Mark 11:1-11. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on April 14, 2019.
Today we are celebrating Palm Sunday and so I will skip ahead in the Gospel of Mark to the passage that deals with the Sunday before the crucifixion of Jesus. On this day, Jesus came into Jerusalem riding on a donkey’s colt. What is he doing? Jesus is offering himself to them as the Son of David for whom they had waited, and of whom the prophet Zechariah had prophesied in chapter 9:9. It is not just because he is on a donkey’s colt, but also because of the powerful things Jesus had done before this. Their constant question to him of whether or not he was the Messiah seems to receive a clear answer in his action here. Yes, Jesus is offering himself to them as their king and it appears as if they are receiving him.
As we walk through this story today, I want us to take two images from this. Here we have the lowly Jesus riding on a donkey’s colt. On the other hand, Scripture gives the picture in the book of Revelation of the Mother of Prostitutes riding on a seven-headed beast. Who will you choose to be king? Jesus did not come to build a beastly system in order to crush the world under his authority. Rather, he came as a humble man, a little lamb, offering citizenship in a coming kingdom to whosoever will. He came to offer adoption into the family of God to whosoever will. He came to offer his hand in marriage to whosoever will. So, what will you choose? Will you choose citizenship in a beastly kingdom ruled by harlots, adoption into a family of wickedness, marriage to the man of sin who will one day rule the world? As for me and my house, we will choose the Lord Jesus!
The king asks us to help
This is an important picture of the character of God. Though He has all power and doesn’t need us, He does want us to have a part in what He is doing. Thus, Jesus gives his disciples some instructions to go get a certain donkey at a certain place. Now, before we get into these specific instructions from the master, it would be good to recognize another aspect of his instructions or commands.
We have general instructions from Jesus that are to all who want to follow Him at all times. We find them in the Word of God in commands like, “Love your enemies and do good to those that hate you.” Matthew 5:44. It is interesting that in our modern society we are beginning to redefine love and hate to the point that something that is actually loving is declared as hatred. For example, if these things about Jesus are true then no other religion on earth, or lack thereof, can save someone. If I truly cared about a person, I would lovingly tell that they are following a false religion that cannot save them. No, I wouldn’t ridicule them and abuse them in anyway, but I just might end up hurting their feelings by telling them the truth regardless of the fact that it was not my intent. Yet, such is increasingly labeled as “hate-speech.” Regardless of all that, if you are a believer in Jesus then you have received general instructions from Christ with which you are expected to wrestle with your context in order to obey. We constantly ask ourselves and the Lord what it means in this specific situation. Instead of listing all possible situations and legislating what the loving thing to do is, Christ expects us to grapple with these issues ourselves and with the help of the Holy Spirit. This often leads to times of prayer and seeking God for specific direction.
Yet, there are times when we receive specific instructions from the Lord by the Holy Spirit. Christ is not physically on the earth to give a specific word. The disciples that day did not ask themselves, “Is this really the will of the master?” They knew for sure because Jesus was right in front of them. However, we take the general command into our prayer life and seek the specific instruction of the Lord for each context. Sometimes he speaks to us by his Spirit and sometimes he lets us struggle to work it out. Always, he is watching over us and helping us.
Now, our flesh can interfere in this process of receiving specific instruction from the Lord. It can try to talk us out of doing what God is asking because it doesn’t make sense to us, or will make us look silly. On the other hand, it can also dream up things in order to stroke the ego. We must humbly and prayerfully consider what we believe God is telling us. We should have godly Christians around us that we are comfortable sharing the things with which we are wrestling. In the end, we should step out in faith and trust the directions of the Lord. We are choosing in those moments to help him in the endeavor that he is doing.
So, Jesus was planning to enter Jerusalem in a spectacular way and he gave his disciples specific instructions. However, those instructions did not explain everything. Have you ever noticed this about God? He tells us enough so that we can do what He wants, but He doesn’t tell us everything. This is a hard thing for our flesh to take. What if they think we are stealing the colt? What if they call for the police and take us to jail?
