Perspectives on Palm Sunday

We have been going through a series called the Gospel Course,

but we're going to divert that for this week.

This wasn't my plan, but the Lord kind of arrested my plans

this week and getting ready for Easter.

And so today we're going to look at the triumphal entry and

prepare ourselves for this week. We have a lot of things going on

this week. Y'all this week.

Well, we have today we begin the Easter time, Wednesday we have

evangelism training, Friday we have a Good Friday service, and

then Sunday again, church for Easter.

So we've got a lot going on. Make sure you join us for those

sorts of things. Whatever you can make today is

Palm Sunday. It's traditionally called when

people would lay these branches down for Jesus.

That's going to be the story. We'll be in Matthew chapter 21.

Matthew 21 · chapter mention

If you want to get your Bibles ready for that, that's where

we'll be today. And then Good Friday will be

Friday night. Come back for a special, perhaps

sombre time of worship and communion.

And then next week, bring your guests and pray for for favour

and for guests as we put out all those Flyers this week that

people would come and and be with us.

So we're going to be in Matthew chapter 21.

Matthew 21 · chapter mention

And honestly, this passage for me is really intimidating

because there's so much going on here for Jesus approaching

Jerusalem for his final day. And I want to do all of the

study and all of the work and give you as many details as

possible. And I feel like the Lord did not

let me do that for you. We have a different view of this

time. This is the time whenever all of

Israel is gathering to Jerusalem.

They're there to celebrate the Passover.

So many people are flooding in and out of the city of

Jerusalem. And this is Jesus's last day on

earth before he's crucified. He's going to Jerusalem.

He would become their king if they would let him.

And there is a great display. People receive him well on this

day. But as we'll see this week,

people quickly change their minds.

And today, during this Palm Sunday, instead of going into

all of the details, we're going to look at 7 perspectives of the

same event. So as we read, you'll be taking

note of the different people that are at this event or in

different places, different times around this event.

And we're going to see each one from their perspective.

Before we do that, I want to ask you to come prepared to think

about which one of these people you might identify as.

And maybe you're, we'll see disciples here.

Maybe you'd say, hey, I'm being faithful, but there's some other

people that need some healing. There's some other people

feeling lost. And perhaps you could just on

your notes today, circle which one you you feel like you

identify with the most today. And we'll spend some time in

prayer at the end and ask the Lord to work in us.

So let me read for us Matthew 21.

We're going to read 1 through 17.

The Bible says, And when they drew nigh unto Jerusalem, and

were come to Bethphage unto the Mount of Olives, then sent Jesus

to disciples, saying unto them, Go into the village over against

you, and straightway you shall find an ass tied.

I'm not swearing. That's what the Bible says right

there. And you'll find an ass tied in a

cult with her. Loose, loose them, and bring

them unto me. And if any man say aught unto

you, you shall say, The Lord hath needed them, and

straightway he will send them. All this was done, that it might

be fulfilled. Which was spoken by the prophet,

saying, Tell ye, the daughter of scion, Behold, thy King cometh

unto thee meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the fowl of

an ass. And the disciples went and did

as Jesus commanded them, and brought the ass and the coal,

and put on them their clothes, and they set them they're on, or

they set him there on verse 8. And a very great multitude

spread their garments in the way, others cut down branches

from the trees, and strawed them in the way.

And the multitude that went before and that followed cried,

saying, Hosanna to date the son of David, blessed is he that

cometh in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest.

And when he was come into Jerusalem, all the city was

moved, saying, Who is this? And the multitude said, This is

Jesus the prophet of the of Nazareth of Galilee.

And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them

that sought, that sold and bought in the temple, and

overthrew the temples of the money changers, and the seats of

them that sold doves, and said unto them, It is written, My

house shall be called the House of prayer.

But you have made it a den of thieves.

And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he

healed them. And when the chief priests and

scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children

crying in the temple, saying Hosanna to the Son of David,

they were sore displeased. And they said unto him, Hearest

thou what these say? And Jesus said unto them, Yeah,

have you never read out of the mouth of babes and sucklings?

