Immanuel Sermon Audio
Luke 19:28-48
We just sang that Jesus was our King, and we're about to read a passage from the Gospel of Luke that screams and yells and is like a big neon sign reminding us that Jesus is our King. Luke 19, we're going to be looking at verse 28 to the end of the chapter, so you can find that in your Bible. You can follow along on the outline that's in the bulletin. Brooke and I were gone for most of this week, and I knew that last week, which meant I knew that as we were out of town for a couple of days, I wouldn't have time to prepare for this Sunday, so I did this sermon last week. And really looked at a passage of Scripture that is very familiar to me and probably very familiar to most of you, and had an incredible time thinking about it, studying it, trying to decide what to share with you and what we just don't have time to talk about. So I hope the things that we discussed this morning help you see Jesus more clearly and help you respond to Him in a way that would honor Him. I want to talk to you about background and context before we jump into this passage that is very familiar. In Luke 951, this has been several weeks back, Luke 951, we read that Jesus set His face to go to Jerusalem. He made the intentional decision, knowing exactly what was waiting for Him in Jerusalem, the cross, to set His face to resolve in His heart to go there, knowing that when He got there, He would die for sinners, and so we've been on this journey with Jesus. He's had some of the disciples with Him, and He's had Pharisees sort of popping in and out of the scene, criticizing Him, questioning Him, trying to trap Him. We also know, not from the Gospel of Luke, but from John 1157, that at the point in the story we're at now, the order to kill Jesus has already been given. The order to arrest Jesus has already been made. And so in Luke 19, we're going to read about Jesus. Look at verse 29. He's drawing near to Bethany and Bethpage. Those are sort of suburbs, you could say, of Jerusalem. He's almost there, and He knows when He gets there what's waiting for Him, and this order to arrest Jesus has already been given, right? He's got a warrant out for His arrest. As He's marching into Jerusalem, there might as well be wanted posters all over town because all the authorities know we need to arrest this guy, we need to take Him into custody. So the order has already been given, Jesus is almost to Jerusalem, and in these verses He arrives in Jerusalem. And when you realize that, all of a sudden in Luke 19, you say, we're in the very last week of Jesus' life. We've been tracking all the way through this Gospel. We've been on this journey since Luke 951, traveling to Jerusalem. All of a sudden, this is the last seven days that He's on Earth, and here's how it plays out over the last couple of days, Sunday, Jesus enters Jerusalem. We call this the triumphal entry. He rides in on the donkey, the palm branches, the whole nine yards, you know the story. Monday, Jesus clears the temple. We're going to talk about that this morning. On Tuesday, Jesus teaches, we're going to touch on that briefly. We know nothing from the Gospels about what He did on Wednesday other than that at one point the Gospel writers tell us He was daily teaching in the temple, so probably He did more than one day of teaching, and maybe He did that on Wednesday as well. On Thursday, He's going to celebrate the Passover, and on Thursday evening after sundown, He's going to be in Gethsemane. On Friday, He's going to be tried, crucified, and buried. Saturday is quiet, and Sunday is the resurrection. You look at Luke 19, and you say, we've still got seven chapters in the Gospel of Luke. Seven chapters just to talk about these last few days in the life of Jesus Christ. At this point, as Jesus is about to come into Jerusalem, He's got about 120 hours left on the earth. The clock is ticking, and He knows it. All right, we're going to read this passage, but here's the big idea before we read it. Jesus is the king of all kings who triumphed through suffering. This sets our king apart from every other religion, every other so-called religious leader on earth, who would like to conquer by force. We've seen examples of that this week in the news. Our faith is different. Our king is different. He is the king. He's the king to rule all kings, but he conquered through suffering, not through conquest. He triumphed through suffering. So look with me at Luke 19, we'll begin reading in verse 28. When He had said these things, He went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. When He drew near to Bethpage in Bethany, at the Mount that is called Olivet, He sent two of the disciples saying, "Go into the village in front of you, we're on entering. You will find a cult tide on which no one has ever sat. