The Week Before the Cross (Luke 19.28-48)

Introduction

Three years ago, the Queen came to Stockton to officially open the upgraded White Water Course on the Tees Barrage. Massive crowds were there. I was hoping to go myself, but when I saw how many roads were closed and how many people were expected to turn up I decided it just wasn’t worth it. It would have been impossible to get a view. There’s nothing like royalty to draw a crowd.

They don’t even have to be alive. Dead royalty have just as much appeal as living royalty. Did you see on the news this week about Richard III? They’ve given him a proper burial in Leicester Cathedral, 530 years after his death in the Battle of Bosworth. You had to have a ticket to get in to the church (how often can we say that?) and 35,000 people lined the streets in the city centre to see his coffin.

Incidentally, you know the story about Richard III’s skeleton being discovered under a car park in 2013… Well, there’s a rumour going round that NCP fined him £60 for staying more than two hours…

Royalty in Town

But, you see, nothing like royalty draws a crowd. And that is what all the fuss was about on Palm Sunday. Hundreds of thousands of people were in Jerusalem in 33AD for the biggest thing of the year – the Passover festival. People travelled from all over to be there.

But the atmosphere around this particular Passover was even more electric than usual. Jesus has just, a few days earlier, and a few miles down the road, raised a man called Lazarus from the dead. John’s gospel (12.9-18) tells us that that is why the whole city was like a tinder box that Sunday; listen to what it says.

“Now the crowd that was with [Jesus] when he called Lazarus from the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to spread the word. Many people, because they had heard that he had performed this sign, went out to meet him” (John 12.17-18).

So the place is absolutely buzzing with excitement. Everyone is asking, “Do you think he’ll come? Will he? Won’t he? Is this the time?” Will he finally consent to be crowned king?” And the raising of Lazarus from the dead down the road earlier that week made them feel sure that, yes, this was it.

And now, as he makes his way down the Kidron Valley towards Jerusalem, riding a mount, for them, this is the signal. This is it.

We’ll come back to that in a minute...

Jesus’ Authority

But first, look closer at what’s going on beforehand. It all starts with Jesus’ decision to head into the city that day. I want you to notice his authority. First of all, his authority over men and women.

In v28-35 he sends two runners off ahead to find a donkey. They are to untie it and lead it back to where Jesus is waiting. Maybe it’s just me, but if someone – anyone – asked me to walk up the road and just help myself to a bike that was leaning against a wall, I would say “I really don’t think I should.”

The moment someone says, “Hey, where are you going with my bike?” I know it’s going to look a bit lame if I say “Jesus said I could.” But Jesus knows this might happen. So he adds this, “Oh, and if anyone says “Hey, what do you think you are doing taking my donkey?” just tell them “The Lord needs it.” To be quite honest, that doesn’t really make it any easier does it?

But listen, such is Jesus’ authority over men and women that the two runners just go ahead and do it. It’s enough.

·         Jesus looks at fishermen and tax collectors in the middle of a day’s work and says “Follow me.” And they leave everything and do it.

·         He heals the sick with a touch.

·         He calms the storm with a rebuke.

·         He raises the dead with a command.

·         Jesus only has to say “Get a donkey” and the disciples go and do it.

And his word is enough for the donkey’s owner to let the animal go with no further comment. “The Lord needs it.”

It may just be this morning that Jesus is looking deep into your life and saying, “I need something from you.” I need your gifts. I am asking for your time. I want to use your house, your car, I want your heart.”

What are you going to say?

But look, not only is Jesus’ authority over men and women undisputed, his authority over beasts has no rival either. Jesus straddles this young colt which, v30 says, has never had a rider on its back before, and he masters it.

When you drive past a horse you have to slow down and drive carefully so as not to startle it don’t you? You can just picture this young colt, nervous and agitated because of the noisy crowd, made to take its first rider, maybe frightened as people push against it to get a view. It takes a gentle, reassuring authority to calm a beast of burden in a raucous, excited environment.

