Luke 19:28-40 - On Palm Sunday, Don't Mistake the King you Want for the King you Need - April 10, 2022

By all appearances and for all practical purposes, Jesus seems like he’s finally made it today. Palm Sunday is the only day in his entire life when “All Glory, Laud, and Honor” are given to him; the one and only time the crowds come to him – not looking for free food or healthcare (or to try to kill him), but to hail him as the King who comes in the name of the LORD. Today Jesus looks every bit the King he claimed to be. But there’s a caution for us on Palm Sunday: don’t mistake the King you want for the King you need.

Undeniably, Palm Sunday is very “regal,” very “royal,” isn’t it? Exhibit A: Jesus is finally acting like a king should act. Kings send their servants to do their bidding – and Jesus sends two of his disciples to retrieve a colt. Kings don’t ask for permission to use their subject’s property, they requisition it – and Jesus tells his disciples to say the Lord needs it. You may think that a donkey doesn’t appear to be a very kingly mode of transportation – Air Force One or at least a stallion might seem more appropriate – but it’s interesting to note that this is the only time in the Gospels where we hear that Jesus is riding at all; otherwise, he got where he was going the old-fashioned way: his own two feet. And when you combine this with Zechariah’s prophecy that Jerusalem’s true King would come into the city riding on a donkey (Zechariah 9:9) it’s clear that Jesus is making a statement with this mode of transportation: he was openly claiming to be the King of Jerusalem, the rightful successor of David, who would bring peace to Israel.

Exhibit B: the people went crazy. They loved it. This is what they’d been waiting centuries for. Just like cities throw parades for victorious sports teams today, the people of Jerusalem gave Jesus a welcome fit for a king. They threw their coats down, so that he rode into Jerusalem on a carpet. John says that they took palm branches and went out to meet him (John 12:13). The palm branch was like the national flag of Israel. Just as people wave the stars and stripes before the President today, so they waved their palms before their king. And this wasn’t blind or undeserved praise. Luke says the whole crowd of disciples began to praise God joyfully, with a loud voice, for all the miracles they had seen. They had seen him give the blind sight, feed thousands, defeat demons, heal lepers and, last, but certainly not least, they had seen him bring Lazarus back to life after he had been dead for four days (John 11).

Never before had Jesus received this kind of welcome. Never before had they publicly and boldly proclaimed all that Jesus had done. And, unlike before, Jesus accepts their praise. He doesn’t tell them to keep his miracles to themselves, as he had before (Luke 5:14). He didn’t turn around and go into hiding as he did after they tried to make him king after he fed the 5000 (John 6:15). He doesn’t tell them my kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36) as he would tell Pilate in a few days. In fact, Jesus tells his enemies that this praise is so fitting and necessary that if the crowds were silent the stones would cry out.

Today it looks like the baby born in a stable in Bethlehem and raised in the backwoods of Nazareth has finally lived up to the angelic hype. Finally, he has the glory, the crowds, the praise; finally, Jesus isn’t worshipped by just a few lowly peasants in rural Galilee but by a huge crowd in the capital city; finally, it seems Jesus has come to do something more effective and powerful than just preach and teach, he’s come to take power and control; finally, Jesus is acting like the king the people want.

This is the Jesus you will find proclaimed in many, if not most, churches. This is the powerful, life-changing Jesus who rescues people from their slavery to drugs and alcohol. The Jesus who came down from heaven to deliver people from the prisons of sickness and depression. The Jesus who will save your marriage, entertain and educate your children, get you that dream promotion or vacation, make sure you have more than enough money for retirement and liberate you from life’s greatest burdens: student and credit card debt. This Jesus sounds an awful lot like a politician. And doesn’t this Jesus sound great? Who wouldn’t want this kind of Jesus? This Jesus is helpful, useful, practical, and always relevant. Even the unbelieving world can get behind this Jesus.

Finally, Jesus was acting the way the people wanted him to…and that’s why that crowd grew so big so quickly – they thought he was getting ready to reestablish David’s throne in Jerusalem. Just a few verses before our text Luke tells us that because he was near Jerusalem…the people thought that the kingdom of God was going to appear at once (Luke 19:11). They were expecting Jesus to be the king they wanted; a king who would throw the Romans out of the Holy Land and restore prosperity and power to Israel. That’s the version of Jesus the world can – and does – gladly accept. No blood or suffering or cross. No Jesus who works through foolish instruments like Word, water, bread and wine. The biggest and trendiest churches wouldn’t dare mention that kind of Jesus. Why not? Because they know that this Jesus doesn’t fill seats or open wallets, they know that the world isn’t buying a crucified King.