Thou has perfected praise. And he left them and went out of

the city into Bethany, and he lodged there.

Let's take a moment and pray, and then we'll study our our

text. God, we come before your word

today. I pray that you'd help us to

hear from you that we wouldn't miss what's happening both in

the story but also what you're doing in our lives.

Would you just intersect our lives?

We ask you to speak to us. We give you our heart.

I pray you direct us, each one of us individually for this week

and as a church also direct us, go before us and encourage us

today in your word, I pray in Jesus name, Amen.

Well, if you're taking notes, we're going to look at 7 things.

So I can't hit these very quickly, but the first group of

people that we see in Matthew chapter 21 are the disciples.

Matthew 21 · chapter mention

We see the disciples in verses one through 7.

We see these faithful men that followed him.

These would become his apostles. His sent ones.

You see in verse one, it says then sent Jesus 2 disciples

saying unto them go into the village over against you and

they were to get a there's two animals, a colt and a baby, a

baby colt and to bring them to him.

He was going to need them. So we see this first group.

All these people are not all the same.

This is the most faithful bunch that we'll see in our text.

This this is the faithful bunch. But I I think it's a good time

for us to ask what is a disciple?

If if we're going to choose one of these things, does that

identify me? And in our church, we have a

ministry A1 on one discipleship ministry to help people grow

into a disciple of Christ. And that ministry is just all

settled in the word for the things that Jesus says what a

disciple is. So it's a good time to to be

reminded of those, but also see that in the lives of these men

that were helping Jesus come into Jerusalem.

So I have three things for you in your notes.

First of what is a disciple is that they walk in the word.

A disciple of Jesus walks in his word.

We see here in verse 2, Jesus said unto them, go into the

village over against you and he gives them a task.

This wasn't something that they felt like I'm just called to go

collect the donkeys. Man.

I really feel compelled to serve the Lord in this way.

They just said, OK, Jesus, we're going to do the thing that you

told us to do. And this thing doesn't appear to

be very interesting. It's not very sexy.

Go get an animal. Go get 2 of them.

If anyone argues, just say I need it and and they'll give it

to you. But really, this was satisfying

the scriptures. We see that in verse 5.

He he's fulfilling the scriptures in this simple task

that the disciples are doing is actually helping Christ perform

something. So for us as disciples, we, we

need to be following Jesus in his word.

Jesus says in John chapter 8, if you continue in my word, then

John 8 · chapter mention

are you my disciples indeed. So those that will not hear and

obey what he says in the word of God, I mean you, you might be

saved, but you can't identify as a disciple if you won't follow

what he says. You can't be off on your own

mission. Secondly, we see that these

disciples are close to other disciples.

If you look at verse one, it says that that Jesus sent 2

disciples frequently as he sends them.

They are sent by twos when he sends the 12 and when he sends

the 70. And many times the disciples are

found together in the upper room, and all the things that

they're doing, they're not often found alone.

So if you're going to be a disciple, you're going to be

found with the other disciples. As Jesus says in John 13, all

men will know that you're my disciples by the love that you

have one to another. And that means we have to be

together, loving each other and putting that love on display for

others to see. So disciples hang out with other

disciples. And thirdly, disciples lead

other others to Jesus. Disciples lead others to Jesus.

What what these guys were doing in getting these animals

together and putting their own garments on the back of the

animal for Jesus to ride was to say, this show isn't about me.

I'm just going to make a way for Jesus to be great and to come

into Jerusalem and he's going to receive receive great praise and

admiration. And that's the life of the

disciple. This isn't about me.

I just need to get other people to Christ.

That's our job. And if you can't do that, that's

OK. We love you.

But disciples are actively engaged in this.

Jesus says in John 15 that when we bear much fruit, that's how

we're identified as disciples. We may not may not be Billy

Graham's or super good evangelist, but we're at least

able to contribute to helping other people identify who Jesus

is, see their need for him putting him on display.

So I put it to you this way, the disciples are who God uses to

reach the World. There are no other people in

this story. We're going to see six more.

