Palm Sunday - Mary or the Mob

You can turn in your Bibles to the book of John.

John chapter 12, mixing it up on you.

John 12 · chapter mention

For those who don't know, we've been in Matthew for over a year.

John what? John 12.

John, John, chapter 12, I'm going to read to you starting in

John 12 · chapter mention

verse one. Six days before the Passover,

Jesus therefore came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom Jesus

had raised from the dead. So they gave a dinner for him

there. Martha served, and Lazarus was

one of those reclining with him at table.

Mary therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made from

pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with

her hair. The house was filled with the

fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of the

disciples who was about to betray him, said, why was this

ointment not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor?

He said this not because he cared about the poor, but

because he was a thief, and having charge over the money bag

he used to help himself to what was put into it, Jesus said,

Leave her alone so that she may keep it for the day of my

burial. For the poor you always have

with you, but you do not always have me.

When the large crowd of the Jews learned that Jesus was there,

they came not only on account of him, but also to see Lazarus,

whom he had raised from the dead.

So the chief priests made plans to put Lazarus to death as well,

because on account of him many of the Jews were going away and

believing in Jesus. The next day the large crowd

that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to

Jerusalem. So they took branches of palm

trees and went out to meet him, crying.

Hosanna. Blessed is he who comes in the

name of the Lord, even the king of Israel.

And Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, just as it is

written. Fear not, daughter of Zion,

behold, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey's colt.

His disciples did not understand this these things at first, but

when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these

things had been written about Him and had been done to Him.

The crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of

the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to bear witness.

The reason why the crowd went to meet Him was that they had heard

He had done this sign. So the Pharisees said to one

another, You see that you are gaining nothing.

Look, the world has gone after Him.

God, we thank you for the awesome, awesome truth of who

Jesus is. And Lord, I pray that you would

help us to receive the fullness of it this morning and not miss

out, not join in the crowd who who worships and ignorance, but

be the devoted who worship with faithfulness, with love, with

purity. Jesus, you are the King who is

worthy. That's not up for question.

But Lord, we ask that you would continue to teach us and show us

who you are, exactly who you are, so we would love you more

deeply. We thank you in Jesus name,

Amen. So here we are.

At another Passover feast. Israel probably had 100 to

200,000 people in the city or around the city on the regular.

Whenever it would come time for one of the big feasts of Israel

though, the city would swell big time.

People would travel from all over the place, potentially up

to 1,000,000 people, they say. So it the region is packed.

There's tents, there's family reunions.

This is a long, this is at least a week long feast.

People have been streaming into Jerusalem for weeks and weeks

probably. And again, people are filling up

homes and rooftops and all over the place.

It's a busy time. It's it's an exciting time.

It's a bustling time. Why?

For the Passover feast, Remember the Passover, It was Moses the

night before, after the 10 plagues or after the 9 plagues

had been established. The 10th plague was coming on

that night. The judgement of the first born

son, the judgement against Pharaoh, and all the first born

sons were going to be killed. But the Lord said, but if you'll

take a lamb, whoever takes a lamb and butchers it, and then

takes the blood of this lamb and puts it on their doorposts, the

horizontal beams and the vertical beams, then the death

Angel will pass over. They won't come.

They won't come into your home and kill your son.

The death Angel will Passover and you'll be spared.

Israel celebrated this feast for around 14170 years since it

happened with Moses at the time of Jesus now.

So they've been sacrificing lambs.

They come, they sing the same songs, they follow the same

commands, and they sacrifice yet another lamb.

But on this Sunday, before the coming Passover meal, the Lamb

of God and the final sacrifice comes into Jerusalem.

Most of these people don't know that this is the final

sacrifice. It was tradition that the Jews

would select their lamb for the Passover sacrifice on the 10th

day of what was called the month of Nissan.

So the the different calendars, you know, throughout history

have been used. So the, the 10th day of the

month of Nissan was the, the day of the Triumphal entry, it was

Palm Sunday. So not ironically, but just of

course, by the Lord's sovereign will, this is the day that all

the families would go and select their lamb.

