I’ve been told that when people come to God –– they have certain expectations. They have certain opinions of what they think God should DO for them. They visualize a God who is going to do what they want done.
ILLUS: A woman named Donna had a conversation with her 4 year old niece. The little girl’s mother was pregnant and Donna asked her niece: “So, what do you want, a baby brother or a baby sister?” The niece looked up at her and said: “Aunt Donna, sometimes you just gots to take what God gives ya.” (Donna Patton, Hillsboro, OH. Christian Reader, “Lite Fare.”)
In other words, Aunt Donna thought her niece would have expectations of what God would do for her. A baby brother or sister. But this little girl trusted God and figured that God knew better than she did - what was best for her.
In our text this morning, we read about Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. The crowds excitedly line the streets of the city because their long expected Messiah/King had come and they were electrified.
Now, I did some background study on this issue. I wanted to know WHY the Jews would have expected a Messiah King who give them safety and security - and I found that God’s prophets kept beating on that topic like a drumbeat.
Jeremiah 23:5-7 (for example) wrote: “Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: ‘The LORD is our righteousness.’”
Zechariah 6:12-13 echoes that promise: ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, "Behold, the man whose name is the Branch: for he shall branch out from his place, and he shall build the temple of the LORD. It is he who shall build the temple of the LORD and shall bear royal honor, and shall sit and rule on his throne. And there shall be a priest on his throne, and the counsel of peace shall be between them both."’
AND OF COURSE, there’s this passage from Isaiah 9:6-7
“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.”
That was the promise – a King would be born to give the Jews what they needed. And the Jews studied so hard to find out what they could about this Messiah King, that they even knew where this Messiah was going to be born. When the Wisemen came to Jerusalem seeking He who was born king of the Jews, the chief priests and scribes knew just where to look for that information. They looked to Micah 5:2. “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.”
They even knew that - when He came - He’d come riding into the city on a donkey. Zechariah 9:9 declared “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’”
The expectation of the Messiah had reached a fever pitch by the time of Jesus’ ministry (and even afterwards). There’s a list of at least 6 men who claimed to be this coming Messiah/King… and they all died at the hands of the government at the time. Why did these “Messiahs” die? They died because they believed the Messiah was to be a military leader who would lead His people in armed conflict, and overcome their enemies. So these “Messiahs” tried to fight the Romans… and they lost!
That’s what the crowds on Palm Sunday were expecting. They were expecting a military general and a conquering King. And Jesus fit the bill perfectly. He was a highly influential man, and a charismatic leader. And if He led Israel’s armies into battle, they’d be unstoppable. IF His soldiers were wounded on the field of battle, He could heal them with a touch. If they were hungry, He could feed them with them just a few fish and loaves. And if they died… He could raise them back to life. No army on earth could hope to oppose Jesus!
But the problem was, the crowds at Jerusalem didn’t realize that “sometimes you just gots to take what God gives ya.” The KING these folks wanted… wasn’t the one God had in mind. In their imaginations they had created a promised King who met THEIR expectations.
ILLUS: A college professor named Scot McKnight taught a class on Jesus of Nazareth. He said that on the opening day he gave his students a standardized psychological test divided into two parts. The first part of the test was about Jesus. Students were asked to imagine Jesus’ personality, with questions such as, “Did Jesus prefer to go his own way rather than act by the rules?” and “Was Jesus a worrier?” The 2nd part of the test asked basically the same questions, but instead of “Was Jesus a worrier?” it asked, “Are YOU a worrier?”
The professor said the test revealed that the students all thought Jesus was like them. Introverts thought Jesus was introverted, Extroverts thought He was extroverted. The professor’s conclusion: to one degree or another, we all tend to shape Jesus in our own image. (https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2010/april/15.22.html)
Now, that might not always true… but that’s what was happening to the Jews. When Jesus rode into town on Palm Sunday the crowds had already shaped Jesus into the kind of Messiah they wanted. And that’s WHY Jesus did the things He did next.
First – after the parade… Jesus went directly to the Temple. And in Matthew 21:12-13 we’re told “Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.”
Now, Jesus had already done this once before at the beginning of His ministry (Jn 2:12ff). He’d entered the Temple and drove out the greedy and manipulative merchants from the Holy Temple. But now, why would He do that? Why not just let these guys alone?
Well… because Jesus was making a point.
ILLUS: You see after entering Jerusalem, Jesus could have gone directly to the palace of David (just down the street). And if He’d done that, He’d have been declaring He was an earthly king who had come create a new Israel who He could lead to begin a war. He could have declared that He had come to conquer the whole world by fire and sword. (commentary by John Gill)
But He didn’t do that! Instead He went to the temple - the Holy Place dedicated to God. But… why do that? Jesus did that because He was declaring that He’d come to be their King, but He’d NOT come to lead them into battle against the Romans. He’d come to lead them into righteousness and holiness.
Now, this is what it means to us as Christians. In I Corinthians 6:19-20 it says “do you not know that your body is a TEMPLE of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”
Your very body is the Temple OF God. When Jesus became your King, He came to clean you up (because we are His Temple) from The Inside-Out. Now, granted, there are church buildings that could use a really good spring cleaning. There are church who are filled with people who are greedy and selfishness and self-righteousness. But the building is just a building – it’s not a church. We are the church. And unless you and I are cleansed from the sins of our lives, those church buildings are irrelevant.
Jesus didn’t come to clean up church buildings. He came to clean up His Temple. He came to turn our lives upside down and drive out the sins that had once run our lives. So that’s what the cleansing the temple was all about. It was declaring to us that when we signed up to belong to Christ (when we believed in Him, repented of our sins, confessed Jesus as our Lord and Master) we had signed up to have our lives changed by Him. We can’t just come to Him and stay like we were. Someone once said it this way: “God loves you as you are, but He loves you too much to leave you that way.”
