Introduction:
Daniel 9
Luke 19:41-44 - And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, "Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation."
Two Reasons People Turn Against Jesus (John 12:12-19):
- Jesus isn't Offering what you want. (Luke 19:42)
- Jesus is offering what you Don't Want . (Luke 19:44)
The time of your visitation...
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:55-01:03
After going through the training center in Harvest in Chicago, they had me intern at Harvest Joliet, which was nearby.
01:04-01:06
And I interned there for a month, and I went to a small group there.
01:08-01:10
And I got to meet a lot of these people for the first time.
01:10-01:13
Again, my time with them was very short, but it's a small group.
01:13-01:18
I had known the pastor of the church, but I got to meet a lot of the other people that were there.
01:19-01:22
And there was a blonde lady that was sitting beside me.
01:22-01:24
I think her name was Cassie.
01:24-01:46
But we were going around as sort of an icebreaker for the small groups talking about vacation stuff and Cassie was like well we were going on a cruise and My husband who wasn't at the small group, but she says my husband was all concerned about the cruise My husband said are there going to be things for me to do there?
01:47-01:52
Am I going to be bored? Are there going to be black people there? And I was just like what?
01:54-01:59
and I look around the small group and nobody really batted an eye.
02:00-02:16
And I was like, "What kind of a small group is this?" I'm like, "Are there going to be any black people there?" And she just kept going on, but I was done listening because my brain is like, "Do I address this?" Because I'm kind of the new guy, right?
02:16-02:20
And there's a black couple sitting in the small group.
02:20-02:23
And what must they have thought about that comment?
02:23-02:26
Are there going to be any black people there?
02:26-02:28
So my mind's racing.
02:29-02:32
And I'm like, I've got to say something.
02:32-02:34
Right? I mean, who's with me?
02:34-02:35
You've got to say something.
02:35-02:38
So she got done with her story.
02:39-02:40
And I said, hang on a second.
02:40-02:43
I said, I'm sorry, I have to ask.
02:44-02:48
Why would your husband be concerned if there's any black people there?
02:49-02:58
and she immediately bent over and just belly laughed for like 20, 25 seconds, just like let it out.
02:59-03:01
And I'm like, I'm missing something here.
03:01-03:05
She goes, oh my gosh, you don't know, she goes, my husband's black.
03:05-03:09
She said he was asking are there going to be other black people there.
03:10-03:12
And eventually I got to meet her husband.
03:12-03:16
And we have laughed about this story many times over the years.
03:17-03:19
you talk about a misunderstanding.
03:20-03:22
I'm sitting there like, what is this, a Klan meeting?
03:23-03:27
And like, am I going to have to fight my way out of here?
03:27-03:31
It was a huge misunderstanding that I am so thankful got resolved.
03:32-03:40
And we're going to look at one of the most misunderstood passages in the Bible, one of the most misunderstood events of Jesus' ministry.
03:40-03:45
In fact, what we're looking at today is one of the most well-known events of Jesus' ministry.
03:46-03:48
All four Gospels cover this event.
03:49-03:56
But you're going to see the people in Jesus' day and people today still completely misunderstand what's happening here.
03:57-04:01
We're gonna talk about the event that's known as the triumphal entry.
04:01-04:02
Let's look at verse 12.
04:03-04:10
"The next day, the large crowd that had come to the feast "heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem.
04:11-04:26
"So they took branches of palm trees "and went out to meet him, crying out, "Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!" And Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, just as it is written, "Fear not, daughter of Zion.
04:27-04:35
Behold, your King is coming, sitting on a donkey's colt." Stop there. Get the scene.
04:35-04:39
It says the crowd had taken palm branches.
04:39-04:43
And that was... they were actually used in Israel's feasts, if you study your Old Testament.
04:44-04:47
And it was a sign of joy and celebration.
04:47-04:48
It was a sign of salvation.
04:49-04:53
And to kind of put it in our context, imagine them waving the American flag.
04:54-04:58
That was kind of the patriotic Jewish nationalism thing that was happening here.
04:59-05:00
They were waving those palm trees.
05:01-05:07
They quoted Psalm 118 verses 25 and 26 about the Messiah.
05:08-05:11
And then John here quotes Zechariah chapter 9, verse 9.
05:12-05:17
And I used to read this passage and I used to think, they finally get it.
05:18-05:18
They finally get it.
05:19-05:25
I mean, look at what's happening here after all of the opposition that has taken place.
