Message:
The people hung on His words
In the three years since Jesus began His ministry after being Baptized by John the Baptist people have hung on His words.
Luke 19:48
People like you and me.
Jesus did not write a book or a letter though He did dictate most of the Book of Revelation to St. John.
Jesus wrote on the ground twice on the same occasion but covered it over.
John 8:6-8
Scholars still wonder what He wrote to make men carrying stones drop the stones and walk away from a woman they wanted to kill.
Jesus words were different from the words of the religious teachers.
The Bible says that Jesus spoke as one who had authority.
Matthew 7:29
Mark 1:22
That meant that when Jesus spoke he spoke as the author of what He was saying and not as someone who was referencing someone else’s words.
St. John said that Jesus was the word of God made flesh who came and dwelt among us.
John 1:1-4
For three years Jesus preached a simple message – repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand”.
Mark 1:15
Luke 21:31
The people of the Holy Land like today were waiting for a Messiah a King who would free them from the Romans who had occupied their country.
Jesus came to free them from the Romans and from sin but they thought the Messiah would use force to overthrow the Romans not words alone.
While Jesus did not free the Jews from the physical occupation of the Romans Jesus did free them from the spiritual paganism of the Romans.
Jesus came to free souls first, then He would free the bodies of all believers with His second coming called the time of resurrection.
Today we are waiting for Jesus second coming when all the dead in Christ will be raised having their bodies changed to an everlasting body.
Before that could happen Jesus would have to make the announcement that He was indeed the King of the Jews.
That is what we are celebrating today.
Jesus very public announcement that He is the Messiah – the Promised One of Israel come to rule His people as promised by God the Father.
This arrival was foretold in detail 500 years before Jesus was born by a Prophet of God named Zachariah
Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion!
Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you,
righteous and victorious,
lowly and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
Zachariah 9:9
It is interesting to note that when a king rides a horse it is an intention of war or battle but when a king rides a donkey that is a sign of peace.
Even the Romans knew that so they did not see Jesus as a King who had won anything.
Palm branches were also a sign of peace used to recognize military leaders when they paraded through the streets that they had conquered.
Both the Jewish leaders and the Roman soldiers also knew this.
Jesus had conquered hate with love and sin would be conquered by His sacrifice on the cross.
When I first began to read a bible seriously I was about 28 years old.
That’s about 30 years ago now.
That Bible had the words of Jesus written in red letters.
Red is a symbol of blood and of Jesus authority over sin.
Back then I found myself hanging on every word that was written in red.
It held for me a greater significance greater than all the other words on the page.
That is because I believed that they are the words of Jesus the Messiah of Israel.
I still believe that today with all my heart.
Strange isn’t it that the people who hung on every word of Jesus hung Him on a tree for those very words?
Friends the sad truth is that we are all guilty of hanging on Jesus every word only to betray those words with the lives we live.
That is why Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit to encourage and correct and warn us when we fail to hang our lives on Jesus words.
Today we can celebrate because it is Jesus words that have been sewn into our hearts and that have changed us from the people we once were into the people we now are.
Loyal subjects of the King – King Jesus.
We like the children running in the street can shout Hosanna in the Highest, Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!”
I know at Easter we often focus on the actions of Jesus but let us also focus on the words of Jesus that have given us new life.
These are the words Jesus said just before He entered Jerusalem in triumph.
John 12:44-50
44 Then Jesus cried out, “Whoever believes in me does not believe in me only, but in the one who sent me. 45 The one who looks at me is seeing the one who sent me. 46 I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.
47 “If anyone hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge that person. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world. 48 There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; the very words I have spoken will condemn them at the last day. 49 For I did not speak on my own, but the Father who sent me commanded me to say all that I have spoken. 50 I know that his command leads to eternal life. So whatever I say is just what the Father has told me to say.”
Let us hang on these words this Easter as He hangs on the cross for us. – Amen.