So all the shepherds, of course, like they've been preparing for

this for a long time for the influx of people that are going

to come because everybody needs to have their lamb prepared.

But it's on this day, on this Sunday, this first day of the

week, it's time for us to select our lamb.

So here the Jewish people are worshipping and they're

selecting their lamb for slaughter later in the week.

His name is Jesus. They don't see it that way.

They don't realize it that way. But with hindsight, you and I

get all the clarity. It's so easy to always read our

Bible and go, how could they not see?

How could they not see? But the disciples are still

right there. And they didn't even connect the

dots for the prophecy for Jesus to ride in on the donkey, even

though again, another prophecy fulfilled, another prophecy

fulfilled, another prophecy fulfilled and says, but later

they put it all together, Later they put it all together.

Even after the resurrection, it took Jesus walking on the road

with them and he had to open up their eyes to the Scriptures and

show them that the Messiah had to suffer.

And he showed them from the law and Moses and the prophets and

everything he said it had to be this way.

And they went, wow, of course, that was the best Bible study

ever. And they went, I get it now.

And then he vanished before their eyes.

He reappeared to them later after the resurrection multiple

times. But this is what's going on.

They are experiencing the Passover feast, really the

beginning of the Passover feast. And now here we are in Bethany

the day before. So it's Saturday evening.

This is Bethany. This is about a mile outside of

Jerusalem. So they you can look down into

Jerusalem from Bethany, Gordon Annette, right in Bethany, you

can look down into Jerusalem. You've been over there, you've

seen that you've walked these hills.

Someday I want to go. Someday I'm going to take my

family and we're going to walk the same places that he walked.

So you can see down into Jerusalem.

There's candlelight, there's dinners, there's feasting,

there's joy happening all over the place.

But here we are in verse 1-6. Days before the Passover, Jesus

therefore came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had

raised from the dead. So they gave him a dinner there.

Martha served and Lazarus was one of those reclining at table

with him. So the first point we should

make here is obviously it's just good manners to throw a dinner

for somebody when they raise you from the dead or a family

member. So it's just a common courtesy

if you haven't, if you didn't know that it's not just good

Southern manners. That's just like globally, it's

kind of a known rule. So they're feasting, they love

Jesus. They were friends with Jesus,

which is why it was such a personal thing when Jesus came

to them because he waited four days for Lazarus to be good and

dead. And then he comes in and he

says, and he weeps with them. And they said, Lord, if you had

been here, if only you had been here.

And he says, well, it's not too late, but now we keep going.

Verse 3. Mary therefore took a pound of

expensive ointment made from pure nard and anointed the feet

of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair.

The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

So we see Jesus being honored. The day before Palm Sunday, Mary

poured out this expensive and rare perfume onto his feet.

Just so you have some context, it was about a year's wages.

So roughly, what's a year's wages?

So if we're going to take just an average culturally top to

bottom, you're saying $55,000 is the current average if you want

to take a year's wages. So that's how much this perfume

is that she pours onto a man's feet.

And what does she do after she pours it onto his feet?

She also, she doesn't just wipe it with a cloth, she wipes his

feet with her hair. So this is her very highest, her

very extreme best for his extreme lowest.

We're told in First Corinthians that a woman's long hair is a

glory to her. So Mary realizes this is the

best that she can do for the King of the cosmos.

She took her hair, her glory, her feminine covering, her

beauty, and laid it low on the dusty feet of Jesus.

This is what devotion looks like.

I want to get as low as I can. When people bow down before the

Lord in the Book of Revelation, it says that all the elders lay

prostate, always have to say that word.

Slowly. They lay down flat in front of

it. They just want to humble

themselves before the Lord. Like what else can I do except

get low at His feet? It's just an automatic.

It's just an automatic response in worship.

I want to get low to magnify His glory.

I don't want to be in competition with it.

I don't want to make myself equal to it.

