RECOGNIZE THE KING
(All my sermons use illustrations found on www.sermoncentral.com and all scripture is NIV unless otherwise noted)
I have often wondered how many people would recognize Jesus if He were to walk amongst us today? Now I know that Jesus is “with us,” but that is not what I am talking about. I mean if Jesus was to return for a visit. Not the 2nd coming of Christ described in scripture; then all people will recognize Him. His triumphant return will not be doubted by anyone. What I am saying is, if Christ were to come and shop at Wal-Mart one afternoon, how many of us would know Him? If He were to eat at the Pizza Ranch, how many of us would bow at the salad bar? If He were to sit in the back row of service this morning, how many of us would recognize the King?
Have you ever been looking for someone in a crowd? Perhaps you’ve been to pick someone up at the airport, or been met yourself when you’ve gone to visit someone you haven’t seen for a long time. Think of the moment when you finally make eye contact with the person you are looking for. Suddenly, out of all the people gathered in that place at that time you make a personal connection with someone that you know and who knows you! You run up to them and embrace them. Any doubts – would they be there? Would they know you? – all such questions disappear as they turn their face towards you.
This morning I want to look at a passage of scripture that tells the story of a King who enters a city and although it seems the people recognize Him, they truly do not. It is a story of people who are looking for something they want, rather then what they need, and because of their endless greed and selfishness, they miss a real King who offers a far greater gift then they seek. If you have your Bibles with you this morning, please turn with me to Luke 19:28-44 and follow along with what should be a familiar story.
Luke 19:28-44 After Jesus had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. 29 As he approached Bethphage and Bethany at the hill called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples, saying to them, 30 "Go to the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31 If anyone asks you, 'Why are you untying it?' tell him, 'The Lord needs it.'" Those who were sent ahead went and found it just as he had told them. 33 As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, "Why are you untying the colt?" 34 They replied, "The Lord needs it." 35 They brought it to Jesus, threw their cloaks on the colt and put Jesus on it. 36 As he went along, people spread their cloaks on the road. 37 When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen: 38 "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!" "Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!" 39 Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, "Teacher, rebuke your disciples!" 40 "I tell you," he replied, "if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out." 41 As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it 42 and said, "If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace-but now it is hidden from your eyes. 43 The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. 44 They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you."
PRAYER
This passage is known as the Triumphal Entry, and although we see people spreading out their clothing, as some kind of red carpet for the King, it is Jesus that shows us that the people do NOT recognize Him for the King He truly is, He says in verse 42 that it is hidden from their eyes.
This morning let us take a little closer look at this story of what we call “Palm Sunday.”
I. EYE’S WIDE SHUT
I feel fairly sure that not everyone there was thrilled that Jesus was entering Jerusalem riding on the back of a donkey. His humble entry was predicted in the Old Testament, Zech 9:9 Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
The King comes to you, righteous and having salvation, GENTLE. They recognize A KING, but fail to see THE KING. They expect something they want and therefore miss what they could have.
As Jesus comes closer to Jerusalem, He begins to take charge and direct events. Near Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, He tells His followers to go get an animal for entry into the capital, He tells them if anyone asks tell them that the Lord needs it. This is not really that unusual because in this time a dignitary could procure use of property for personal use and this right was extended to Rabbis as well. So the disciples do as they are commanded and everything happens just as Jesus said it would. As He enters the city the scripture tells us that His followers, His disciples lay their clothes on the path of the donkey, much like a red carpet would be rolled out for someone very important today. The people of the city of Jerusalem would follow the disciples lead, much like people today would check out a crowd gathering around a celebrity. They had their eyes wide shut, they did not know anything about the King that was entering their city and this would truly become evident in just a few days. These same people would listen to the teaching of the King, which would worry the Pharisee’s and the chief priests, and then they would shout in one voice for the crucifixion of Christ (Luke 23:18) They just couldn’t see what the Lord was going to do for them. They had in mind one thing, and when the crowd began to fog over their ideas of the King, they followed the crowd.
So many times we do the same thing. We walk into obstacles and have our EYE’S WIDE SHUT.
It was a fog-shrouded morning, July 4, 1952, when a young woman named Florence Chadwick waded into the water off Catalina Island. She intended to swim the channel from the island to the California coast. Long-distance swimming was not new to her; she had been the first woman to swim the English Channel in both directions.
The water was numbingly cold that day. The fog was so thick she could hardly see the boats in her party. Several times sharks had to be driven away with rifle fire. She swam more than 15 hours before she asked to be taken out of the water. Her trainer tried to encourage her to swim on since they were so close to land, but when Florence looked, all she saw was fog. So she quit. . . only one-mile from her goal.