The answer is that Jesus always has others who belong to him that we do not know. This is worth remembering in life. Though Jesus had 12 disciples, everything was not on their shoulders. Jesus had other disciples that were wrestling with following his instructions too. They didn’t travel around with him like the 12, but they were real disciples nonetheless. We need to trust the small part that God has given us to do and know that it will be magnified by all the many small tasks of the other disciples around us. Some will be people that we know, but most will be people we don’t. The key point is that the Spirit of God is able to orchestrate these things as we simply learn to trust him. May God help us to learn always to be ready to do the work that will show the world the truth of who God is.
So, the disciples go and find the colt that Jesus told them about and, sure enough, someone asks them what they think they are doing. When they give the response that Jesus told them to give, the guys let them go. Imagine that! No problems. Now why did Jesus want a donkey anyways?
The king doesn’t always do what we expect him to do
Jesus is often an enigma to us because we are so used to analyzing things with our fleshly minds and don’t fully comprehend the ways of God. So, following him can often throw us some curve balls. If you want to follow Jesus then you are going to be tested. In fact, walking with Jesus tests everyone, even those that look like this Christianity is easy stuff. The curve balls of life will test our ability to keep listening to Jesus. On this day, Israel was being tested as a whole, but each individual person was being tested as well. The crowds seem to be ready to accept Jesus as king. Clearly the disciples have already accepted Jesus and are on board. It is interesting that Mark doesn’t mention the Chief Priests, Scribes, and the Pharisees, as in the other gospels. Most of them have made up their minds to reject Jesus and in fact have been plotting a way to execute him.
It might be helpful to analyze our response to Jesus with a logic grid. On one axis we will mark their initial response to Jesus as Yes or No. On the other axis we will mark their faith in Jesus at the end of their life as a Yes or No.
Thus, we end up with 4 possible outcomes, YY, YN, NY, NN. Those who quickly said yes to Jesus and stayed with him to the end would be those first disciples like James, John, Peter and Andrew, etc. Judas would represent the one who said yes up front, but fell away from Jesus in the end. The apostle Paul would represent the one who rejected Jesus at first, but then later had a change of heart and stuck with Jesus to the end. Lastly, we have those who went to their grave, never having put their faith in Jesus at all. What is the real difference between a YY person and a NY? How about a YN and a NN? We should quickly realize that it doesn’t really matter how quickly I responded to Jesus. What really matters is where I am in the end. In fact, there is a world of trials that happen between our initial acquaintance with Jesus and the end of our life. Every day tests whether or not we will stay with Jesus. The apostle Peter himself publicly denied the Lord for a time, but he was granted repentance and was restored. Forget about what your score is along the way, and choose to follow Jesus today.
Faith is not about how perfect we look, but where we end up. Today, if you hear his voice, don’t harden your heart, but rather say, “Speak, Lord. Your servant is listening.” Keep your eye upon the heavenly prize. Keep your allegiance with Christ and trust that he will pull you through in the end, regardless of how many times you fail. Go to war against those things within you that seek to pull you away from Jesus, and to give up in the end.
The crowds began to shout as they see what Jesus is doing. They are ready for Jesus to raise up the fallen kingdom of David, which the prophets had promised. They wanted the Kingdom of David, but it was too late for that. When he gets to Jerusalem and goes to the temple it says this. “So, when he had looked around at all things, as the hour was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve.” Jesus knew that he was going to get their late. Why not wait until the next morning? It is as if the “too late” here is a metaphor for the desires of the people. He had done it on purpose. Why? He knew that he would ultimately be rejected by the people because he wasn’t going to do what they expected. He really hadn’t come to late, but their hearts had given up on God and would not believe unless he jumped through all the hoops that they wanted him to jump through. Sin was choking their hearts and blinding their eyes. This is the same heart that is throughout the whole world today. If there is room for God at all, we will allow him to come in and sweep our sin under the rug and bless us as if we had been righteous all along. However, for an increasing number of people, there is no room for God in our world. The attitude is this. Just leave us alone and we will find Utopia ourselves. To this attitude, believers who remain faithful to Christ represent a problem. You may be following Christ today, but will you follow him to the end? When people are losing their minds and thinking that sacrificing you will save humanity or mother earth, will you stick with him then? I pray that, regardless of how many times you fall and scrape your knees spiritually, you will cling to Jesus and trust Him to pull you through.
Will you trust this king? No, he doesn’t always make sense to us, but of all beings who have walked this planet, He is the only one who even comes close to looking like God. Accept Him today and join the Kingdom of God.