God bless the One who comes in the name of the Lord. We bless all of you from the Temple of the Lord. The Lord is God, and He has shown kindness to us. Bind the festival sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar. (vs. 26-27)
Can you see Him, Jesus, riding across a donkey and her colt? He is coming into Jerusalem in the week before His death. "Hosanna!" the people are shouting as they wave palm branches in the air or lay them, along with their coats, on the path in front of Him. "Hosanna! Bring salvation now!"
Cannot help but think what was in our Savior's heart, because He knew the salvation He was bringing did not look the way they thought it would. They wanted a warrior. A new King David! Only mightier. The Messiah was to bring political change - radical and swift. But Jesus was a Lamb. To be bloodied on the brazen altar. Sacrifices were never bound to the altar. But He was. He understood the words of David, His earthly grandparent, several times removed. For in a short week, this Messiah would be nailed to a tree, stripped and bloody, dripping God-blood onto the earth He spoke into being.
That was not the end, of course, for the divine conspiracy was to liberate us one man and woman at a time. He made the first triumphal entry so that He could make the second....into us. However, just like the first time, it is not always what we expect. Jesus climbed down from the donkey and her colt and ripped the Temple up! Threw out what was evil. Made it clean. Turned it upside down so His Father could live in it. A holy God wants a holy tabernacle. So it should not have been so surprising when He jettisoned my pride and selfishness, humbled me by pouring mercy on my former defamation of His new temple - me. Because He loves this temple. Understands what it means for the Holy Spirit to inhabit it as the glory of the Father. Should we not expect, then, for Him to defend it yet?
They did not know, the Israelites crying out for salvation now, that it was there! Bound to a tree as if to the horns of the sacrificial altar. It did not look like victory. No Jesus beating His chest and screaming, Braveheart-like, in primal preeminence. The victory was in the death. Just as it is with those of us who love Him for it. We die so He can live. We trade the unholy sanctuary of Satan for the Temple of the Living God. When He enters in triumph, we lose the empty joys of selling our souls to the vendors of this world. But we gain a tabernacle filled with light, cleaned out and set in order. Made holy to the Lord.
The followers went and did as Jesus told them to. They brought the donkey and the colt and laid their coats on them, and Jesus sat on them. Many people spread their coats on the road. Others cut palm branches from the trees and spread them on the road. The people were walking ahead of and behind Jesus saying: "Praise to the Son of David! God bless the One Who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna to the God of heaven!" Matthew 21
Can you see Him, Jesus, riding across a donkey and her colt? He is coming into Jerusalem in the week before His death. "Hosanna!" the people are shouting as they wave palm branches in the air or lay them, along with their coats, on the path in front of Him. "Hosanna! Bring salvation now!"
Cannot help but think what was in our Savior's heart, because He knew the salvation He was bringing did not look the way they thought it would. They wanted a warrior. A new King David! Only mightier. The Messiah was to bring political change - radical and swift. But Jesus was a Lamb. To be bloodied on the brazen altar. Sacrifices were never bound to the altar. But He was. He understood the words of David, His earthly grandparent, several times removed. For in a short week, this Messiah would be nailed to a tree, stripped and bloody, dripping God-blood onto the earth He spoke into being.
That was not the end, of course, for the divine conspiracy was to liberate us one man and woman at a time. He made the first triumphal entry so that He could make the second....into us. However, just like the first time, it is not always what we expect. Jesus climbed down from the donkey and her colt and ripped the Temple up! Threw out what was evil. Made it clean. Turned it upside down so His Father could live in it. A holy God wants a holy tabernacle. So it should not have been so surprising when He jettisoned my pride and selfishness, humbled me by pouring mercy on my former defamation of His new temple - me. Because He loves this temple. Understands what it means for the Holy Spirit to inhabit it as the glory of the Father. Should we not expect, then, for Him to defend it yet?
They did not know, the Israelites crying out for salvation now, that it was there! Bound to a tree as if to the horns of the sacrificial altar. It did not look like victory. No Jesus beating His chest and screaming, Braveheart-like, in primal preeminence. The victory was in the death. Just as it is with those of us who love Him for it. We die so He can live. We trade the unholy sanctuary of Satan for the Temple of the Living God. When He enters in triumph, we lose the empty joys of selling our souls to the vendors of this world. But we gain a tabernacle filled with light, cleaned out and set in order. Made holy to the Lord.
The followers went and did as Jesus told them to. They brought the donkey and the colt and laid their coats on them, and Jesus sat on them. Many people spread their coats on the road. Others cut palm branches from the trees and spread them on the road. The people were walking ahead of and behind Jesus saying: "Praise to the Son of David! God bless the One Who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna to the God of heaven!" Matthew 21
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