The King Has Come

Throughout His three-year ministry on earth, Jesus had been preparing His disciples for His giving His life and even His resurrection. However, as with much of what He said, they didn’t seem to hear or understand what He was saying.

As His final days upon the earth approached, the Lord spoke more about His impending sacrifice. However, as the feasts of Unleavened Bread and Passover approached, the apostles didn’t treat the holidays any differently then anyone else. For them, it was all about the associated activities and traditions.

However, things were much different for Jesus, as He was focused on what He would do at the end of the week, to pay for the sins of the world, and to overcome death and the grave.

The account of Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem on what has become known as Palm Sunday, is so important, that it was reported on by each of the four Gospel writers.

The Lord and His apostles headed from Galilee to Jerusalem, along with approximately two million other Jews, since Passover, since is was mandatory for Jewish males to attend the four main feast days each year, with Passover being the main feast day.

Even at this time, in the days leading up to Passover, Jesus was preparing his apostles, but not for Passover, but for what He was about to do.

1 Jesus Makes Preparation

God never does anything carelessly, or in a reactionary manner, but always meticulously makes precise preparations.

Matthew 21:1-3

Jesus and His apostles had gone from Galilee to the village of Bethany, approximately 2 miles from Jerusalem. They’re staying in Bethany wasn’t surprising, since it was where His good friends, Lazarus, Martha, and Mary lived.

Under normal circumstances, Jesus would have walked the two miles, but this day wasn’t to be normal.

On the road between Bethany and Jerusalem was the village of Bethpage, which would play a significant part in this account, as Jesus told two of His disciples to go into the village where they would see a donkey and its colt tied. They were to untie and bring them to Him. He then said if anyone asked what they were doing, they were to say “The Lord has need of them”.

This pictures how the Lord makes preparations and grants favor, when we are serving Him.

2 Prophetic Fulfillment

Matthew 21:4-5

By riding a donkey into Jerusalem, Jesus would fulfil the prophesy of how the Messiah would appear to His people:

Zechariah 9:9

Conquering rulers would frequently ride into town upon a white horse, signifying bot the victory they had won, and that there would now be peace.

However, on very rare occasions, a victorious ruler might choose to ride a donkey, which would picture their humility, and that they weren’t going to subjugate the people.

By riding a donkey into the city, Jesus was foretelling how in just a few days, He would conquer, sin, death and the grave.

But that was far from the only prophesy being pointed to on that day.

Long before, the prophet Daniel had prophesied “seventy weeks” which had been determined for the nation of Israel.

The “weeks” were not literal weeks, but rather “weeks” of years, in other words, seventy “sevens”.

Here’s just a portion of Daniel’s prophecy regarding those weeks of years:

Daniel 9:25-26

Verse 25 refers to the number of years being determined from the decrees to release the Jews from captivity in Babylon, to the rebuilding of the temple, and to the rebuilding of the city wall and gates.

The verse mentions the appearance of the Messiah:

Daniel 9:25b

Therefore, there was no doubt that Jesus was showing Israel that He was indeed Messiah and their King, and by choosing to ride in on a donkey, the Lord was coming in humility.

In addition to the Lord presenting Himself as Messiah, the next verse showed His death, which would come that same week:

Daniel 9:26a

As seen in that verse, Jesus was not slain because of His sins, but for those of the world:

John 1:29

3 Jesus’ Triumphal Entrance

Because the population of Jerusalem had greatly increased during the time leading up to the two consecutive feasts, the roads leading into the city would have been quite filled as well. Therefore, there would have been large numbers of people seeing Jesus making His entrance into Jerusalem that day:

Matthew 21:6-9

Large numbers of the multitude began acting in what would have been quite an unusual manner for Israelites, has they laid their clothes on the road, and cut down palm branches and spread them on the road:

Matthew 21:8

Their actions may be broken down in two ways:

• When a conquering king would enter a city, the people would frequently place their clothes on the path the leader would ride upon, thus signifying they were submitting to him.
• The second aspect was quite compelling, as Herod had planted numerous palm trees along the roads leading to his opulent palace in Jerusalem. He was attempting to beautify what was an austere road mountainous road leading into the city. By cutting down palm fronds and placing them on the road before Jesus, the people were both showing their submission to Jesus as their ruler, and their rejection of Herod’s rule.

The people loudly proclaimed what Jesus had prophesied centuries before:

Psalm 118:25-26

The word translated as “Hosanna” comes from the Hebrew word < hôšî‘âh nā’> which can be translated as “save, we pray”.

Yet, despite those words, it was evident most of the people didn’t either understand the significance, or truly believe what they were saying, because in just a few days, they were declaring they wanted Jesus crucified.

It’s a sad picture of outward profession, lacking the inward conviction.

As seen in Daniel 9:26, the Messiah would be “cutoff” meaning Jesus would die at Calvary a few days after His triumphal entry. That pointed to another major prophetic event in Daniel’s passage, as it “paused” the seventy-week clock, and it has been paused for over two-thousand years. When the church is raptured, the seven-year Great Tribulation period will begin, which will re-start the seventy-week clock with the seventieth and final week.