Mark 11:7-11

Mark 11:7-11  When they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks over it, he sat on it.  Many people spread their cloaks on the road, while others spread branches they had cut in the fields.  Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted, “Hosanna!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”  “Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!”  “Hosanna in the highest!”  Jesus entered Jerusalem and went to the temple.  He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.

Jesus rode into Jerusalem as the Messiah.  The people thronged around him, spreading cloaks and branches in front of him as a welcoming sign of subservience and respect.  They were paying homage to their coming king, the great Messiah--the one who would put all things back together the way they should be.  The one who would make the Jewish people a great nation again.  The one who would deliver them from the Roman yoke of bondage.  The people were definitely receiving him as king, heir to the throne of David.  As Jesus and his retinue progressed to the temple, the people were spontaneously proclaiming his excellency, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”  “Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!” “Hosanna in the highest!”   

Jesus came to Jerusalem in this commotion of celebration.  The people finally accepted him as the "anointed one," the one who would bring God's favor upon them and their land.  But Jesus came not to rule as they expected.  He did not come to restore the Jewish earthly kingdom, to exclusively bless them with God's favor.  Rather, He came to establish the eternal kingdom of God, a powerful, spiritual kingdom that would last forever, a kingdom to which all people would have access, a kingdom where all would be blessed, where God himself would reign in their midst.  But this kingdom would not come through natural power and authority; it would be ushered in by Jesus' sacrifice and death.  Jesus would be abused, humiliated, and stripped of his humanity through violence.  His life would be taken as if it were nothing.  All that He had worked for would be placed on the cross.  His life would end ignominiously.  After his crucifixion, silence and death reigned in the tomb.  No adoring crowd, no shouts of, "Hosanna," would be heard on that day of death, for their expected Messiah was lying in the grave.  Who was this dead Jesus?  Who was this man lying in Joseph of Arimathea's tomb?  

My son, Jeff, a  Presbyterian minister, put it beautifully in his response to yesterday's breakfast.  This Jesus "is not a King who controls his people through coercive power.  He is a King whose authority is demonstrated in sacrifice.  Whose means of influence is sacrificial love.  And He chooses, yes chooses, the symbol of Roman tyranny and control--the cross as the symbol of his love and reign.  He calls into question, and dismantles, the whole world view of power, influence, and morality.  He triumphs over every principality and power and points us to a new way of being.  Jesus' power is a threat to any and every worldly authority.  Therefore, He cannot be an add on to our lives.  He cannot be just a means of personal satisfaction, or personal sin management.  He cannot be merely the recipient of a "get into heaven free" prayer.  He is either LORD, which changes everything, or He is nothing."  

We know the rest of the story of our risen Lord.  With the disciples, we discover that the grave does not hold Jesus, for He is resurrected.  This resurrection designated him as truly the King of kings.  As the Bible indicates, “Where, O death, is your victory?  Where, O death, is your sting?  Jesus becomes the first fruit of the newborn, the new life.  He becomes THE WAY, the only way to life eternal.  He proclaims that He is evermore the resurrected LORD, the NEW LIFE.  He brought captivity captive.  He has brought life to the lifeless, hope to the hopeless.  Death has been defeated.  HE IS THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD (In him was life, and that life was the light of men.  John 1:4).  LIFE will reign forevermore.  We can cry out with Job, in faith believing, "I know my Redeemer lives!"