I just want to get low before Him.

This is my joy. This is my pleasure to delight

and to elevate and to worship Him.

This is the approach that Mary T that Mary is showing.

This is the approach that she takes, the very feat that later

that week would be nailed to the cross.

She's anointing with $55,000 of ointment.

That can't be salvage. It can't be used again.

It's been saved for a long time. This is a treasure in this

household. This is a valuable family

heirloom, most likely. Look at this.

Look what we've got. Can I smell it?

All you ever do is pop the top on it and go wow.

Yep. Cover it up.

Can we use some? No, no, We're really never going

to use it. Now, maybe on a special occasion

we'll just do a dab because it's so valuable.

You can't spend it. And if you were like, how could

you ever do it justice? How could you ever do such a a

pleasant, pleasing thing justice?

Well, there's one way you could pour it onto Jesus.

You could pour it onto his dusty feet that had been walking

through the streets. You could pour it onto the

Master, the one who brings the good news of the gospel to the

world. And that's exactly what she did.

That's what worship does, and that's what worship wants to do.

Mary understood who Jesus was. It would have been nothing to

give something like less valuable like Abraham when he

offers his son. It would have been nothing for

Abraham to give himself, but instead he gave the most costly

thing. And that's the thing that brings

the Lord the most glory. And a Worshipful heart is always

happy to do it. A Worshipful heart has an

overflow of gratitude that is focused on the glorification of

God. But of course not everybody

likes that. Verse 4.

But Judas Iscariot, one of the disciples who was about to

betray him, said, why was this ointment not sold for 300

denarii and given to the poor? So we could have sold it for the

year's wages. We could have sold this for

$55,000, and then we could have given all of this money to those

in need. Oh, how sweet of you, Judas.

What a great idea. How morally superior, how

righteous of Judas. How do you argue with that?

How can you? It's a great point.

We really could have done that, right?

Well, the problem is it's a lie. The problem is it's not

Worshipful. So the only thing we'll say for

now about Judas is that there are always going to be people

who make moral claims, but they lack warmth and they lack love

for God. They will always want to argue

for what seems reasonable. When worship isn't worried about

what's reasonable, worship is willing to be unreasonable.

Remember David dancing before the Lord?

That's not really reasonable. I don't know that that was

really the appropriate thing to do.

The thing you'll notice, and those who oppose the devotion

and heartfelt sold out love for God is a barrenness in their

lives. There's a fruitlessness in their

lives. So they might have the the

facade of godliness, but the fruit is absent.

And they are the ones who would not only sin in in their own

withholding a worship from the Lord, but they would want you to

do so as well. They'll tell you to, Hey, peel

back. Hey, your devotion looks a bit

extreme, I think. No, no, I think it's good.

I just think you don't do it in the right way.

There are always people like that.

They're in the church and they're out of the church.

There will always be someone who says that your worship is too

extravagant. Keep going.

Verse 9. When the large crowd of the Jews

learned that Jesus was there, they came not only on account of

him, but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the

dead. So the chief priests made plans

to put Lazarus to death as well, because on account of him, many

of the Jews were going away and believing in Jesus.

So Jesus's murderous enemies want to kill him, and they want

to kill Lazarus. Let's kill him.

But he raised that guy from the dead.

All right, we'll kill him too, and we'll just, we think that if

we could kill everybody, then we could solve our problem.

This once again proves that humans don't need more evidence,

we need more faith. If your heart is hard, I pray

that the fear of God would break it and make it soft so that you

would just say, Lord, I believe, Lord, I believe because with the

word of God comes the ability to believe God.

And now that was the night before.

That was the evening before and now the moment we've all been

waiting for. Mary worshipped in her home, but

now everybody worships in the streets.

It's Sunday and the Lord descends the slope from the

Mount of Olives. Olives, the very hill he's going

to ascend into heaven from in just 43 days.

This is the same place where he's going to say I'm coming

back. And eventually that is the same

spot that Jesus is coming back to put foot on the earth.