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, why are you untying it, you shall say this, the Lord has need of it." So those who were sent went away and found it just as he told them. And as they were untying the cult, its owner said to them, "Why are you untying the cult?" And they said, "The Lord has need of it." They brought it to Jesus and throwing their cloaks on the cult, they set Jesus on it. And as He wrote along, they spread their cloaks on the road. As He was drawing near, already on the way down the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of His disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen, saying, "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord, peace in heaven and glory in the highest." And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Him, "Teacher, rebuke your disciples." He answered, "I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out." And when He drew near and saw the city, He wept over it, saying, "Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace, but now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. They will not leave one stone upon another in you because you did not know the time of your visitation." And He entered the temple and He began to drive out those who sold, saying to them, "It is written, 'My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers.'" And He was teaching daily in the temple. The chief priests and the scribes and the principal men of the people were seeking to destroy Him, but they did not find anything they could do for all the people were hanging on His words. Let's pray. Father, our prayer this morning is that we would hear your words, that we would hang on them, that we would not leave unchanged by them, but that we would submit our minds and our hearts and our lives to the King that we see presented in this passage. We pray for a clear picture of who Jesus is and a clear understanding of how we need to respond as His people. We pray it in Jesus' name, amen. As I told you, I have prepared this sermon a couple of weeks ago, and I spent the majority of my time thinking about what to include, what to exclude, how to present it, how to structure it, and the simplest thing, and I think the best way we can look at it this morning, is just to see Jesus, to see the King, where He's going, what He's doing. And I think the application will be obvious as we move along. So let's start off with this. I want you to see the King entering His city. It is His city. The King is entering His city. And we think about Jesus writing into Jerusalem, and what we see here, you've got to begin with Zechariah 9. This is an Old Testament prophecy, and it says, "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem. Behold," look at these words, "your King. Your King Jerusalem is coming to you, righteous and having salvation is He, humble and mounted on a donkey on a cult, the full of a donkey," Zechariah 9. That's 500 years before the verses we're looking at in Luke 19, 500 years, 500 years is a long time. The Jewish people have this prophecy ringing around in their head, among others, that their King would come writing into Jerusalem on a donkey. They studied it. They knew it. They memorized it. They prayed about it. They waited for it. The King will come writing on a donkey. When you read Zechariah 9.9, and you say, "500 years," you realize that Jesus is not just flying by the seat of His pants here in the last 120 hours He's on the earth. Everything He's doing is intentional, everything He's doing is deliberate, everything He's doing is planned. Some people look at this scenario with these people seemingly stealing a cult or a donkey as if it's some sort of miracle. I think it's something Jesus set up. I think this phrase, the Lord needs it, is some sort of code word, some sort of password He's set up. He's been in this area, He knows people in this area, and He's planning His every move now that He's down to His last week on the earth. He plans, knowing Zechariah 9.9, the King is going to write in writing on a donkey. When I get there, I've been traveling since Luke 9.51. When I get there, I'm writing in as the King, writing on a donkey. Now, in our culture, that's kind of weird. We don't think about kings writing donkeys. Look at this picture, Napoleon. It kind of loses its appeal if he's on a donkey, right? You look at that and he's hanging on, he's a bronch rider and he's got his sword there and one hand in the air, he's saying, "Ah, that's tough, that's manly, that's a king." What about in our own country, old George, on a big old horse and the horse just looks powerful and he's got his sword drawn in his side? You imagine these guys sitting on a donkey and you say, "It's not quite as intimidating. It's not quite as awe-inspiring. It's not quite as manly." Would you understand not only did Zechariah give us this prophecy that the king would come writing on a donkey, but in the ancient world, not just in Israel, but the ancient world, warring kings did ride horses like these. Kings who were at peace often rode donkeys and it wasn't a disgraceful thing, it wasn't an embarrassing thing like it would be in our society or in our culture. That's what kings did when they came in peace. Jesus is saying to Jerusalem, we'll talk about peace here in just a little bit when we get down to verse 42, Jesus is saying, "I'm not coming to conquer you. I'm not coming to slit throats and to make heads raw. I'm coming in peace and I'm coming as your king." And so he rides this donkey. You think about the