None of the other people are really going to be contributing

to the mission. They're all going to be in

different states. So if we don't reach the World,

who's going to? And that may seem like

overwhelming reach the World. I know when I look at countries

and I see statistics for populations and accessibility to

the gospel, I just feel crushed by how can we reach them all.

But the disciples were simply asked, hey, go do the thing that

I told you. So for us, that might look

something like what we did this weekend.

We went out and put up Flyers, man.

I mean, it's kind of ridiculous. Of all things that we could do,

it doesn't feel very fruitful or evangelistic.

But in some way or another, we just need to do the next thing

that's in front of us and try to get people to Jesus.

That's all we're doing. That's the life of the disciple.

So you guys did great. I'm proud of you now be praying

that the Lord uses those to bring people in are the second

group that we see is the multitude.

The multitude, if you look at verses 8:00 and 9:00, it says in

verse 8 and a very great multitude spread their garments

in the way others cut down branches from the trees and

strawed them in the way. And the multitudes that went

before that followed cried saying Hosanna to the son of

David. Blessed is he that cometh the

name in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest.

This multitude is a massive group of people.

We we don't know the exact number, but by definition, the

word multitude means a state of being many.

It's a great number, however many that is.

It's enough for you to use the word multitude.

You wouldn't use that word in our church probably.

But it's a multitude. And this multitude, they, they

seem to have the right things going on.

I mean, just just look at what they're doing.

They spread their garments. They said, let's put down

something for him to walk on. Like we would roll out a red

carpet for someone famous. They cut down branches.

I don't have enough clothes. But we'll just take things.

We want to put them down before you.

They cried Hosanna, which means save now.

And they called Jesus the son of David, which is a really, that's

a, that's the right title. And he truly was the son of

David. I don't know if you understand

how important that is. We don't have time to get really

sidetracked into that. But you could read Second Samuel

2 Samuel 7 · chapter mention

Chapter 7 and 12 and verses 12 and 13, and you could see this

covenant that God made with David that his seed would sit

upon the throne of Jerusalem. And this is what the audience is

saying. He's the one.

You could also see in Isaiah 97 that He will sit on the, the

kingdoms of the governments of the world will all be subject to

Him as He's rightly the heir to the throne of the world.

You can go back. You're in Matthew right now.

If you go back to Matthew chapter 1 and look at verse #1

Matthew 1 · chapter mention

you see that this is truly Jesus's title.

Matthew one verse one, the book of the generation of Jesus

Christ, the Son of David, the son of Abraham.

This is what the crowd was saying.

He's the one. But as we'll see, this is the

same crowd that's also going to betray him.

So in your notes, I put it to you this way, that crowds of

people may feel great, but they're not loyal.

It feels good to fill the room and praise the Lord.

We get a multitude one day. That'd be good, but we really

need to focus on disciples because those are the ones that

are loyal. This same crowd I gave you those

3 verses in Matthew 26 and 27. I think I have one of them for

you where it says later in this week the chief priests and

elders persuaded the multitude that they should ask Barabbas

and destroy Jesus. So this multitudes susceptible

to persuasion, they don't have deep convictions and whoever's

more powerful in their life, they say, OK, well, we're just

going to do what what those people say.

So beware the multitude. When they love you, they may not

love you very long, or maybe you can identify as that.

Your convictions aren't deeply rooted and you can be tossed to

and fro. You need to become a disciple

and not just be in the crowd. Thirdly, we see there's another

group here, the city. The city being different than

the multitude. It says in verse 10.

And when he was coming to Jerusalem, all the city was

moved saying who is this? If you could just imagine in

Jesus day there were people that were greatly on the periphery of

what was happening with this travelling rabbi that was

healing people. They maybe heard some things,

but they weren't in the circle. They weren't there for the

feeding of the 5000 or for the raising of Lazarus.

They just maybe heard some things and they saw the buzz

with Jesus coming into Jerusalem and everyone saying hosanna and

throwing their things on the ground, the son of David, and

they asked the right question, who is this?

This would be likened to the open skeptic, someone who maybe

hasn't intentionally rejected Christ but said, I'm not really

sure. I haven't heard the things that

you've heard. What is going on?