He will descend and he will stand again on the Mount of

Olives. Boys and girls, men and women,

across that Atlantic Ocean is the land of Israel.

Jesus is coming back to put his feet on the Mount of Olives and

he is going to rule and reign forever on the earth.

It is going to be good and glorious.

He's going to make a new heaven and a new earth.

He's going to make all things new and he is going to establish

his eternal Kingdom. Like they thought was coming

that day. They thought a certain rulership

was coming that day. That rulership is coming, but

it's not coming on Palm Sunday, not on that day.

Verse 12, the next day, the large crowd that had come to the

feast heard that Jesus was coming into Jerusalem.

So we know that large crowd means a ton of people.

Why do we know this? Because remember, we know that

Jesus fed 5000 men, not including women and children.

So we know that that conservatively would be like

15,000 people. You could stretch that number

much, much larger, very likely. So that's when the disciples

talk about large numbers of people.

They've seen it all. At this point.

They got three years of history. So when John says a large group

of people, he means a large, large, large, thousands upon

thousands upon thousands upon thousands of people.

There's at least hundreds of thousands of people in and

around Jerusalem. They've been hearing the

stories. Jesus has been around Israel for

three years. This all didn't just start a

week ago. This whole thing has been

building. The masses have heard, You know

somebody who knows somebody who's been healed, you know

somebody who's heard and preached.

And now Lazarus is being raised from the dead.

There were others who are raised from the dead, but this guy was

dead 4 days. Are you sure it's different from

the boy's casket? They were walking the boy down.

He had just died. They're saying Jesus raises him

up. But what about the guy who's

been dead and in the tomb for four days?

Was the boy dead? Oh, I heard he wasn't dead.

I heard this rumors, gossip, confusion.

Lazarus was dead and in the tomb for four days.

Jesus made sure of it. So now word is spreading.

All right, we can't get we can't get past that one.

We can't say the little boy was sick with a fever.

The little girl who had just died a couple hours earlier.

Like we, we can we can lie about that.

But the guy who's dead in the tomb for four days, that grabs

even more attention. So everybody is coming,

Everybody is interested. Large crowds have come.

So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him

crying. Hosanna.

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the king

of Israel. And Jesus found a young donkey

and sat on it, just as it is written.

Fear not, daughter of Zion, behold, your king is coming,

sitting on a donkey's cold. This is so that passage there.

And in your Bible, if it's set aside and whenever you look at

the text, it's quoting something from the Old Testament.

So he's quoting Zachariah and the prophecy that was made about

Jesus. His disciples did not understand

these things at first, but when Jesus was glorified, so later

after he ascended into heaven, then they remembered that these

things had been written about him and had been done to him.

So they connect the dots later, even though he's doing it right

in front of them, he says, hey, go into town.

I want you to go find a dog. You're going to find a donkey

tied up and I want you to bring it to me.

If anybody says anything, just tell them, hey, the master has

need of it. And that literally happened.

They went into town and they start to untie this donkey.

They found some guy was, bro, what are you doing?

That's my donkey. And they go, the master has need

of it. And then he goes, OK, so the

Holy Spirit had prepared this guy or he just knew obviously

about Jesus. He was like, well, if he wants

it, then he can have it. So he gave up something very,

very valuable to him as well. The crowd that had been with him

when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the

dead continued to bear witness. So people keep telling, I saw it

happen. I watched Lazarus be dead and I

watched Lazarus be raised. The reason the crowd went to him

was that they had heard he had done this sign.

So there's a lot of excitement, a lot of joy, a lot of jubilee,

a lot of celebration, a lot of expectation.

And now all throughout his ministry, Jesus has been

silencing people and reminding people, hey, don't tell anybody.

He, he has been measuring and, and determining the best way to

expose himself to the whole world and to really turn up the

heat. And now he comes into Jerusalem

boldly while the Pharisees are wanting to kill him.

And he's fulfilling the prophecy that Zechariah had given.

So his miracles have reached far and wide.