Later she said, "I’m not excusing myself, but if I could have seen the land I might have made it." It wasn’t the cold or fear or exhaustion that caused Florence Chadwick to fail. It was the fog.
Many times we too fail, not because we’re afraid or because of the peer pressure or because of anything other than the fact that we lose sight of the goal. Maybe that’s why Paul said, "I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 3:14).
Two months after her failure, Florence Chadwick walked off the same beach into the same channel and swam the distance, setting a new speed record, because she could see the land.
But it didn’t stop there, the scripture says this morning that the whole crowd of disciples began to sing praises to God, they had seen the miracles he had done. They said “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” Yet there were some there who did not shout praise to God, and told Jesus to tell His followers to quiet themselves, to rebuke them. Yet. Jesus knew that if the followers did not shout His praise “even the stones would cry out.”
II. EMPTY PRAISE
But, it was empty praise, for the same people would shout in one voice to have Jesus put to death. Empty praise is something we should be able to associate with, it happens all the time in the world we live in. It is a form of unfaithfulness and selfishness we truly see in our culture today. We have good things to say about others as long as we are getting what we want from them. We see it in the polls we do on Presidents, we see it with sports teams, we see it in marriage and we see it in church. As long as people are doing what we want them to, as long as they are serving our needs we will sing their praise, BUT, one slip and we move on to something better.
I have seen this in so many Christian walks. People who will serve the church and who love Christ as long as things are going good. But when things get difficult, or when the timing is not to their liking, they move on to something else.
We can get victory over hardships by singing praise to the Lord. "My mouth is filled with Your praise...all day long." Ps. 71:8 NAS
Roger Bennett, pianist and songwriter died in 2007. Prior to his death he wrote on his website: Our enemy stalks us exactly the way the Bible describes, as a roaring lion. He hides in the bushes waiting for any sign of weakness. Then he strikes. He didn't strike me physically. He struck a more critical part -- my joy...confidence...and hope. Every thought turned towards heaven bounced back like it was made of brass. Every time I tried to look on the bright side, I ended up imagining a dark future. Then he threw his most effective dart -- doubt. "You call yourself a Christian. What a hypocrite! You're more afraid than ever...more filled with despair. So much for your faith, Mr. Gospel Singer!" I believed every thing he said. I tried everything I knew to pull out of it...I thought if I dozed off it would pass...but the clock seemed to move in slow motion. Sleep was nowhere near. I tried to lose myself in the Bible, but the words blurred and I couldn't make sense of them."
Then Bennett had an epiphany, as he thought about Paul and Silas in prison. "They didn't despair," he wrote: "They sang praises and that became their weapon. One after another...old songs came to me and I sang them to my empty room. It wasn't a great performance, but it may be the most powerful blessing I've received." The Palmist wrote, "My mouth is filled with Your praise...all day long.
The disciples had accepted Jesus as the promised King through whom God had been working with great power, as evidenced by miracles. In Him was peace and glory, the evidence of authority from heaven. The leadership, on the other hand, sees the claims as exaggerated, even as something Jesus himself should not accept. We as readers of Luke’s Gospel are asked to choose a side, Jesus says that even nature knows His claims are real. This passage makes us think, it begs us to decide for ourselves where we place Jesus, “Is He the Humble KING of peace or not?”
The disciples believe Him to be, and nature would back them up, BUT is it empty praise that changes when the going gets tough? We know that it is for Peter, who just a few chapters, (several days later) will promise to go to prison or even death with Jesus, but falls to the pressure of the culture. Is our praise real, or only untested? Will we stand in the gap when things get tough, and never give up, or is our praise really empty? Do we get going when the going gets tough, or do we turn and run?
A woman took her husband to the doctor’s office. After his checkup, the doctor said, "Your husband is suffering from a very serious infection." The husband, who was hard of hearing said, "What did he say?" His wife said, "He says your sick". The doctor went on. "But there is hope. You just need to reduce his stress. Each morning, give him a healthy breakfast. Be pleasant, nice, and kind. For lunch and dinner make him his favorite meal. Don’t discuss your problems with him, it will only make his stress worse. Don’t yell at him or argue with him. And most importantly...just cater to your husband’s every whim. If you can do this for your husband for the next 6 months to a year, I think your husband will have a complete recovery." The husband said, "What did he say?" His wife said, "He says, You’re going to die".