Whatever anxieties you have today, whatever fears, whatever worries, whatever stresses… if Jesus can master a young donkey in a cauldron of noise with his calm authority he can settle your troubled soul, can’t he? Give your worries to him, let him take care of it. Jesus’ authority over man and beast knows no match.

Blessed Is the King

In v37 he arrives at the brow of the hill that looks down over Jerusalem – the Mount of Olives. The crowd go wild. They are sure that this is a procession for a man coming to claim the throne. So they take off their coats and place them on the ground. That’s what you do for royalty isn’t it? Wasn’t it Sir Walter Raleigh who did just that for Elizabeth I so she wouldn’t have to walk in a puddle?

When our Queen came to Stockton on Tees, people had been waiting just a few weeks since the first announcement that she’d be visiting our town. The people of Leicester waited 530 years to see Richard III. But these people in Jerusalem had been waiting 1,000 years for this day.

That is how long they had been waiting for another king who would be as good as David. Now, at last, they were sure they’d got one.

Jesus would have made a great king to be fair.

·         He was loved by ordinary people.

·         He cared for the most vulnerable – the sick, the widows, the poor, the outcasts.

·         He loved children.

·         He made people better.

·         He was always wise, always had a brilliant answer to every trick question.

·         He was peace-loving and non-violent.

·         He lived simply, not in an extravagant second home.

·         He hated hypocrisy and always told the truth.

If a candidate like that was standing for Prime Minister in the upcoming General Election how do you think you would vote?

So you can see why there was such great excitement and emotion. It was over the top. It was undignified. It was so loud and hysterical that in v39 the Pharisees tell Jesus to get his people to tone it down a bit.

But they’ve been waiting a millennium for this moment! It’s not happening. “If they keep quiet, the stones will cry out” Jesus says.

And then, at that moment, everything changes. Because in all the euphoria and elation, Jesus suddenly bursts into tears. The word for “wept” in v41 is a very strong one. It means deep and bitter sobbing. It means “to wail.” Jesus is overcome with deep sadness.

What was it that so upset him? Was it the thought of what was coming up in the week ahead? No. Was it the sudden realisation that he was going to suffer and die? No. It was the sudden realisation that his own people would suffer and die.

They were shouting, “Here comes the king! Like David, he will put us back on the map. He’ll bring the glory days back.”

They thought this day would be the end of their troubles. In fact, it was the start of them. Here’s why Jesus broke down in tears; verse 42: “If only you knew today what would really bring you peace – but you just can’t see it.”

They thought that they would get the peace they longed for by being led intro battle, starting a riot in streets, and winning a famous victory over mighty Rome.

In the Middle East today, people still think like that. If we can just kill more of them than they kill of us, we will have peace. It’s been replayed on a loop for centuries. But violence never secures peace there and it never will. It just heaps more suffering on people who have suffered enough.

And Jesus says in v42-44 that the day would come when trying to get peace through a violent uprising would lead to the total destruction of Jerusalem with massive loss of life – men, women and children.

37 years later, in AD 70, the history books tell us that that is exactly what did happen.  The Romans crushed an armed rebellion with such devastating force that not one stone was left on another. It was a bloodbath.

They did not know on that day what could bring them peace.

·         Loving their enemies would have.

·         Doing to others what they wished to be done to them would have.

·         Forgiving those who hurt them would have.

·         Turning the other cheek would have.

We will never find peace in our lives if we keep scores with people who have hurt us. We will never be at peace if we live for getting even. The only way to find peace for our injured soul is through letting go and forgiving.

Military rulers always ride into town on horseback. You go to London or some other great city – all the statues of generals and kings place them on a horse – but not Jesus. He deliberately choses a donkey to fulfil a prophecy in Zechariah which says this:

“Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you,
righteous and victorious,
lowly and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
I will take away the chariots from Ephraim
and the war-horses from Jerusalem,
and the battle-bow will be broken.
He will proclaim peace to the nations.”

So he came humbly on a donkey, with a message of peace, to shouts of acclamation, through the Golden Gate to the east of the city.

Jesus or Pilate?