His teaching has reached far and wide.

He recently raised Lazarus from the dead maybe 8 or 9 days ago

at the absolute most. It's probably been like a month

ago, but all this is very recent.

All this is building now. He deliberately says get, get a

donkey for me to ride in on. I'm going to confirm all

suspicion and fulfill another prophecy.

The crowd believes that Jesus is the Messiah.

You need to know that they do believe that he's the Messiah.

They think he is. They go, this is it.

It's finally happening. He's really here.

The problem is that they have a misunderstanding of what the

Messiah is going to do. So they do believe this is him

and they are excited and this is real worship.

They want him to come in and crush his enemies.

And that's the thing. He is going to crush the head of

his enemy, of his enemy, and he's going to build his Kingdom.

But he's not going to build like a bulldozer.

He's going to be like a mustard seed.

And like he's about to say later in John, unless a grain of wheat

falls to the ground and dies, it remains alone.

Look at my grain of wheat. I have it, but it's got to go

into the ground. It has to die, and then it will

bear much fruit. This is how Jesus builds his

Kingdom. He says I am the seed and I'm

going into the ground and I'm going to be like the mustard

seed that comes out and it grows and it grows and it grows.

It starts so small. It's a very unexpected story.

And eventually the birds of the air can come make their nests,

and all the creatures of the garden can come shelter in the

tree. It gets so big and it covers the

whole earth. This is how Jesus has built his

Kingdom. You and I are here today, 2000

years later, loving Him, still willing to give our lives for

Him. All around the world, all around

the world, Christians are still willing to give their lives for

the Lord Jesus Christ because they love him, because they know

Him, because they walk with Him, because they trust Him.

And we're still thankful to be able to do so.

So this is how Jesus is going to establish his Kingdom.

They're, they're crying out Hosanna, which means save now or

save us, please. And that's exactly what Jesus is

going to do. But they're wanting him to

rescue them politically. They want to be rescued

nationally. They want to be rescued

culturally. And he's about to save them

spiritually by meeting their greatest need.

They've been killing millions of lambs for 1000 plus years and

they don't realize it yet, but they've got 1 lamb left to kill

and they're going to do it later in that week.

These same people in this crowd who are cheering Hosanna,

Hosanna, literally some of them on Friday morning will be at the

trial screaming crucify him. Why?

Why do they turn so quickly? Because he let them down.

Because he did not turn out to be the Jesus that they really

wanted. They had an image in their mind

of who they wanted. And when he fully revealed that

he couldn't and wouldn't be that guy, they go, oh, I thought this

was it. We thought this was the moment.

We thought the revolution was about to happen.

Like, clearly, he's not a big fan of even our Jewish

leadership, and we're really not either.

We thought they were Hotshots. But he's revealed otherwise.

And that's been really helpful and enlightening.

But also the Romans ruling over us.

And, you know, we as the people of God, which we've always been

taught that we are, we ought to be ruling over the world and our

Messiah ought to be the king over everybody.

It's our turn to what? To be like the Romans.

That's what human nature would have done.

It's our turn to dominate and to crush.

Well, Jesus does dominate, and Jesus does crush, but he does it

in an unexpected way. He does it by killing the old

man and putting in a new man. It was Napoleon Bonaparte who

talked about Jesus and he said, look like I've crushed and I've

conquered great parts of the world.

And Alexander crushed and conquered great parts of the

world, he said. But there's somebody unlike any

of us who has conquered the whole world.

And his men are still willing to die for him today.

He didn't do it with force. He did it with love.

He's like, and that's something I can't compete with.

Like anybody can take over the world.

If you have enough military might, you can take over.

And then you can say I'm in charge.

Yeah, you are you. You had might and might makes,

right? So you get to dominate, you get

to crush and you get to control everybody.

But even Napoleon was like, he did something I couldn't, I

couldn't do. Like, I use swords and I use

cannons and I use all kinds of and horses.

But Jesus rode on a donkey and he came in and conquered the

whole earth by dying for the whole world.