05:25-05:29
Like now they get to the point that they're like, oh, we get it now.
05:29-05:30
We see who he is.
05:31-05:33
Like, oh, this passage is so refreshing.
05:34-05:34
Right.
05:35-06:19
And if you've been going with us through this series, you realize John chapters 5-12, that's all you see. Opposition, opposition, opposition. Jesus shows up, Jesus says anything, does anything. Opposition, opposition, opposition. That's John 5-12. So now you get here and you're like, "Ah, they get it now. They get it!" And they didn't get it. You see, they thought that Jesus was going to be this conquering king that was going to overthrow Rome. And Israel was under Roman occupation. The Jews were living in their own land, but they weren't sovereignly in charge of their own land. The Romans were in charge.
06:19-06:39
So you had Israel underneath the Roman government, and they were thinking, as we would if we were under the oppression of a foreign government, we would think who's going to save us? Who's going to deliver us? And they thought, "Ah, here he is Jesus of Nazareth is going to deliver us from the Romans.
06:40-06:41
He is the conquering king.
06:44-06:45
In this passage, you'll see there's two crowds.
06:46-06:49
There are people who came to Jerusalem for the Passover.
06:49-06:51
They weren't Jerusalem citizens.
06:51-06:53
And we're going to see verse 17.
06:53-06:56
There were a crowd of people that were there when Lazarus was raised from the dead.
06:57-07:00
And these crowds were to come together for this celebration.
07:01-07:10
And the weird thing is, like, the actual citizens of Jerusalem, if you read Matthew chapter 21, the actual citizens of Jerusalem had no idea who Jesus was.
07:10-07:29
Because they asked the crowds, like, "Who is this? What's all this?" And they're like, "You don't know who this is. This is Jesus." And then you have verse 14, very popular, very popular passage, a very common thing we all understand, that Jesus Christ rode into Jerusalem on a young donkey.
07:30-07:37
And I would just say quickly, don't miss that little miracle, because you don't just ride on an unbroken animal.
07:37-07:39
That's exactly what Jesus did.
07:39-07:43
Okay, so that's the scene, and then look at the response to the scene, look at verse 16.
07:44-07:55
It says, "His disciples did not understand these things at first, but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about Him and had been done to Him.
07:56-08:02
The crowd that had been with Him, when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead, continued to bear witness.
08:03-08:09
The reason why the crowd went to meet him was that he heard he had done this sign.
08:10-08:13
So the Pharisees said to one another, you see that you are gaining nothing.
08:14-08:17
Look, the world has gone after him.
08:18-08:20
So the disciples, they didn't understand.
08:20-08:26
Now, if you can, for just a second, try to imagine yourself like in the disciples' sandals for a second.
08:27-08:33
Because you go back to chapter 6 and verse 15, do you remember the crowds wanted to force Jesus to be king?
08:33-08:34
Do you remember that?
08:34-08:35
And what did Jesus do?
08:36-08:37
The Bible says he withdrew.
08:37-08:39
He got out of there and he went by himself.
08:39-08:46
He said, "No." They're like, "We want you to be our king." And he's, "No." So you have to imagine the disciples, they're like, "Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
08:47-08:58
"Before people were like, 'We want you to be king,' "and you were like, 'Nay,' and you left, "and now you're doing this parade and the palm branches and the...
08:58-08:59
Why is this okay?
09:00-09:10
It would have been really baffling for them because for three years, for three years, Jesus would heal people and tell them, don't say anything to anyone.
09:11-09:15
Remember when Peter said, I believe that you are the Christ of Israel.
09:15-09:16
You're the Messiah.
09:16-09:17
Do you remember what Jesus said?
09:18-09:18
Don't tell anyone.
09:19-09:25
And then when Jesus was transfigured before the disciples, He sort of pulled the veil back and showed his glory.
09:25-09:26
Do you remember what he said?
09:27-09:28
Don't tell anyone.
09:29-09:38
But here, Jesus was officially declaring himself to be the Messiah, in no uncertain terms either.
09:39-09:42
Not like, oh yeah, by the way, that's me.
09:43-09:49
I mean, we're talking crowds and thousands of people and parade and what's going on here?
09:50-09:59
Well, one of the things that's going on here is Jesus was deliberately provoking the Pharisees to move up their plans to kill him.
09:59-10:07
You see, the Pharisees, they wanted rid of Jesus, but they didn't want to kill him during the Passover because that was a sacred day and there was gonna be all these crowds.
