit my mom in St.

Louis and saying, I'm not getting on that plane.

Well, why?

Well, I might be able to explain the Bertulli effect, but there's no way that thing's gonna actually clear the runway.

I'm gonna die if I get on that plane.

Well, then I don't believe airplanes fly.

Right?

To believe is to live like it's true.

So with repent, the question I wrestle with is what is God saying that is true about the situation I need to agree with.

To believe, I need to ask myself, what would it look like for me to actually live like what God says is actually true?

Repent and believe.

See, to live like Jesus is King and his way of life is the best way of life takes constant repenting and believing.

Let me talk a couple minutes about how this is playing out in my life these days.

As I mentioned, we came here from South Bend, Indiana, where I was the pastor for nearly 12 years.

It was a wonderful church, a wonderful situation.

People loved us, we love them.

But about a year and a half ago, something began to stir in Michelle and me that we felt our time might be winding down.

Which made really no sense on the surface because I was on Easy Street in many ways.

We could have stayed there until I retired or died or both, I don't know.

But God began to nudge us from this very secure and comfortable nest to take a leap of faith.

And that led to, after a year of discernment and conversation, for me to resign my position in October without any place to go.

Which might sound spiritual, but it's terrifying.

It's very, very terrifying because I'm that's not how I'm wired.

I am a person who has backup plans for my backup plans.

I'm a I'm a top A, type A kind of a guy.

Um I'm OCD.

My wife's a little worse, she's CDO, which is in alphabetical order the way it should be.

Um so these are things that are like, I can't believe we're doing this.

But we were convinced that this is what God was saying to us.

It was affirmed to us by people we know loved us and loved God, and we were, we knew if we didn't obey, we were going to increasingly be more and more miserable simply because we weren't following Jesus the way he called us to.

So I say all that to say the last six months, for me in particular, anxiety and fear have been very present realities for me.

Fear of where we're going to land, fear of how we're gonna make it financially, fear of finding a role in which I can flourish, fear of what do I do if I'm not the guy in charge anymore?

How do I even function like that anymore?

Fear of moving further from our aging parents and our newly married kids who are already talking about starting families, and now I'm gonna be the grandfather that sees my grandkids twice a year, and all this kind of fear began to flood me, and I began to become a very, very anxiety-driven person.

And then in this crossroads where this anxiety and this fear met Jesus' call to follow him, this practice of repenting and believing that Jesus is really king is the one thing that began to transform me.

See, I had to repent of this notion that for my life to work, it was up to me.

That I had to get it right for everything to go the way it was supposed to.

I had to repent of this default that I was born the king all over again.

See, King Rick is never good news.

No matter how many times I tell myself that, it is just not good news.

So, with the Spirit's help, I've been learning again to agree with what God says is true about me and about him in my situation where anxiety seems to be percolating to the surface.

And that good news is Jesus is the king, I'm not.

Jesus is the king, I'm not.

Translated, Jesus is sovereign.

Jesus is saying, Rick, I don't care what you think of what's going on here, I've got this.

And I've got you.

I've got this and I've got you.

See, if Jesus is king, if he's got this, I don't have to be driven by fear or anxiety.

I don't have to be afraid of what's around the corner.

I don't have to be afraid of who's gonna be elected president.

I won't even go there.

I don't have time to go there.

I don't have to be afraid of economic pressure, I don't have to be afraid of new beginnings or how our folks or kids are gonna get along without us, like we're the ones that have to make everything work for them, or fear of what others may think of me as we're settling in here.

Because if Jesus is king, what he has done is made it possible for me to be a child of the most high God.

And as a as a child of God, I'm safe with my Father.

He's really got me, he's really got this.

Not that nothing bad will ever happen, but I'm safe with him.

His grace is always enough.

His grace will either change my circumstances or his grace will just keep me if my circumstances get worse.

But his grace is big enough no matter what.

So I don't need to let fear and worry be the driving force in my life.

So repenting and believing has worked out this way for me.

Every time I get anxious these days, instead of beginning to wring my hands and start to make pros and cons lists and come out with all these things I need to do next, my first response is now okay, Father, let me redirect my attention to you.

Give me a vision of who you are again.

You are the king.

Let that wash over my heart and mind.

Capture me once again with that good news.

And as I do, anxiety goes away, a weight gets lifted, even when my circumstances don't change.

And I begin to go, okay, he's got this.

He's got this.

Now, there may be something he wants me to do along the way, but that's not up for me to figure out right now.

Right now, he's got this, he's got me.

And I can now sit down on the inside and create some space for God to do the work that he wants to do in me.

Jesus is King.

And because he's king, we can say, It is well with my soul.

I can know peace and joy that transcends my understanding, that transcends my circumstances.

And the reason that's true is because at the crossroads of these competing kingdoms, Jesus proclaims the good news that he's the king.

He's still the king.

He's the king of not only a different kingdom, but a kingdom that's better than any other kingdom you can find.

And as I pledge my primary allegiance to Jesus, as I continue to repent and believe and live like he's really king, while I may find myself in the crossfire, still, I can live a winsome life oozing with love, joy, peace, and hope.

Hope because Revelation 19 tells us that one day Jesus will return on another horse, but this time it won't be a colt.

This time it will be a great white horse.

And this time he will be the one who once and for all has conquered sin, hell, and the grave.

And embroidered on his robe and tattooed on his thigh are these words: King of kings and Lord of Lords.

And he shall reign forever and ever.

Jesus is King.

Jesus is king.

He's king.

And he invites us to live like that's true.

That's the good news for us today.

Let's pray.

Jesus, give us a fresh vision of you.

Challenge our default assumption that if life is gonna work, we're the ones that have to make it work.

Reveal to us those kingdoms that are vying for our allegiance that pull us away from pledging our primary allegiance to you.

And come now and meet us in our fear and in our anxiety.

Do the work that you alone can do.

Father, help us to be a people who rest in your goodness, who trust that you've got this, you've got us.

And help us to be a people that are just different because you're our king, but different in the most attractive way.

Do your work in us in such a way that people are like, what do you got?

I gotta have that.

We're your people, you're our king.

And we ask for your spirit's help to live like that.

Good news is true, not only today, but throughout this week.

May your kingdom come in and through us.

We pray in our matchless king's name.

Amen.

Let me just send you all with a blessing.

Just kind of put out your hands and receive this this morning.

May the Lord bless you and keep you.

May He make His face to shine upon you.

And may you know His peace.

His peace that passes all understanding, His peace that trumps all circumstances.

And may the good news that Jesus is King be the song that sings in your ear, that rings in your ears this week.

Live like Jesus is King.

And may his kingdom come in and through you as you're a blessing to the world around you.

I pray in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Amen.

Have an awesome week.