Read Luke 19:28-40… if you read chapter 18 and the 1st part of 19 you will get more of the ‘flavor’ of this passage. But let me set the stage (so to speak):
v.28-40 detail Jesus’ continuing journey toward Jerusalem. These verses take place sometime after Jericho events such as Blind Bartimaus and the salvation of Zaccheus… and with the way verse 28 begins it seems as if it happens immediately following Jesus’ story/ parable about the faithful and wicked servants…
So we have the stage set for this part of the passage…
The WHO is Jesus and His traveling entourage
The WHERE is between Jericho and Jerusalem
The WHAT is Jesus’ mission and purpose being fulfilled (but that is NOT what the disciples thought… the WHAT for them was the immediate establishment of an earthly kingdom with Jesus ruling as the Messiah they had always been taught about…)
The WHEN is just prior to Jesus’ crucifixion, this immediately precedes Palm Sunday which is the Sunday prior to Easter/Resurrection…
The WHY is two fold…for Jesus it is His mission, His purpose, His driven obedience to the Father. For the disciples it is self-serving interest in becoming part of an earthly kingdom.
The HOW is again focused on Jesus’ understanding of what His mission is, and the intentionality of His journey. His determination to stay obedient and focused on the Father drives Him toward Jerusalem.
The atmosphere surrounding this event and how the people around Jesus felt was electric. About the only contemporary equivalent would be MAYBE a political party at their convention ‘crowning’ the candidate of their choice! It is a party atmosphere… and all are looking fwd to great change and something wonderful to happen. Of these people, only Jesus fully understand what was truly happening!
Jesus is on task, focused and determined to remain obedient to God’s plan and is about to reach Jerusalem. He stops near a town outside of Jerusalem and asks His disciples to do a strange thing… he asks them to basically take a donkey that does not belong to them!
What is the significance of the colt? Why one that has never been sat upon? Someone read Zechariah 9:9 for me
9 Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
This would have resonated loud and clear with the disciples AND with whomever would witness Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. This symbolic donkey ride taken by Jesus was proclaiming His kingship, although the kingdom He proclaimed was not the one these people were expecting… the throne He would sit upon was NOT in Jerusalem, but it was an eternal and heavenly throne… far greater than they could ever imagine!
The fact that it is a young colt that has never been sat upon could be a reference to
Numbers 19:2 [ESV]
This is the statute of the law that the LORD has commanded: Tell the people of Israel to bring you a red heifer without defect, in which there is no blemish, and on which a yoke has never come.
Deut 21:3 [ESV]
And the elders of the city that is nearest to the slain man shall take a heifer that has never been worked and that has not pulled in a yoke.
It carries with it a reference to the purity of the animal, for only a pure and undefiled animal is worthy to carry the Savior of the world!
What about the fact that they are taking a colt that does not belong to them. Was Jesus asking His disciples to ‘steal’? Were they ‘imposing’ a hardship onto the owner of this animal, was Jesus taking advantage of them?
Well the answer is NO… to all the above! You see, in 1st century times the culture would allow and even encourage people to ‘allow’ the use of their livestock to a major religious or political figure, this was called angaria.
ANGARIA was the custom that was developed from an ancient law/custom that has Greek, Babylonian, Persian and Roman influence… Originally it referred to a postal system of sorts where stationed riders at strategic places along the main road!
These men had the job to take royal dispatches to their needed destinations. Because theirs was such an important task, custom or even LAW dictated that they would have the authority to ‘obtain’ transportation when needed… if they needed an animal, they would simply tell the owner who they were and they could take it…
In this time in Jewish history this custom had evolved into a sort of badge of honor for whoever was asked for their livestock to be used… Jesus uses this custom to procure this animal… so there is NO theft here; it was a fully acceptable procedure.
Also the fact that Jesus tells them exactly what is going to happen and then it happens in that manner… only serves to strengthen their faith in Him and trust in His divinity!