Who is that? And if you can find someone in

this camp that's a that's a good, this is the right

question. If you can ask the question, who

is Jesus, You're asking the right question.

So I have for you a famous person who asked this question

and came to the right conclusion.

Maybe if you're, if you weren't born in 1990 something, you

probably know who this is. Ryan Trahan is a famous YouTube

guy and he converted to Christianity because of his

girlfriend. So praise the Lord that I

wouldn't normally recommend you date a lost person, but in this

case it seems like it worked out.

I don't know him very well, so I'm not promoting whatever he

might believe, but I at least have a video for you that I

we'll be fine. There we go.

But that's just an example of one person that would say, let

me investigate, who is this Jesus person?

I'm open to the truth. I'm on the periphery.

I just don't know. So I put it to you this way in

your notes. When we promote Jesus, the world

will take notice. When we promote Jesus, the world

will take notice. See, the disciples, they just

were contributing to their part and there was a whole city

around them that was paying attention to what was going on.

All right, these are going to get more interesting as we go.

The 4th group of people that we see are the money changers.

The money changers, that's a word, that's one word in the

Bible and it's this group of people that were in the temple.

If we look at verse 12 that says, and Jesus went into the

temple of God and cast out all them that sold and bought in the

temple and overthrew the tables of the money changers and the

seats of them that sold doves. So all of Jerusalem is or all of

Israel is coming to Jerusalem. Especially the males had to show

up to this feast. They needed to bring a sacrifice

or they could purchase one when they arrived and in the temple.

This is the second time that Jesus got really upset with

these people. He weaves a whip and turns over

tables because these people were corrupting the sacrificial

system. They were extorting it.

They were converting money into other money and making gain out

of people that were there to worship and they found

themselves an adversary of the Lord Jesus.

So they would be likened unto people that are using religion

to make money. And there are a lot of examples

you could Google that. People with jumbo jets and all

that sort of thing. We don't have time to get into

all of the examples and we we maybe don't identify with that

as much here. But we do find this group very

distracted. They're not saying Hosanna,

they're not saying Son of David. They're actually on the opposite

side. They're too busy making money.

What they saw was if I can get 1% from all the extra people

come in into the city, then I can make a lot of money.

We could get really, really distracted focusing on the wrong

things. I put it to you this way in your

notes. If you're only using God for

gain, watch out. You find yourself in a place

where Jesus says that isn't, That's not what I'm all about.

I don't suspect that of you guys, but that is a group of

people that are here at this time when everyone's worshiping

and they're just making money. Matthew 6 and verse 24, Jesus

says that you cannot serve God and Mammon, you can't have two

masters. We, we can't be focused on the

money or else we're going to miss one of the most important

events in Jesus's life, coming into his Kingdom, the son of

David to take his throne. And they totally whiffed.

They totally missed it because they were focused on the wrong

thing. The fifth group of people that

we see are the blind and the lame.

The blind and lame. In verse 14 it says in the blind

and the lame came to him in the temple and he healed them.

It doesn't say a whole lot, but this healer has been doing this

all throughout his ministry and here just in one sentence we

find him still doing that. He essentially restored the

temple back to a place that it should be.

He said in verse 13 it should be the House of prayer and he he

took it one step further to even bring healing to people that

needed it. But check this out in verse 14.

It says they came to him in the temple.

The people that needed healing sought Jesus out.

So in your notes it says it this way.

If you need healing, put yourself where Jesus is.

At some point you just have to hear the noise.

What's going on? Jesus is in town.

He's in the temple tearing things up.

Man, I got to get in there. I got some problems.

I've got issues. I don't even understand all the

hosanna stuff. I just know he fixes people and

I need to get to Jesus. Sometimes we just be feeling

like that. I just need to get with Jesus.

Hebrews chapter 12 says to let that which is lame be turned out

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

of the way and lather. Let it rather be healed.

At some point we just need to get some healing lest we aren't

able to walk. We won't be able to have

straight paths will be turned out of the way.

So if you need some healing, get where Jesus is regularly.

We meet here every Sunday. I hope that He's found in our

midst. Put yourself in a place where

you know that you can seek the Lord.