So Jesus cleansed the temple because He was declaring that HIS kingdom would be holy… but He wasn’t done yet! In our text today we read “In the morning, as he was returning to the city, he became hungry. And seeing a fig tree by the wayside, he went to it and found nothing on it but only leaves. And he said to it, "May no fruit ever come from you again!" And the fig tree withered at once.” Matthew 21:18-19
Jesus killed a fig tree? Yeah… in fact, He’d done the same thing earlier in His ministry. So… he killed two fig trees! What’s that all about? Didn’t He like figs? Had He gotten up on the wrong side of the bed? Was He just in a bad mood? No!
You see, Jesus only had three years to establish the groundwork for His coming church and everything He said and did were calculated to teach us something about what He wanted from His followers. And this was especially true of the killing of the fig trees. It was deliberate act, and it was meant to send us a message.
Now… a question: According to our passage from Matthew 21, why did Jesus kill the fig tree? (Answer: It didn’t produce a fruit.)
John the Baptist told the crowds who came to be baptized “Every tree therefore that DOES NOT BEAR GOOD FRUIT is cut down and thrown into the fire.” Luke 3:9
In Matthew 21, after Jesus killed the fig tree, He told the chief priests & the elders of the people “The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people PRODUCING ITS FRUITS. Matthew 21:43
Producing fruit? You mean… God expects me to do something? Well… yeah. In this world, there are givers and takers, and there are those who just kind of “look on” and don’t do much. But the Kingdom was established by Christ so that we could be taught to be givers/ helpers/ servants. We were saved to DO something for Jesus.
In John 15, Jesus said He was the vine and we were the branches: “Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” (John 15:2) We were saved to produce fruit for Jesus.
In fact, one of my favorite verses is Ephesians 2:10 that says “We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus FOR GOOD WORKS, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” Jesus saved us so that we could do good works… so that we could bear fruit.
ILLUS: I spoke with a woman some time back who became annoyed when I said that. In her mind, “going to church”, sitting in a padded chair, and being nice (living a “good” life) were all God wanted from her. She was wrong, but that’s what she thought.
Now, is there anything wrong with living a nice life? Being nice to others. Nope. Nothing wrong with that at all. But if that’s your total measuring stick of what producing good works is about, you’re living your life like a fig tree that shed its leaves anywhere but in someone else’s yard. That’s nice… but it really doesn’t produce fruit. It merely tries to avoid offending your neighbor.
When you came up out of the baptistry… Jesus wanted you to DO THINGS for Him.
ILLUS: I recently read about a church that grew tremendously over its 1st few years. It started out with about 30 people in a basement and grew to over 500 or more. Why did it grow? Well, new converts were told they had two jobs once they were saved: Pray for the church and commit to doing SOMETHING for Jesus (witnessing, visiting the sick, engaging in ministry for the church, and serving those who needed Jesus).
You see, the point of the FIG TREES was that Jesus was saying we shouldn’t be satisfied with just setting in a pew (padded chair) and going through the motions of a worship service… because He won’t be satisfied with that. Jesus didn’t save us so we could get comfortable. He saved us so we could bear fruit.
Now… there’s two ways you can look at this: Some people view this idea of DOING SOMETHING for Jesus as a chore. It’s a burden. It’s an inconvenience. They don’t want to do anything; they don’t want to be bothered. They’d rather be comfortable just attending church. That kind of mindset was reflected in a statement an Elder made to their new preacher: “Preacher, your job is to get us to do what we know we need to do but DON’T WANT TO DO!”
But that’s really NOT how God wants us to see this. If you see serving Jesus as a burden, you’ve missed the point. Jesus wants us to see serving Him as an opportunity… as an adventure. He wants us to understand that He has faith in us (to do these good things). He’s paid us a great compliment. He believes in you, and He has given you a great gift: He’s given you a reason to exist. A purpose for your life. A reason to get up in the morning.
ILLUS: I recently talked with an old friend of mine that lives in Branson, Missouri. He had “retired” and decided to take his ease. But after awhile he found that he was falling asleep in front of the TV and was bored with his life. So, he went out and got a job at Home Depot. Why? Because he realized God didn’t make us to just sit around and vegetate. He created us to be active and involved in life. And He saved us to produce fruit.
CLOSE: I want close with this story I heard years ago. There was once a farmhand who worked on a farm for an older couple. He lived in a bunkhouse attached to the barn and was paid a weekly wage. Every day he’d go out into the fields and tend to the livestock. Every day he’d go past the aging barn its paint faded. He walked past the fences that needed mending and weeds that had been allowed to overgrow the lanes. The farmhouse itself was in disrepair. The windows needed replacing and the siding needed attention. But the farmhand didn’t concern himself too much with these things, because it wasn’t his farm. He only did what HAD to do.
Then, one day, the old family called him into the parlor and sat him down for a talk. They told him how fond they were of him. They were getting on in age and they had no children and no relatives. So they were going to will the farm to him. One day… it was all going to be his. He was deeply moved and told them how grateful he was. And as he left the house, he looked around at the barn, the fences, the lanes and the house itself and he thought to himself “you know, I need to start fixing these things up.”
What changed his attitude? What changed him was the realization that the older couple believed in him. They were leaving him a great inheritance. And now… what he did for them didn’t seem to be a chore. He used to see his work as something he HAD TO do. Now he saw it as something he GOT to do.
If Jesus came to be your king… that’s what he called us to do. But if you don’t belong to Him, you won’t be able to lay hold of the inheritance He wants to give you.
INVITATION