It's not what we expected and it's not what they wanted, which

is why they're so willing to crucify him and go, Well, I

don't. He's no use to me.

You're not valuable to me anymore.

I don't know how you did the tricks that you did.

Maybe it was magic, but I don't need you anymore.

But here he is being honored, being worshipped, being

celebrated. It's like what happens in Second

Kings. So there is a king being,

there's a man being made king. His name is Jehu.

And all of his officials, quickly as he was marching down

the road, they spread their garments.

They took off their cloaks and they put it under them.

Why? As a sign of submission to their

king. So the Jewish people are doing

the same thing today. They said, they're saying I'm

under you. So they wanted the king to walk

on their clothes. And he walked down the street

and they're saying all of his officials are like TJ, Team J,

Team J, That was their way to say walk on mine, walk on mine.

I am under you. I'm in submission to you.

So the same thing's happening here.

And you need to understand this is the people giving their best.

They didn't have closets and drawers full of clothes and full

of different outfits. They didn't have the summer

clothes and the winter clothes and the tubs in the attic that

they swapped out with the seasons.

Most people had very limited amounts of clothing.

So this is not an insignificant possession.

You might be thinking, yeah, I guess I could throw down my

jacket for somebody. Your only jacket, the only thing

that covers your torso. Clothing was so was so was such

a high possession. This is why when Jesus is

crucified, remember, they take his seamless tunic and they say,

oh, like all the Roman, the Roman guard are taking his

things and they're saying, who's getting this?

Who's getting that from the dead guy?

Oh, this thing's really nice. So don't tear it.

No, come on, you take it out. Hey, we'll cast lots for it.

Again, prophecy fulfilled and so said so.

So one of those guys ended up walking at one of those Roman

guard and have walking away with Jesus's clothes.

Why? Because they're so valuable.

It was such an important thing. So this is what people are

spreading underneath Jesus on the road.

And remember, these roads are not paved roads.

This is a dirt Rd. But remember, this isn't like

the dirt roads you and I drive on today.

These roads are travelled by animals.

And that means all of the things that come out of animals.

That's a part of the road. And there's another plop.

There's another plop. And by the way, it's

particularly high traffic these days.

So I don't know if the sanitation crew was keeping up

with everything that horses and donkeys were doing on the roads

as they're walking and the people are going.

Who cares? Who cares why?

Because that's what a Worshipful heart does.

Who cares What am I? What am I?

And what a pleasure and what a privilege to say that he's, he's

stepped on my coat. He stepped on it.

They're not even doing it. It's not even Jesus.

It's just his donkey because he's riding on top of it.

But what a joy, what a, what a privilege it is for them.

There's a big problem, like we said with all this worship,

though it is an uninformed worship.

It is zealous, but it is conditional, and that is the

great danger that they ran into. That is the danger that you and

I run into a conditional worship, a conditional love for

Jesus, a conditional devotion to God.

This is the warning that I'm bringing to you today that we

take from Palm Sunday, from the triumphal entry.

Zealous is not the same thing as faithful, and conditional love

is not love. For some, for a few it was pure,

but for the many they were worshipping the God of their own

image. They have a plan for Him, and

they want Him to submit to it, and they've got it all

backwards. So how do you come to the

Messiah? What is your technique?

Do you come with conditions? Do you come with terms?

If He obeys, you cheer for Him and determine he's worthy of

praise. But if he does something

different, do you turn from Him? Or are you like Mary with the

pure worship, with the devoted worship, with the understanding

worship? Or are you like the mob?

Mary worshipped Jesus for who he actually was.

The mob worshipped based on who they wanted him to be.

So what happens when Jesus doesn't give you what you want?

When he allows you to experience the results of the fall, which

we all do and we all will and we all have?

How do you see him then? What does your devotion for him

look like then? What does your praise for him

look like then when he doesn't follow your timeline?

Do you have a limit? Judas sure did.

He couldn't take the disappointment.