audacity of what Jesus is doing, you've got to admit he's got guts. The spiritual leaders in Jerusalem have already given the order to arrest him and he knows that they want him dead. They do not believe he is who he says he is. They do not submit to his authority. And yet Jesus says, "I'm going to ride into quote unquote their town, even though you understand it's his town. I'm going to ride on to their turf on a donkey and I'm going to say to them, I'm the fulfillment. I'm the king. Zechariah 9.9 is about me. He might as well be wearing a banner that says, "I'm your king." And he comes riding into this city. It's an ironic scene though. The king, our king, the one we just sang about had to borrow a donkey to do it. He didn't even own a donkey. He didn't own an animal. He owned nothing. Our king gets ready to do what Scripture said he's going to do for 500 years. He looks around and he says, "I'm going to need to borrow somebody's animal. I don't own one." And yet you look at it from the other perspective and you say he borrowed it, he created it. It was his. It's all his. John 1-1, "Nothing has come into existence that didn't come through the Word of God Jesus Christ." He invented donkeys. They all belong to him from the first one all the way down. And yet he humbles himself as a servant and he doesn't lay claim to what is his right fully and he sends his followers to borrow an animal so that he can ride in. Look, he did not come to make heads roll. Luke 19-10, he came to seek and to save the lost. He came as a servant. And then something else strange happens. At least it's strange for our culture. He's riding this animal into Jerusalem and Luke tells us that people start rejoicing. Think in the text, it says that as he was drawing near verse 37, the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice and praise God with the loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen, verse 38. The text says saying, "But you could really use the word singing because in what follows, they're talking about a song, they're talking about a song, they're talking about Psalm 118 that says, "Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord." Now you listen to that and you say, "So Jesus is riding a borrowed animal into town and all these people just break out in song." It's almost like a Disney movie where you're plugging along and then all of a sudden all the characters are singing and they all know the words and they know the lyrics and the choreography and then it ends and you keep on with the action. It's not exactly like that but it's pretty close. This is a song they all knew. It was from their national song book. It would be like one of us starting the national anthem and you know it. You could sing along, you could join right in. And so somebody starts singing from the Old Testament, Psalm 118, a Psalm that is about Guess Who? The Messiah. They're walking with Jesus, they're putting this together. They're thinking about Zechariah 9, they see him riding up and somebody says, "I think he's the one. I think this is it. This is the moment we've been waiting for." And they start singing this Psalm altogether. Not only that but look at the text, verse 38, "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord." That's from Psalm 118. But look what else they say, "Peace in heaven and glory in the highest." If you read that anywhere in Luke, it's the angels from Luke 2. They're singing about what the angels sing about when Jesus was born and they're putting all of these pieces together, they're trying to make sense of it. And all the while the Pharisees are watching. Now put yourself in the shoes of the Pharisees, you know Jesus is in the area. You've had your little meetings and your planning sessions and you've come up with the plan, we are going to arrest him. And Luke tells us right here at the end of our passage, verse 47, "They were seeking to destroy him." They didn't want to find him, they didn't want to lock him in prison. They wanted to destroy Jesus and they're watching. And here comes Jesus, writing on a donkey, and everybody knows Zechariah 9.9. He's saying to everyone around, "I'm your king. You want to murder me, but I have the right to rule over you." And as they're coming up, all of these people start singing. They break out in Psalm 118 and they're so furious, they're so enraged, but they're so cowardly that they don't make their move on Jesus and instead they say what? Tell your disciples to zip it and Jesus answers what the classic line, if these were silent the very stones would cry out. This is what all of history has been waiting for, not just my disciples, not just you, not just Jerusalem. This is what it's all been pointing up to. If they aren't going to sing about it, the rocks are going to sing about it. It is an interesting scene when you think about the fact that we call it the triumphal entry. I don't know what comes into your mind when you think about triumph. But that phrase, the triumphal entry, it's borrowed from something that the Romans did. And this is not a photograph, but it's a picture of what a Roman triumph might have looked like. You can see the Colosseum in the background