Is our praise REAL or EMPTY? We have a God who understands our pain first hand. John Stott wrote, “I could never believe in God, if it were not for the cross… In the real world of pain, how could one worship a God who was immune to it? I have entered many Buddhist temples in different Asian countries and stood respectfully before the statue of Buddha, his legs crossed, arms folded, eyes closed, the ghost of a smile playing round his mouth, a remote look on his face, detached from the agonies of the world. But each time after a while I have had to turn away. And in imagination I have turned instead to that lonely, twisted, tortured figure on the cross, nails through hands and feet, back lacerated, limbs wrenched, brow bleeding from thorn-pricks, mouth dry and intolerably thirsty, plunged in God-forsaken darkness. That is the God for me! He laid aside his immunity to pain. He entered our world of flesh and blood, tears and death. He suffered for us. Our sufferings become more manageable in light of his. There is still a question mark against human suffering, but over it we boldly stamp another mark, the cross which symbolizes divine suffering.”
III. RECOGNIZE THE KING
As Jesus approached the city of Jerusalem, he wept! Jesus cried because He knew that they did not recognize that God came to visit. He knew that the city of Jerusalem would suffer because they had their EYE’S WIDE SHUT, and they were EMPTY in the praise. The problem is that Jesus did not deliver a worldly takover at the time that He came to visit the world. He suffered and died for our sins, but He did not deliver the Jews from the Roman government and that is what they wanted.
Muhammad was born in A.D. 570 in Mecca, an important trading town in what is now Saudi Arabia. He was orphaned when he was only six and was raised by his Uncle, Abu Talib, a merchant who worked along the trade routes. At the time, pagan worship dominated Arabia. An estimated 360 gods and goddesses had to be appeased, and over 124,000 known prophets led followers in a variety of directions. Muhammad likely had incomplete and erroneous exposure to Christianity, living well before the first Arabic portions of the Bible.
At 25, Muhammad married Khadija, a wealthy widow. Together they had six children, although only the youngest daughter, Fatima, survived to bring him male descendants. His marriage enabled Muhammad to focus on meditation and prayer in the hills and caves near Mecca.
During one of these times in 610, Muhammad began to receive what he believed were revelations from the angel Gabriel. Although bewildered at first, Muhammad was encouraged by his wife and others, who were impressed by the poetic Arabic of his recitations. These revelations continued over a period of 22 years and form the basis of the Qur’an. Muhammad proclaimed that the Qur’an was the eternal and final revelation of God, a perfect copy of the text in heaven. Moreover, he declared all previous Scriptures had been superseded by the Qur’an, and they remain largely ignored to this day. Muhammad attracted many followers, who considered him a prophet. However, he quickly met opposition for his rejection of the idolatrous practices of his culture. In 622, he and 70 followers left Mecca for Medina, where he was warmly welcomed and established a government. Not much later, he developed a strong religious community and an army of 10,000, which in turn conquered Mecca. After Muhammad died in 632, his successors went on to conquer the region and firmly establish Islam. (Mention of Joseph Smith and Mormonism)
Perhaps The people of Jerusalem decided not to RECOGNIZE the King because they did not give them what they wanted, but offered what they really needed. The importance of making the right decision about Jesus is a constant theme throughout the New Testament. Accepting Him WILL lead to great blessings, but perhaps not in the manner our worldly and selfish desires would want. Rejection of Him will most certainly lead to pain and suffering throughout eternity. God truly desires for us to recognize His Son Jesus as Lord and master of our lives. Perhaps today you need to accept Him as Savior, perhaps today you need to RECOGNIZE THE KING.
Do you hear the invitation of Jesus?
Dearest ( insert your name),
You are cordially invited to come and enjoy the delicious banquet of my salvation. Serving will begin at My House and will continue for eternity. I’d love for you to come and get to know Me personally–and join my Family. This feast is free to you because the cost has already been paid by My precious Son, Jesus. You are receiving this invitation simply because I love you. Please join me...and you may come just as you are.
Sincerely,
God Almighty
RSVP
Engraved with the Blood of Jesus
What is your response? Will you accept His invitation? Or will you make an excuse? For those of you who choose to reject God’s gracious invitation, I have something for you. Here’s an excuse form for you to use. Fill it out and tear it off. Keep it with you all your life, and when you die, leave instructions for the funeral director to place this excuse form in your hand, so when you stand before God, you can offer Him your excuse.
Dear Jesus,
On April 17th, 2011, I heard your servant, (Pastor Joe Stapleton), invite me to come to You for forgiveness of my sins and eternal salvation. I’m sorry, I cannot come to You today because (give your excuse)
Not Yours truly,
(place your signature here)
What are you going to write? What excuse do you think God will accept? Instead, why don’t you accept His invitation to receive Jesus as your personal Lord? That way when you go to heaven, you can sing, “Nothing in my hand I bring, only to Thy Cross I cling!”
INVITATION