All this momentum and Jesus was willingly going to die.

That's not what Judas wanted. That's not what Judas had been

praying for. That's not what he was standing

on. Everybody can wave a palm

branch, but nobody wants to carry the cross.

But you must keep steering your heart towards Jesus because it

is prone to wander. It will take steering and

direction. You will have to direct your

heart for the own safety of your own soul.

You will not drift towards it Sunday after Sunday.

Even in these chairs, your heart doesn't drift towards Jesus.

You never drift anywhere good. Anybody who spent any amount of

time on the water, you never like whenever you just stop

paying attention and you're not, you're not noticing what's going

on. You never go.

This is exactly where I wanted us to go.

That's never happened to me. I spent a lot of time on the

water, and I know I was never able to just let things drift.

Oh, we'll just see what happens. Maybe we'll go in the right

direction. You have to lead, you have to

row, you have to choose. And it will take effort.

It will take steering. It will take navigation.

You must take your thoughts and make them obey him.

You will not drift into deeper devotion or more loving

obedience or more submissive worship.

You must contend for it. And the King really is worth it.

He deserves your fully informed and your faithful love.

That's why it's important that you know who Jesus is.

It's why we tell the truth about who Jesus is.

And we don't just give the the the slight, the a piece of the

truth because the devil will give you a piece of the truth.

The devil will give you half a truth, but Jesus wants you to

have the whole truth about who He is.

And there are always going to be people who say that you go too

far in your devotion to Him. There are always going to be

people who tell you that you're off the deep end there.

These people are backsliders, and they are lost.

Like Judas, they will claim to have wise and righteous motives,

but you will know them by their fruits because they will always

keep their shirt on their back. And their so-called devotion is

an invisible one that lacks A commitment that costs.

And like the Pharisees, they will always have a resentment

for your extravagant worship. Another gospel tells us the same

day on Palm Sunday that as people were worshipping as

children were celebrating the Pharisees.

In the middle of this crowd they called out to Jesus on the

donkey. Teacher, rebuke your disciples

and Jesus didn't. He said.

I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would

cry out. Jesus was saying it might be

ignorant in some of the cases, but the worship is still right.

It's still right that I am worshiped.

It's still right for me to receive it.

So nobody's getting rebuked today.

I'm going to continue to tell the truth, just like I have

about who I am for three years and all week long.

I'm going to continue to tell the truth.

There's a lot of truth telling coming over the next few days in

Jerusalem, in the temple courts, so people will have every

opportunity to hear the fullness of who he is.

But he says if they were silent, the very stones would cry out.

All creation is going to cry out.

How much more should we cry out? Saints, we've been loved, we've

been saved, we've been changed, and we've been sent.

So how could we possibly hold it in?

All creation recognizes its creator.

If we were silent, the rocks would replace us.

So you have to decide. And we're closing and we're

going to take communion together.

Chris and Kayla. Yeah, if y'all could get us

ready. So you have to decide.

Do you want a servant that you can control?

That's what the Jews were expecting.

That's the God that they had been trained about.

That's the American Jesus that you and I have heard a lot

about. Just ask Jesus into your heart.

He has a wonderful plan for your life.

Those are technically true statements, but that is not the

whole truth. That told you nothing of the

cross, That told you nothing of being willing to lay down your

life to follow Him, That told you nothing about all the other

disclaimers that He made. It says if you're not willing to

pick up your cross and follow me, you are not worthy to be my

disciple. No, all the Christian home decor

just tells me I am worthy. I'm worthy of what?

What exactly am I worthy of? I am who God says I am, that's

true. But what am I worthy of?

What am I deserving of? Everything I get is grace.

I didn't earn it. I'm not worthy of it.

But you're still loved. You're still loved.

I know I'm loved, but that's different from being worthy.

That's different from being deserving.

That's different from earning anything.

So one put, one puts me in a great position of humility.

One puts me very low and says he's worthy of it all.

That leaves nothing for me to be worthy of.