and the big powerful horses and they're carrying the emblems of war and they're all decked out in their military uniforms. When an army in Rome would come back from battle, there would be a parade. They would triumph or they would proceed parade through the streets of Rome. And it would be a big deal. There would be shows of military power and shows of force and they would be carrying the spoils of war behind them and slaves would be drugged behind them and everyone would look impressive and clean and nice and showing off all their possessions and their weapons and their stuff. That's a triumph. There are some countries in the world that have military parades like this to show force, but in our society, we don't do it so much in military parades anymore. We do it in sports, right? Parades of triumph. Look at these pictures. These are Kansas City Royals. I hate to rub this in to Ranger fans, but the Royals won the World Series. And they had a triumph parade. At this parade, more people came to celebrate than people that live in Kansas City. There's a lot of folks there and they fill the streets and they ride in fancy cars and they clap and they celebrate and it's so important. They have a stage set up and there's masses of people, Jesus, the triumphal entry, a poor Jewish rabbi, riding a borrowed animal with no saddle up in Jerusalem and a ragtag bunch of people, about half the folks there singing and about half the folks there wanting dead. It's a strange scene when you think about it and it reminds you that Jesus is the king of all kings, but he didn't come to Jerusalem in this story to conquer. He came to suffer and he triumphed through suffering. Moving a little bit quicker, I want you to see the king lamenting his people. Luke tells us that Jesus looked over Jerusalem and he wept. The verb there is "clio." It does not mean he was misty-eyed. It does not mean he had a lump in his throat. It doesn't mean that he had a tear coming down his cheek. It means he was weeping. He looks over this city and Luke says he's weeping. Twice the gospels tell us that Jesus does this. You remember the other one. It's at the tomb of Lazarus. If you've ever been challenged to memorize a scripture verse, this is the verse you went with, right? Gospel to John, chapter 11, Jesus wept. So easy. He wept. He wept when he stood at the tomb of a friend and he saw the consequences of sin, death. He took all of that in and he thought about what his future was going to look like, Jesus's and he wept. Now Luke says he looks over his people, Jerusalem. It's not just a city, it's not just buildings, it's his people. He looks at these religious leaders who want to arrest him and who want to murder him and their hearts are hard. He has blinded them and Luke says that as he looks over these people, he weeps. He also talks about some dark days for Jerusalem. He says some scary stuff here. Let me just tell you one lesson. As Jesus starts talking about enemies and barricades and surrounding you and tearing you to the ground and your children with you, not one stone left on another, here's a lesson. Sin always has consequences, always. You can pick your sin, but you don't get to pick your consequences. In the Jewish leaders, the religious establishment blinded by their own sin, hardened their hearts towards their king. And what Jesus is saying here in Luke 19 is that moves me to tears, but you need to know there are consequences coming. And the consequence came about 40 years later, in the year 70 AD, when the emperor of Rome, a man named Titus, marched into Jerusalem. There's an ancient carving of Roman soldiers hauling off articles from the temple and marched into the city. When they marched back to Rome, Titus built this arch. If you've been to Rome, maybe some of you guys have seen this, it's called the arch of Titus. And the arch depicts on the carvings, on the engravings, his victory in Jerusalem among other places really happened. One Jewish historian tells us that when they besieged the city and they breached the walls and they got into Jerusalem, they flattened the temple. Not one stone was left on another, just like Jesus said. And according to one Jewish historian named Josephus, 1.1 million people were killed in the siege. That's a number that's hard to fathom. You say maybe he was exaggerating. Maybe he was. That's a lot of people. 1.1 million people killed in this siege, 70 AD, and Jesus is saying right here, before he ever dies on the cross, before he ever makes it into the city, he's looking over his people, their hearts are hard, they're blinded by sin, and he's weeping for them. He's weeping because they're rejecting him as king, but he's also weeping because he understands better than you and I that sin always has consequences, and he knows what's coming for these people. Once you see the king cleansing the temple, Luke moves on in verse 45, says Jesus entered the temple and he began to drive out those who sold. This is on Monday. On Sunday he rides into Jerusalem, now we're on Monday. John chapter 2 tells us that Jesus did this a few years earlier. He went in. John 2 is the incident, you may remember where Jesus made a whip and drove