But lest you think this is just a screed on how wrong the rest of the world is and how right we are, I have a confession to make: the Jesus the world wants…that’s the Jesus I want too. Is the same true of you? I don’t really want bloody Good Friday Jesus. I want glorious Palm Sunday Jesus. I don’t want a king who is rejected by the world, and says that the world will reject me too if I follow him (Matthew 10:22). I don’t want a Jesus who picks up a cross and then tells me that if I’m going to follow him I must pick up my own cross, too (Luke 9:23). I want a Jesus who stops at Luke 19:40. I want a superhero Jesus that I can brag about to my family and friends – not a bloody, beaten, loser Jesus who says that we must go through many troubles on our way to the kingdom of God (Acts 14:22). Isn’t it true that we often prefer the King we want over the one we need? Consider your prayer life. When you pray do you plead with Jesus to save you from God’s wrath or to save you from health issues and financial insecurity? What’s your attitude towards worship? Are you coming here with open hands to receive the gifts Jesus purchased with his blood or do you imagine that coming here is like putting coins into a divine vending machine to keep the blessings rolling out there? Perhaps the clearest and most shameful evidence is that like that first Palm Sunday this crowd – you – are here shouting praise to King Jesus in his glory, but where will this crowd – where will you – be on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday when King Jesus is betrayed and convicted and whipped and bleeds and dies? The truth is that if we want Jesus to be a King who comes to make this life and this world better, then we don’t want the real Jesus, the Jesus of the Bible. And this is more than just a mistake, this is sin, this is idolatry. It’s time to repent.

Repent for your own good; repent, change your mind about the King you want, because idol Jesus, the Jesus the world wants, the Jesus we often secretly want, won’t save anyone. There is no salvation to be found in a Jesus whose work ends at Luke 19:40. Sure, Jesus has done some wonderful miracles and preached some mesmerizing sermons and fulfilled some OT prophecies. But if Jesus’ work had stopped there, the devil would still control us, our sins would still condemn us, and we would still have every reason to fear death – because the yawning gates of hell would still be open. The Jesus who “makes” it in the world doesn’t make it as a Savior.  

It’s easy to make mistakes about Jesus on Palm Sunday because the appearances can be deceiving. He appears to march in as David’s legitimate heir who has come to be the earthly King the people want. But if you look past the palm branches and fawning crowds, you can see the real reason Jesus came. Jesus specifically sends his disciples to find a colt on which no one has ever sat. Why does that matter? In the OT, whenever there was an unsolved murder, whenever a dead body was found and no one knew who did it, God commanded the citizens of that city to find a heifer which had never been yoked, never been used for plowing, and slaughter it as an atoning sacrifice (Deuteronomy 21:1-9). They were to say atone, LORD, for your people whom you have redeemed (Deuteronomy 21:8). Through that heifer the Lord himself was atoning for the people’s guilt.  

Jesus isn’t riding into Jerusalem on a war horse to establish his kingdom on earth, he’s riding on a colt as the sacrifice for the sins of the world. He comes not to slaughter his enemies but to be slaughtered. Even as the crowds shout his praises and prepare to install him as King – he knows what really lies ahead: that he is going to be beaten, tortured and installed with nails onto a cross. He knows that the palm branches waving before him today will be replaced by the Roman whip ripping open his back. He knows that each step on that carpeted path is one step closer to Calvary where not only the religious establishment, not only the crowds, not only his disciples – but his own Father will disown him.

On Palm Sunday, it’s easy to be mistaken. It looks like Jesus comes to be the king the world wants. It looks like Jesus belongs on the throne so much that even the stones have to admit it. And the stones would. But they do not cry out today. No, when do the stones cry out? Good Friday! Only after Jesus is lifted up on the throne of the cross; only after the notice is nailed above his head identifying him as the King of the Jews (Luke 23:38); only after King Jesus has given up his spirit do the stones shake and quake and split in acknowledgement of the truth: oh, sorrow dread! God’s Son is dead! (Matthew 27:50-51 & CW 137:2)

In the end, not the Palm Sunday crowds but the Good Friday stones proclaim the King we need. We don’t need a Jesus who hangs out in a palace, we need a Jesus who hangs on a cross. A Jesus who is popular in the world wouldn’t want anything to do with you or me. We don’t have the power, the money, the looks, the talent, the charisma the world values and praises. A Jesus like that would be out of touch and out of reach for sinners like us. We need a Jesus who meets us where we are; who knows what it is to grieve and weep; who knows what it means to be weak and helpless; who is despised and hated by the world just like we are. When we are suffering, we find comfort in a King who suffers too. When we are burdened by sin and haunted by demons, we run to a King who knows sin’s burden and the devil’s fury. More than we need a King who is popular among this world’s elite, we need a King who isn’t ashamed to associate with sinners; because that’s what we are. Let the rest of the world have health and wealth and happiness Jesus; I need the Jesus who gave up his health and wealth and happiness to defeat sin, death and the devil in order to win eternal life for me.

This is the Jesus who saves the world. A Jesus who never suffered and died could save no one from death. A Jesus who is everything the world wants in a King would be no King at all – he would just be another lying politician. The world turns in disgust from this King and his wounds, his blood, his cross, his death. Nothing in the universe is more offensive to the world than Jesus the crucified King. The world might not want this Jesus who comes to Jerusalem on a donkey to die, but I do. Because there is nothing in the world I need more than for Jesus to suffer and die for my sins. May the Lord help us this Holy Week to never mistake the King we want for the King we need. Amen.