So we have a colt given freely… a colt of pure and undefiled identity! This colt is brought to Jesus and the people place Jesus on the colt, but not before they take their cloaks and form a saddle for Jesus…
Then as the colt begins to proceed toward the city, people begin to lay their cloaks in the road for the colt to walk upon. This draws the same picture we find in 1 Kings 1:33 when David has the priest go and find Solomon to anoint him king… in that case the animal is a mule, but in this case it is a donkey
33 And the king said to them, "Take with you the servants of your lord and have Solomon my son ride on my own mule, and bring him down to Gihon.
This act of laying out their garments in front of Jesus gives this very excited time… this very energetically charged event the ‘red carpet’ feel… Jesus is being swept into the public eye in a grand fashion…
They cry out “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!” Yet another gesture of royalty by these people who came pouring into the city!
But not all who witnessed this event were impressed; in fact there are some who were fairly disturbed and angry over the situation. Let’s read Luke 19:39-40 [ESV]
39 And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, "Teacher, rebuke your disciples." 40 He answered, "I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out."
The religious leaders were indignant and jealous of the attention Jesus was receiving, and they show their disgust in coming right up to Jesus and demanding that He put a stop to such nonsense…
They use the phrase, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!” The Greek syntax is important here as the leaders use a Aorist Imperative in their command to Jesus… this tense of the verb is a command… not a request!
In other words, they came up to Jesus, probably while still on the colt, and DEMANDED He cease and desist this terrible and shameless display! SHUT ‘EM UP is what they told Jesus! Jesus was not asked politely to keep it down, or try to hold things down… He was told straight up that he had better stop all the foolishness!
The response Jesus gives is CLASSIC and a tad bit sarcastic. Jesus does not listen to their demand for silence. For too long Jesus had silenced anyone from telling others about WHO He was… every time He healed and whenever the disciples garnered another nugget of truth about His identity, Jesus would warn them NOT to tell it to anyone!
Do you remember Peter’s confession of Christ as the Son of God? Jesus told Peter that his assessment of Jesus was right, and that God had revealed that to Him, but it was not time to share that with the world just yet so keep it to himself for now…
But now at this time, Jesus knows that it is time for His arrival and proclamation of who He is… although He knows that many will misunderstand this and within a week many have turned on Him and call for His death…
But here and now, the crowd was fanatical about cheering on Jesus, about telling ALL who Jesus was… about proclaiming the Lordship of Jesus and the Kingdom of Heaven! And when the religious leaders call on Jesus to make them stop… His answer both surprises them and angers them!
Jesus said, “look if I could get them to stop… the inanimate things of creation would start it back up!” I can imagine Jesus looking into the eyes of that religious leader and seeing His determined resistance to Jesus…
So Jesus lets him know that even IF all these people refused to acknowledge Him as Lord… it would not stop because Creation itself would reach out and rejoice and praise God. Jesus uses the rocks as an example… cold, lifeless, rocks that can NEVER have the opportunity to speak… even they could and would cry out if these people rejected him!
When I read this passage I can see many things we need to remember:
The 1st thing I can see is that God is in control!
Jesus was focused and determined and fully in control of His approach to Jerusalem…
The 2nd thing I can see is that God calls for our obedience even when we can’t understand HOW it can be done!
Sometimes God leads us to do things and go places and we cannot make sense of it OR it seems out of character for us OR it can make us feel uncomfortable…
The 3rd thing I can see is that when the disciples were obedient, God delivered on His promise.
However, when God leads and guides, and when we are submissive and surrender to His leadership, He has promised He will deliver and the Bible is filled with story after story of God making good on the promises He has made… But obedience is the key to blessing!
The 4th thing we can see in this passage is God’s plan will upset human desires…
Not all people… in fact MOST humans will not be comfortable with the plans of God. The religious leaders were upset because this was upsetting the order of things and they were losing influence and position in the eyes of the people! It was about THEM…
When we focus on ourselves and what is in it for us, we are NEVER going to be comfortable with God’s plan for our life! It is going to seem highly outrageous to us and we are NOT going to like it!
In fact many of us are just like those religious leaders in that we will ask God to cease and desist His urging and calling on our life…
And God’s answer to US today is the same response that Jesus gave the religious leaders… if you won’t do it… creation itself will bend over backward to do it for me… It is God’s invitation to join in, but it is NOT His strong arm forcing us to do what He desires!