At that very same moment, to shouts of acclamation, someone else was entering the Jaffa Gate, to the west of the city, arriving on a horse? Does anyone know who that was?

I only learned this last year, but it was a certain Roman Prefect called Pontius Pilate. He actually lived - not in Jerusalem - but on the coast in Caesarea. He only came into Jerusalem for important festivals like this.

He would have arrived in military procession flanked by guards in gleaming armour and burnished leather, the Roman standard going before him, shouts of “Ave Caesar” and foot soldiers pushing the local plebs out of his way. A display of power.

So you’ve got a war-like machine with an arrogant ego arriving on one side of the city, making his way to his luxury second home in the privileged district. Or you’ve got your ragamuffin Prince of Peace on the opposite side.

Jesus is challenging us about what kingdom we’re in. Are you a subject of the kingdom of this world, where might is right, where what counts is status and ego and what people think of you and what you’re worth?

Our caretaker Gary, who lived in that world of flashy cars, big mansions and private helicopters until the law caught up with him, is always telling me that since he came to Christ that way of life that used to have such a magnetic allure for him just doesn’t any more.

He feels pity for the way he used to be – nothing he had then ever delivered him a fraction of the peace and joy he now has in Christ. “Going to prison” he often says, “is the best thing that ever happened to me.” He just sees through the bluster and the pride and the vanity of the kingdom of this world as a fading vapour.

Jesus said to Pilate in the week of the cross, “My kingdom is not of this world.”

Is yours? Or have you found your way into the kingdom of God, where what counts are eternal things like love and grace and forgiveness and truth?

For all his pompous entry into Jerusalem that day, Pilate’s footnote in history is as a weak-willed civil servant who, according to the best sources, committed suicide about five years later when he fell out of favour with the emperor.

Whereas, as somebody has said, “The greatest man in history is Jesus.

·         He had no servants, yet they called him Master.

·         He had no degree, yet they called him Teacher.

·         He had no medicines, yet they called him Healer.

·         He had no army, yet kings feared him.

·         He won no military battles, yet he conquered the world.

·         He committed no crime, yet they crucified him.

·         He was buried in a tomb, yet he lives today.”

In the week of the cross there were two bowls of water. On Good Friday, Pilate used his bowl to wash his hands of an innocent man. He didn’t care. What was one more Judean nobody to him? “Not my problem.” Anything to keep the riff-raff out of his hair...

But the night before, on Maundy Thursday, Jesus used his bowl to unassumingly serve and wash the filth and dust from his disciples’ grubby, sweaty feet. True greatness.

John’s gospel says this: When Jesus had finished washing their feet he said, “Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.”

Jesus enters the city, and to everyone’s confusion, turns (not right towards the Roman garrison) but left into the outer court of the temple. This was the one place that non-Jews could come and be quiet and pray and meet with God.

It’s impossible to pray there though. The place is heaving with tourists pushing and shoving. You can hear the clinking of the money changers’ coins. There are market traders shouting out prices and the animals they’re selling are bleating and squawking. It’s full of noise. It smells like a badly run zoo.

No one’s getting anywhere close to meeting God in that place. Believe it or not, church can get like that sometimes. All noise and no substance; a treadmill of doing the same thing over and over again with the whole point why we do it completely forgotten. “You did not recognise the time of God’s coming to you” says Jesus.

The Bible says “draw near to God – and he’ll draw near to you.” Some people go to church week by week for years, holding the Holy Spirit at arm’s length and never once drawing near to God.

I ask myself, am I able to discern Jesus’ presence in this place today? Is this a house of prayer where my desire is to meet with God? Or is it like a den of thieves, where I’m only here for what I can get out of it?

Ending

How are you going to respond to God’s word today?

·         Is it time to come under his authority?

·         Do you need his peace and reassurance in the stress and anxieties of life?

·         Should you be laying down your arms to receive real peace?

·         Do you need to get out of the kingdom of vanity and ego today?

·         Do you want to get into the kingdom of serving others in love?

·         Is now the time to draw near to God and recognise the time of his coming to you?

Let’s pray…

Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 29th March 2015