What do I deserve? Well, that's too frightful to

even talk about. What I deserve is hell.

What I deserve is torment. What I deserve is to be

trampled. What I deserve is not to be

passed over. I deserve for the Lord to visit

me with all of His wrath and all of His judgment.

That's what I deserve. But I want Him to Passover, and

by God's grace, He can Passover. Do you want a servant you can

control or a king who can actually save your soul?

Will you will will your worship be convenient or will your

worship be costly? This goes way beyond the Sunday

morning conversation. I mean, that's like, that's the

kindergarten level. It's laughable.

It's rainy, it's polliny, it's cold, it's hot.

Yesterday was Saturday. I was up late.

This isn't a church attendance message.

That's an automatic and easy win for the Saints.

What I'm talking about is an obedience that costs everything.

Palm Sunday, it's easy to rejoice, but Friday is coming

and few actually follow all the way to the cross.

And that shows up in your whole life.

So now we're going to come to the table together to receive

the elements together. Don't come casually.

Come on purpose. Don't come like Judas.

Judas, who took the Lord's body in his mouth and drank the wine

in his mouth, and then still trampled on the body and the

blood of Christ. So you could take the elements,

but it could be to your own damn damnation.

Take the elements under your salvation.

Come humbly, come thankful your King loved you enough to give

himself fully to be executed in your place.

He took the wrath of God so that it would Passover.

You see Jesus as He really is.

See Him as the whole truth, and then give your life to Him.

Don't give your life to a mirage.

Don't devote yourself to a God of your imagination.

Devote your life to the King of Kings as He really is.

Someone asks you to just bow your head and pray right where

you're at. And again, I'll just give one

more warning. Do not take the body and the

blood of the Lord lightly. Judas thought it's just another

meal, and many have done the same.

They've come to the table in the same way the Bible says you eat

and drink condemnation unto yourself.

I want to be merciful to you. I want to be a good pastor to

you and not let you do that. It's a meal that the Jews had

had 1000 times. It's a meal that you've had

hundreds of times. Save now.

Save please. Blessed is he who comes in the

name of the Lord, Master King, Lord Jesus, we love you.

We confess our sin now. Our sin was dark and awful.

You washed it and made us white as snow.

If you haven't submitted your life to to Jesus, this is the

moment to do so fully and completely.

Lord, make me faithful not just on Palm Sunday.

Make me faithful all the way to Good Friday and then bring me

all the way through to Resurrection Sunday made me

faithful to the end. Save me by your blood and your

grace. We honor the body.

We honor the blood, the true Passover lamb.

No more sacrifices are needed. No more animals need to die.

The innocent man who didn't sin took my beating, took my nails,

and took the forsaking of the Father so that I wouldn't be

forsaken. Thank you Jesus, for your nail

pierced hands and feet, for the curse of the crown of thorns

that was put on your head. They spit in your face.

You took the full execution that I deserved.

You drank every drop of the wrath of the Father so that we

could be not just passed over, but we could also be elevated.

That we could be raised up with you and glorified.

We thank you for the body. Let's take it together.

In the blood of the final sacrifice, we remember.

Let's take it the cup together. Lord, I pray that your people

would go out with shouts of joy today, that they would

experience a deep satisfaction knowing that they know you for

who you are and for who you said you were.

Give us deeper understanding, deeper delight, and deeper joy.

We honor you. We're thankful for you.

We celebrate this Holy Week. It changed the whole world.

It changed all of eternity. But I pray you would keep our

hearts Worshipful, in particular this week.

As we draw near to Friday and Saturday and Sunday, Lord, I

pray for the lost world around us, for our friends and for our

family. Give us a heart for them.

Give us a bigger desire to see the lost saved.

Give us more hunger and thirst. Give us more desperation.

Give us more boldness that we would tell the truth, the whole

truth, and the good news that Jesus died for sinners like me.

And now the Lord bless you and keep you.

The Lord make his face Shinedown upon you and be gracious to you.

The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you great

peace in Jesus name, Amen.