the people out of the temple. So he's done this before. It's happened just a few years earlier, but now he comes into Jerusalem on Monday and Luke says he drives out those who are buying and selling. He flips over their tables. I can't tell you how many times I've heard folks say this means you shouldn't sell anything in the church building. You shouldn't have a garage sale. You shouldn't have a yard sale. You shouldn't have a fundraiser. You shouldn't have this. Let me explain what's going on. Every year these Jewish people would come on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover and about a month before the Passover all throughout Jewish territory, booths would be set up. They're tax booths and these booths are set up a month earlier to say if you're not going to the Passover, you still have to pay the temple tax. One half shekel had to be paid in the exact amount in shekels, not Roman coins, not Greek coins, not Egyptian coins in a shekel. So they set these booths up and they say, look, if you're not going to travel, you pay it here at the booth. Every Jewish male pays the temple tax every year, half a shekel. But a lot of them were going to travel to Jerusalem, so they wouldn't pay it at the booth. They would want to pay it when they got to Jerusalem. The problem is in their day they had lots of different coins. It's not like in the United States we only used dollars. They just sort of used whatever was floating around and so they had Egyptian money. They had Greek money. They had Roman money. They had all these different coins, all of this different currency. And when they got there, they had to have a half shekel. So somebody came up with the idea and said, we need to help these pilgrims. We need to exchange their money. We should keep a bunch of half shekels here and when they come, we swap them out. It's a good idea. The problem is people were involved and eventually they said, not only should we help them out, but we should help ourselves out. We should make a little bit of money off this. And they charged high rates and they ripped people off and they took advantage of folks. The people selling animals did the same thing. These pilgrims, coming to Jerusalem, had to offer a lamb for the Passover sacrifice. Well, who wants to travel by foot with a lamb, all the miles dusty roads to Jerusalem? Why not just take the money in your pocket and buy a lamb when you got there? That's a great plan. They knew it was a great plan. So the price of the lambs went through the roof. It's sort of like when you go to the movies, right? You can't take anything in with you. Don't be the person that cheats. And you get in the line and you say, okay, I just paid seven bucks to see the movie and I'm about to pay 18 bucks for a bucket of popcorn. In a Coke that cost you about a nickel, you're selling to me for $6.50. What are you going to do? You're going to buy it. It's like when you go to a sporting event, go to the cowboys game or the Rangers game, they're selling hot dogs, they're selling drinks, they're selling whatever, and they're not selling them at a discount. They know they got you. They knew they had the pilgrims. And Jesus walks into the middle of that and he says, look, this is way different than a football game or a movie. These are people coming to worship God. And you've got them at a disadvantage and you're taking advantage of them and manipulating them. And so Jesus walks in, picture the scene, if you can fathom this. He walks onto the turf of the people who want to murder him and he knows they want to murder him. And he walks right into the middle of their neighborhood and he takes those tables and he flips them over. And he doesn't escort people out, he drives them out. This is Jesus the bouncer clearing the temple, grabbing guys by the ear, pulling them by the nose, by whatever it takes. He's driving these people out of here, flipping their tables over, causing an incredible scene right in the middle of the place where the Pharisees are in charge and the Sadducees are in charge and the scribes are in charge. And they already want to kill him. What do you think they want to do now? They're furious, but Jesus goes in and he clears the temple. Lastly, number four, I want you to see the king teaching his gospel. When you go from verse 46 to verse 47, you're moving from Monday to Tuesday. Here's the temple on a Monday, he's now teaching on a Tuesday. That means he's got about 80 hours left, three days to the cross. When a man knows that he has three days left on earth, you can expect him unless he's a fool to be involved in important things, 80 hours. 