10:07-10:16
But now, thanks to his popularity from raising Lazarus from the dead, and they're seeing this triumphal entry and this declaration that he's the Messiah, they're like, "We can't wait any longer.
10:17-10:20
"We were gonna kill him down the road, But look, we can't wait.
10:21-10:22
This has to happen now.
10:22-10:24
We have to move things up.
10:24-10:29
You see, they're like, we absolutely cannot kill Jesus during the passive.
10:30-10:31
We can't do that.
10:31-10:33
But you know, God had a different plan.
10:33-10:39
God's plan was, my son is the lamb of God who's going to take away the sin of the world.
10:40-10:44
And it is my plan that the lamb is sacrificed on passive.
10:45-10:47
So man had plans and God had different plans.
10:47-10:48
and guess who won?
10:48-10:49
Any guesses?
10:51-10:55
And that's one of the reasons this triumphal entry happened.
10:55-11:05
We see right here in the passage, they're like, "We've got to do something, because this ain't working." And they moved up their plans so that they fulfilled God's plans.
11:06-11:08
I used to think this was like a spontaneous celebration.
11:09-11:19
I used to think that, that it was sort of like Jesus and His disciples were walking into town and somebody saw them They're like, "Hey, Jesus is coming!" And they kind of threw this whole thing together.
11:20-11:23
But I spent a lot of time studying this passage this past week.
11:24-11:30
And the further you go, the more you realize every single detail of this was orchestrated by Jesus Christ.
11:30-11:43
The crowds, Jesus choosing to come in on Passover week, and knowing that the Lazarus fans would be coming, the donkey, the upper room, Jesus had this all laid out.
11:43-11:45
But I'm going to tell you the most baffling thing about this passage.
11:46-11:50
The thing that blows your mind more than anything about this passage is the timing.
11:51-11:54
I'm going to go through this really quick because this could be a whole...
11:54-11:56
I could spend a long time on this.
11:56-11:57
But really quick.
11:57-12:00
If you go back to Daniel chapter 9, just write this down, don't go there now.
12:00-12:04
But Daniel chapter 9, Daniel was given a prophecy of Daniel's seventy weeks.
12:05-12:10
Those were weeks of years, right? One week equals seven years. So Daniel was given this prophecy of seventy weeks.
12:11-12:17
And in the prophecy, there would be 69 weeks, that's, math people, 483 years.
12:17-12:28
There's a period of 483 years that would start at the decree to rebuild Jerusalem, and that period would conclude when the Messiah presents himself to Israel.
12:29-12:49
Well, that decree was given in 445 BC, and you do the math, do the timeline, and study this out, you see from when the decree was given, 69 weeks later, weeks of years later, takes you to AD 30, the ninth day of the month of Nisan.
12:50-12:52
That's the exact day that Jesus rode into Jerusalem.
12:52-12:53
To the day.
12:54-12:57
God says, here's when my Messiah is going to be presented to his people.
12:58-12:59
It's incredible.
13:00-13:12
So, so Jesus meticulously planned and he perfectly executed this entry into Jerusalem in order to present himself as the Messiah.
13:13-13:18
And when you think about that for a second, I spent a lot of time thinking about that this week.
13:19-13:24
At first, and I'm saying this at first, hear me out, kind of like the, will there be any black people there?
13:24-13:25
I want you to hear me out.
13:26-13:33
When I first read that, I thought, that doesn't seem very humble, to throw a parade for yourself, you know what I mean?
13:34-13:35
We'll be honest.
13:36-13:46
I'm like, it just, it doesn't seem, it doesn't seem very Jesus-like, that I'm coming to Jerusalem and I'm orchestrating all these events, so there's this giant parade.
13:47-13:54
It just didn't seem very humble that Jesus would say, "I'm going to present myself as the king." I mean, is that really consistent with his character?
13:55-14:15
Then I realized, after further study, this was absolutely consistent with his character, and this absolutely had to happen the way it did happen, For this reason, don't miss this, Jesus not only wanted to present himself as the king, he wanted to demonstrate what kind of king he was.
14:16-14:17
Here's what I mean by that.
14:18-14:26
Most kings would ride into town on a white horse as a sign of power and majesty.
14:27-14:33
Jesus said, "No, I'm riding into town on a donkey." That was a sign of humility.
14:34-14:36
Jesus wasn't a conquering king who came to kill.
14:37-14:39
He was a peaceful king who came to die.
14:40-14:46
Jesus wasn't a king who came to defeat the Romans, but a king who came to sacrifice himself for sinners.