Our number six is we see children at this event in

Matthew 21 verses 15 and 16, the Bible says, and when the chief

Matthew 21:15

priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did and

the children crying in the temple saying Hosanna to the son

of David. And verse 16, Jesus responds and

says, yeah, have you never read out of the mouth of babes and

sucklings? Thou hast perfected praise.

See, kids are always paying attention.

They, they pick up on things. I don't even understand how this

happens. It happens on accident.

They're going to pick up on things without you even trying

to teach it to them. I recently started getting into

Formula One, the race car thing, you know, as an American, it's

like, what is that? It's in another country.

I don't know what that is, but Netflix put on Drive to Survive

and they're pushing for an American market.

Cadillac got involved in making motors and getting the team

going. And recently the my boss in the

city is into it. So I just started saying, hey

man, let's let's figure out what he's into.

And I've been just watching YouTube videos at night.

I don't even watch whole races because I don't I'm just trying

to understand how does it work and it's not really even a thing

for me. I haven't watched a race.

I don't know much about it. I've just I've only seen a

handful of YouTube videos. But my 10 year old son today

Bing, the thing that he wanted for his birthday was a Formula

One Lego set with the cars in the truck.

And I was like, why do you even want that?

And my wife was like, you don't realize how strong your

influence is on the life of your kids.

I was like, I haven't even watched the whole race.

I don't feel like I talk about it.

I don't even understand it. She's like, they've seen enough.

They know that you like it and they're now into it.

And I was like, I don't even know if I'm into it.

Like, let's not commit. We're just learning about it,

you know? But here we are.

And my kids are picking up on things that I'm barely even

interested in. I mean, I do think it's

interesting. I am learning.

It's a new cool sport thing, I guess.

But these children in Jerusalem, as all these families would come

and the multitudes are around, someone's got to be with the

kids or the kids are just there. And it would be said.

Historians say that Psalm 118, verses 25 to 27 is what Israel

Psalms 118:25–27

would have been quoting. As they got, they greeted people

coming into Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover.

Psalm 11825 to 27. Hosanna, save now, where's our

king? And this was a song that even

the kids would sing. The kids are listening to our

music. They're watching our attitudes.

They know our words. And here they picked up on the

right stuff. They didn't know a whole lot

about the world. They didn't know what was going

on in Iran or anything else. They just said Jesus is here.

We heard that's really good. So we're into it.

And that's the thing that gets us into the Kingdom.

It's that attitude. In Luke 18, Jesus talked about

it. He said, And they brought unto

him also infants. This is at a different time that

he would touch them. But when he was, when his

disciples saw it, they rebuked him.

But Jesus called them unto him and said, Suffer little children

to come unto me, and forbid them not for of such as the Kingdom

of God. Verily I say unto you, whosoever

shall not receive the Kingdom of God as a little child shall in

no wise enter therein. It is this kind of faith, it is

saving faith that says, I just believe the Gospel.

I don't have it all figured out. I don't have a robust theology.

I don't know what I'm doing with my life.

I believe that Jesus died for me.

I believe that's a good thing. I'm going to follow him.

And yet we sometimes lose that simple childlike faith.

Out of the Mouth of Babes has perfected praise.

And if you've seen people genuinely born again and they

start reading the Bible and walking with Jesus and getting

excited, man, it's just so, it's so empowering to us in our own

faith, isn't it? So the praise of new believers

should provoke us in our own faith.

Children are wonderful and cute. Today it's Bingham's birthday,

so we went back and looked at pictures of when he was first

born. That was crazy.

I looked a whole lot younger. It was like, wow, parenting has

worn me out. They're lovely when they're

kids, they're beautiful. But man, that was so tiring.

And we want them to grow and we want them to develop.

And the same should be true of us spiritually when we're born

again, when we trust Christ, we come in as newborn babes, brand

new into the Kingdom. I just love Jesus and you need

to nurse a bottle of the Bible and grow up lest you become

carnal, fleshy, immature. The apostle Paul said to the

church in Corinth, now I can't even teach you the Bible because

you all are so jacked up. You just need to grow up in

Jesus. Grow up this Hebrews 5 would say

if you're just going to hang out with the milk if all you know is

Jesus loves me for the Bible tells me so man, that's that's

not really enough to sustain you to live the life of a disciple.