30 years of life leads up to now you've got three days left. What are you going to do, Luke says, verse 47, he was teaching daily in the temple. What's he teaching? We're going to see some of it over the next few weeks, he tells some stories, he corrects some misunderstandings, he challenges the religious leaders in several different ways. But maybe the best summary of what Jesus taught from the beginning to the end of his ministry is in the gospel of Mark, chapter one. After John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe the gospel. That's a summary of what Jesus taught in his life. Yes, he used parables, yes, he told stories, yes, he did this and that. But the overarching message is this, the kingdom is come, that means I'm the king and you need to repent and believe the gospel. The Pharisees did not want to hear that, they did not want to hear it. They killed Jesus for preaching it. I wonder, do churches today want to hear it? Is that what they want to hear? Don't answer this out loud, but when you come to church on Sunday morning, you come to hear the preaching of the word, you come to hear it taught in your Sunday school classes. What are you wanting to hear? I think if you just look at some churches, you would say, well, what they are hearing and what they're going to hear is sort of life tips. You know what I'm talking about? That's the cool thing for preachers today is to say, I'm going to preach a series on how to have a better family, then I'm going to preach a series on how to have a better bank account, then I'm going to preach a series on how to have a better this, then I'm going to have a preach a series four weeks on how to have a better this, and you just go to that and it's just sort of life tips. It's just sort of self-help. Here's how to make your life better. Jesus shows up when he's preaching and the summary of what he has to say is, I'm the king, the kingdom has come, you need to repent and believe the gospel. That's what you need to hear from Jesus. I'm not sure a lot of churches want to hear that today. I'm not sure that you and I always want to hear that from Jesus. I think sometimes we have in our minds, we need to hear something more applicable to daily life, something more practical, more helpful. Jesus is saying, what can be more helpful than the Son of Man coming to seek you and save you when you're lost? What could be more helpful than me telling you who I truly am and what has happened in my coming and what you need to do in response, repent and believe the gospel. The good news about Jesus is not life tips. It's not given to us in the Old and the New Testament in story form so that we can learn life lessons from David, how to be courageous so that we can see how to be brave from Daniel, how to be a faithful person from Noah. It's given to us to say, God is going to send a king, he sent him, he's calm, the kingdom is here, repent and believe the gospel, and not only does the gospel tell us that, but the gospel says not only did he come once, but he's coming back again. Revelation 19, the end of the story says the king is coming back. The first time he came, he did not come to conquer. He came to suffer. He triumphed through suffering. Revelation 19 is pretty clear that when he comes back again, it's going to look a lot more like that parade in Kansas City or a lot more like a Roman triumph parade than it did the first time. And you're going to look it up and read it, it says that Jesus is not coming on a donkey next time. He's coming on a horse and he's coming with a sword out of his mouth and he's coming in a robe that is drenched in blood and he's coming with the armies of heaven behind him and he's coming to conquer his enemies. That's part of what we believe about our king. When we sing, like we did earlier and we say, we have no other king than Jesus. It means we look back to the cross and we say, our king suffered for me at the cross. He came to seek me and save me, Luke 19, 10. It also means we look forward and we say, our only hope is that our king is coming back. And he's not coming back to be a pushover, he's not coming back to suffer, he's coming back to win, he's coming back to conquer, he's coming back to rule. And when you understand that that's the story that we're talking about in this book, it's not life tips. It's a story about a king who was promised, who came and who promised to come back. The most helpful thing I can say to you, the best life tip I can give you is the kingdom is come, the king is Jesus, repent and believe the gospel. Let me pray for you. Father, we thank you that you have kept the promises that you made to your people, that you made through Zechariah, that you made through the psalmist, that you made all the way back as far as Eden, that you sent someone to save us, to deliver us, that our king has come. And we believe that his name is Jesus, we believe that he lived for us and he died for us and he rose from the dead, and we believe that he's coming back. Father, my only prayer for the people in this room is that they understand the truth of who Jesus is, that they repent of their sin, that they remove anything in their life that stands between them and Jesus and that they believe. They believe that Jesus is who he said he is, that he did what he said he came to do and that he will come back for his people. Father, we pray for your grace to change us. We pray for grace to help us submit to our king. We know that that comes naturally for no one, so we pray that you would help us to do that. And we pray that you would be honored as we sing praises to Jesus this morning. We love you, we're amazed and in awe of your grace and your faithfulness. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.