14:47-14:53
He wasn't a king that rode into town to display his power, but a king who rode into town to display his humility.
14:55-14:58
He didn't carry a scepter with him, but he would be beaten with a reed.
14:59-15:04
And he didn't wear a golden crown on his head, he would be crowned with a crown of thorns.
15:05-15:10
And he wasn't coming into town to be seated on a throne, but be nailed to a cross.
15:11-15:17
So Jesus was showing the world, yes, I am your king, but you have to see the kind of king that I am.
15:18-15:22
I'm the kind of king that lays down his life for you.
15:22-15:23
That's the kind of king I am.
15:24-15:30
And that's why Jesus orchestrated these events to put this on display.
15:31-15:36
So, while Jesus was riding into town, what was he doing?
15:36-15:41
I mean, John sort of gives us the overview of the events, but what about like Jesus himself?
15:41-15:42
What was he doing?
15:43-16:01
I think we imagine, and it's been depicted in Sunday school coloring sheets, and cartoons and things like that, that Jesus was sort of lapping up all the accolades, and he was cheering along with them, and there was lots of this and high fives.
16:02-16:08
Maybe Darren, he was doing his kingly wave, but we don't have to wonder exactly what he was doing.
16:08-16:16
And we don't often do this, but I want you to turn back to Luke chapter 19 because you have to see what Jesus was doing.
16:16-16:19
Luke chapter 19 verses 41 through 44.
16:20-16:23
You can turn back in your Bible or I think we're gonna have it on the screen here.
16:23-16:24
Yeah, we're gonna have it on the screen.
16:25-16:27
But this tells us exactly what Jesus was doing.
16:28-16:36
It says, "And when he drew near and saw the city," look at this, "he wept over it." Do you get this scene?
16:38-16:43
All these people are cheering on King Jesus, waving their palm branches and the cloaks and all of this.
16:45-16:46
Jesus is weeping.
16:47-16:47
Why?
16:47-16:48
Well, he tells us, well, look.
16:49-16:55
He says, "Saying, 'Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace.
16:56-16:57
But now they are hidden from your eyes.
16:58-17:07
For the days will come upon you when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you.
17:08-17:20
And they will not leave one stone upon another in you because you did not know the time of your visitation." Jesus wept over Jerusalem and his words tell us why.
17:22-17:29
It's because they completely misunderstood him, and they completely misunderstood why he came.
17:30-17:31
That's why he wept.
17:32-17:35
They thought, this guy can raise the dead.
17:36-17:37
This is our Superman.
17:38-17:39
He's going to swoop in here.
17:40-17:45
And I'll tell you what, a guy that can raise the dead, he has to have a lot of power up his sleeves.
17:45-17:48
He is going to drive out the Romans.
17:49-17:51
Give us our country back.
17:51-17:53
Make Israel great again.
17:54-18:13
Maybe not that, but these same people on this day who were saying, "Husanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, just the King of Israel." Those same people, a few days from this event, are going to be saying, "Crucify him, kill him.
18:13-18:16
We'd rather have Barabbas the terrorist, we'd rather have him than Jesus.
18:17-18:21
Kill him, get rid of him." You're like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa." That escalated.
18:21-18:28
How did we go from, "Hooray, King!" to, "Kill him, just kill him.
18:29-18:35
"We wanna watch him die." How do you get there in a couple days?
18:37-18:38
I'm gonna tell you how.
18:39-18:40
It all boils down to one reason, really.
18:42-18:42
Wrong expectations.
18:44-18:45
It's wrong expectations.
18:45-18:48
That's what Jesus was pointing out in his statement here in Luke.
18:49-19:02
Jesus was saying, "You think a military victory is going to bring you peace, and your cheering is motivated by this wrong expectation that I'm here to fix your short-sighted problems." And you know, it still happens.
19:02-19:16
People sort of admire Jesus, and they come to church because they think Jesus is going to give them some temporal thing that they want, and they're not mindful of the better things that He's actually offering.
19:17-19:33
And it has to hit you, church, it has to hit you that this misunderstanding, these wrong expectations, these cheers that would become murderous in a couple days, you have to see that this brought Jesus to tears.
19:34-19:36
Jesus said, "These cheers, it's shallow.
19:37-19:39
"You don't get it, you don't understand.
19:40-19:47
"You think I'm here for one thing, you don't get it." This is exactly why we are going verse by verse through the book of John.