So if you identify as the the younger person in the faith,

it's just excited about Jesus. Praise the Lord man, we are so

proud and excited for that, but we also need to grow and

develop. We need to become a disciple.

Grow up in the word. Our last group of people are the

priests and the scribes. This is the most sobering group.

All of these people are present as Christ comes into Jerusalem.

Verses 15 and 16, the Bible says.

And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things

that he did, and the children crying in the temple, saying

Hosanna to the son of David, they were sore displeased.

And they said unto him, Hearest thou what these say?

Jesus said, yeah. He quotes Psalm 8, verse 2 out

Psalms 8:2

of the mouth of babes and suckling.

Zeal has perfected praise. But these priests inscribes,

they see what the Bible calls wonderful things, and those

wonderful things displeased them.

They did not have the right perspective on reality at this

time. They heard the children, the

kids are saying Hosanna, the kids are saying save now come

king of Israel. And they they said, are you

Jesus? Are you picking up on what

they're saying? They're calling you the Messiah.

This says in Luke's version of this event saying, blessed be

the king that cometh in the name of the Lord, peace in heaven,

and glory in the highest. And some of the Pharisees from

among the multitudes said unto him, Master, rebuke thy

disciples. And he answered and said unto

them, I tell you that if these should hold their peace, the

stones would immediately cry out.

So they were calling him king even more than son of David,

king with a capital K. And the Pharisees said, you need

to rebuke them. Tell them that's wrong.

It's not right of you to say that because that's what they

really wanted. They had the spirit of

Antichrist. They denied Christ as king.

So I put it to you in your notes like this, the self-righteous of

the most vehement rejecters of Christ.

This was their city. They had the temple, they had

the sacrifices, they had Moses. They did not want the son of

David. They did not want a king.

They were righteous in their own way, Romans 10 says.

For they, being ignorant of God's righteousness and going

about to establish their own righteousness, have not

submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.

This is truly the way. If you're not following Jesus,

you're going about to establish your own righteousness through

some other religion or a moral means, or at very least just

rejecting Christ as some kind of authority over you.

We hung those Flyers up in the city and one of the ones right

by my office, we were actually went out on Thursday and hung

some up as well. One of the ones right by my

office. You know, we put tape all four

sides around them. Someone tore it down but turned

it upside down and put it back up.

So they had to go out of their way to carefully disassemble it

and put it back up. So I, I went back out and I

flipped it back around again and I saw it today and it was upside

down again. And what's interesting is on the

flyer is a cross and like the Satanist symbol is the upside

down cross. And that's what Portland has

been doing with our Flyers is just saying we don't want the

cross. I got another e-mail late last

night. Someone used our contact form on

our website, you know, scan the QR code, go through.

And I was like, sweet. And then I read it and it said,

please stop putting pictures of death all throughout our city.

I was like, well, that's definitely a lost person's

perspective. It is a grim looking poster, but

it's also the power of God unto salvation.

That's the spirit of Antichrist. These are the religious

rejecters. These are the self-righteous,

some kind of righteousness outside of Jesus Christ.

And you'll find that these are the greatest persecutors of the

cross. They had them in Jesus's day.

What makes us think that we'll be free of them in our day?

We can expect some kind of opposition.

We ought to. We certainly don't want it, but

these are the ones ultimately that manipulate the crowd and

the politics to crucify who would be their Messiah.

We'll find a way to get rid of you.

Those are the people we might witness to, but we're not going

to be messing with. We don't want to be strung up.

We just want to preach the gospel.

We want to find people who are interested.

So as you look at those seven things today, is there one of

them that you feel like you can relate to?

Maybe you just need to be encouraged as a disciple.

Maybe you can think about people who need to hear the gospel that

you need to just put Christ on display.

Maybe you need to grow as a child to develop.

I want to give us a moment of silence and and prayer.

I'll then I'll lead us in a prayer and we'll have one more

song. So let's take a minute and pray.