19:49-19:58
That's why we're in this series called "Knowing Jesus," because we want to move from knowing about Jesus to knowing Jesus, because there's many people that are sitting in churches everywhere.
19:59-20:01
You just don't know what Jesus is about.
20:01-20:01
You don't know.
20:02-20:05
You don't know what Jesus is actually offering you.
20:05-20:08
You expect things from Jesus that he never offered.
20:09-20:12
And you're trying to cash checks that Jesus didn't write.
20:14-20:26
And just as this crowd fell away because Jesus didn't perform how they wanted, there are so many people today that walk away from church because Jesus didn't perform how they wanted.
20:27-20:30
So why do people misunderstand and turn against Jesus?
20:30-20:34
Well, there are two reasons that Jesus said that happens.
20:35-20:38
I'm gonna close with this on your outline, two reasons people turn against Jesus.
20:39-20:43
Number one is this, Jesus isn't offering what you want.
20:43-20:45
Jesus isn't offering what you want.
20:46-21:00
That passage in Luke, again, Jesus said, "Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace." And they were thinking, "If we get rid of Rome, we're going to have peace." And Jesus was like, "That's not it. That's not it.
21:01-21:04
You think this is going to make you happy, and it's not.
21:05-21:10
You just want something that I'm not offering you." Jesus was saying, "You don't know what makes for peace.
21:11-21:16
You're only looking for earthly things. You're only focused on the here and now type things.
21:16-21:27
In church, your faith is going to be shaken, or proven to be shallow, or proven to be non-existent, if you're following Jesus only for some immediate benefit.
21:28-21:29
Oh, it happens all the time.
21:30-21:34
I'll go to church if it will save my marriage. I'll go to church.
21:35-21:41
I'll go to, my finances are a wreck, I'm gonna go to church and see if that can help get my finances in order.
21:41-21:44
I'll go to church and my sick grandma will get better.
21:45-21:50
By the way, that's why the health and wealth gospel is so popular, because you're selling people something they already wanna buy.
21:51-21:52
Hey, you wanna be healthy, you wanna be wealthy?
21:52-21:53
Oh yeah, I want that, okay, great.
21:54-21:55
You know, God wants to give you that.
21:55-21:57
And people buy it.
21:57-22:00
And then they walk away going, well, that didn't work.
22:01-22:05
Maybe the whole thing's garbage, because I'm not healthy or wealthy.
22:07-22:11
Now, do these things sometimes happen? Marriage is healed, grandma gets better, finances...
22:11-22:12
Do these things sometimes happen?
22:13-22:14
Yes, absolutely.
22:14-22:17
And we have seen it over and over and over again in this church.
22:18-22:18
Absolutely.
22:19-22:22
Sometimes God chooses to work that way in His time, in His way.
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He is God, I am not.
22:26-22:32
But I have to ask you, what if your marriage isn't suddenly the happily ever after you thought that Jesus would give you?
22:32-22:36
What if your children that you've been praying for, what if they don't follow the Lord?
22:37-22:39
Or worse yet, what if they turn against you?
22:40-22:41
What if you do get sick?
22:41-22:43
What if grandma never gets better?
22:44-22:46
What if you suffer financial loss?
22:47-22:54
You see, we're gonna be disappointed when we think Jesus is all about meeting my here and now wants and needs.
22:55-22:57
And that's exactly what Jesus pointed out here.
22:57-23:01
We think that temporal things make for peace.
23:02-23:11
Israel was like, "I'll have peace when Rome is defeated." And we say, "I'll have peace when I have the perfect home, the perfect marriage, I'll be happy with money.
23:12-23:25
If I didn't have this health issue, my life would be absolutely perfect." And we're just putting all of our chips on this one temporal thing, and oh, if this happens, and suddenly we're in this crowd.
23:26-23:30
That we'll praise the Lord one day and we are crucifying him the next day.
23:31-23:34
when we discover that Jesus isn't offering what we want.
23:35-23:37
Number two, this is the flip side.
23:38-23:40
Two reasons people turn against Jesus.
23:40-23:41
Jesus isn't offering what you want.
23:41-23:44
Number two, Jesus is offering what you don't want.
23:44-23:47
And that comes from the end of this passage we looked at in Luke.
23:48-23:58
Look at this phrase, Jesus said, "You did not know the time of your visitation." Like, what, the time of your visitation, what is that?
23:58-23:59
You can study that out.
24:00-24:04
That's a phrase that's used several times in the Old Testament and the New Testament.
24:05-24:09
The time of your visitation just simply means this, when the Lord shows up.
24:10-24:15
Now, the phrase is usually, when you see the context, it's usually connected with judgment.
24:16-24:23
And it sort of communicates this, you better be right with God, because He's coming to visit you someday.
24:24-24:30
And when He comes to visit you, Don't you want to make sure that things are square between the two of you?
24:31-24:35
That's kind of the message of day of visitation.
24:36-24:38
And that's exactly what Jesus means here.
24:38-24:47
As he was riding into Jerusalem, as he was giving the clearest pronouncement he's ever given to the crowds that he is the Messiah of Israel.
24:48-24:51
He was saying, hey, God showed up.
24:52-24:57
Today is the day the Lord Almighty visited you to save you and bring you back to himself.
24:58-25:00
Jesus said, and you totally missed that.
25:00-25:01
It went right over him.
25:01-25:06
Today was the day of your visitation, and you completely missed it.
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Because I'm offering something you don't want.
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You see, God showed up in the flesh to lay down his life so that he might resurrect from the dead, so that your salvation might be purchased.
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And I'm here to tell you today, whatever it is that you're here for, those of you that are watching this stream or listening to this later, I don't know what you're looking for from Jesus, but I can tell you for sure what He is offering.
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This is what Jesus is offering, forgiveness of sin.
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Through His death on the cross on your behalf to take away your sin, He's offering you that.
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His presence by the power of His Holy Spirit.
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He is offering you that.
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The promise of heaven that whenever your time is up on earth, and it will be up, by the way, sooner or later, you're leaving here.
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We all are leaving here.
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But you have the glorious promise of heaven.
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He's offering you that.
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And see, these things, forgiveness, his presence, the promise of heaven, eternal life, all of these things are offered for peace because these are things that cannot be taken away, not by Rome, not by the American government, not by your boss.
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Nobody can take these things from you.
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This is really what makes for peace.
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The knowing no matter what happens to me, I belong to Jesus.
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And no matter what the world does to me, my best days are ahead of me.
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Write that down.
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It doesn't matter.
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My circumstances really are inconsequential because nothing will stop God's purposes for me in Jesus Christ.
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And my future is glorious thanks to what he did on my behalf.
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So you see the people in this crowd were saying, "Save us from Rome." And Jesus said, "I came to save you from hell." And their response was, "No thanks. Really, I was just asking about Rome." What are you expecting from Jesus today?
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I want to challenge you, church.
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Don't be so short-sighted that you're merely seeking some benefit for today.
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Don't be so shallow that you merely seek some temporary fix.
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And maybe you showed up to church or you clicked to watch this stream online because you need some trial to be solved and you discover that Jesus is offering you so much more than you realized.
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Today may be the day of visitation for you.
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That's why I want to encourage you to know His triumph.
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You know, Jesus looked like a fail to the crowds in Jerusalem a few days after this event.
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But to God and to those who would receive Jesus, this was just the beginning of the ultimate victory.
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Let's pray.
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Father in heaven, you are a mighty God.
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We believe that you have the power to do anything.
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But Father, we confess to you that so often in the church, we sort of put you on the hook for things that you didn't promise.
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We're trying to claim things that you've never offered, when there are some very clear things in your word that you have offered.
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Like the crowd here, we're just not interested in that.
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I pray, Father, that you would give us biblical expectations.
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We are motivated to come to Jesus, so he can put a band-aid on a boo-boo we have today.
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But that we could come to Jesus and receive the King of the universe who laid down His life as a humble servant so that we could have the eternal things.
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Father, we know that You give us everything on top of that in Your time and in Your way.
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Father, let our faith be based on something that You did promise, not something that You didn't.
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Father, I pray that we would be a people who seek the gift giver, and not just the gift.
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That we will glorify your name, not just for one day.
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That we will join those holding the palm branches in the book of Revelation, eternally celebrating the person of Jesus Christ.
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It's in his name we pray. Amen.
Small Group Discussion
Read John 12:12-19
What was your big “take-away” from this passage / message?
What was Jesus’ purpose for the “Triumphal Entry”?
Why did this crowd go from cheering “HOSANNA” here to shouting “CRUCIFY HIM” a few days later?
What wrong expectations do people have of Jesus today? Where do those wrong expectations come from?
Read Luke 19:41-44. Why did Jesus weep over Jerusalem? What does this say about how Jesus must feel today about those who don’t understand who He is or why He came?
Breakout
Pray for one another.