Transcript

This morning we’re going to return to Luke. Luke 19, as we reassume our preaching through the Gospel of Luke this morning. Luke 19, we’ll begin in verse 28 and go through verse 44. If you’re visiting with us, we just go verse-by-verse, chapter-by-chapter through books of the Bible purposing by God’s enabling to unpackage and reveal the truth God has for his church as we go through. Luke 19, beginning in verse 28,

28 After He had said these things, He was going on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. 29 When He approached Bethphage and Bethany, near the mount that is called Olivet, He sent two of the disciples, 30 saying, “Go into the village ahead of you; there, as you enter, you will find a colt tied on which no one yet has ever sat; untie it and bring it here. 31 If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ you shall say, ‘The Lord has need of it.'” 32 So those who were sent went away and found it just as He had told them. 33 As they were untying the colt, its owners said to them, “Why are you untying the colt?” 34 They said, “The Lord has need of it.” 35 They brought it to Jesus, and they threw their coats on the colt and put Jesus on it. 36 As He was going, they were spreading their coats on the road. 37 As soon as He was approaching, near the descent of the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the miracles which they had seen, 38 shouting: “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 Him, “Teacher, rebuke Your disciples.” 40 But Jesus answered, “I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out!” 41 When He approached Jerusalem, He saw the city and wept over it, 42 saying, “If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace! But now they have been hidden from your eyes. 43 For the days will come upon you when your enemies will throw up a barricade against you, and surround you and hem you in on every side, 44 and they will level you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.”

Now, this is a passage of the Gospels that has been traditionally called the triumphal entry but I’ve been wrestling with that for a couple of weeks. Triumphal entry? Jesus riding a donkey’s colt? Coming into Jerusalem in such a lowly and meek manner, that’s a triumphal entry? Now, it is true, he’s coming into Jerusalem to establish his kingdom, but not in a physical way on the earth. Not yet. He’s going to establish the kingdom in the hearts of people first. As a matter of fact, if you want to see the triumphal entry, go with me to Revelation. Would you do that? Revelation 19, would you go there real quick? Revelation 19, this is going to be the true triumphal entry. Revelation 19, we’ll begin in verse 11, John writes, “And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, ‘King of kings and Lord of lords.'” Quite the contrast, isn’t it?

Here we have really not a text on the triumphal entry of the king of a new kingdom, here we have and here’s what I have entitled this section, “Great Unbelief and a Great Undeterred Savior.” Great unbelief and a great undeterred Savior. Woven all through this passage is Jesus revealing and lamenting the overwhelming, widespread, hardened unbelief of Jerusalem. That’s really the point of the text, but perhaps the one point that must be noted higher than that issue is that Jesus in spite of all and every circumstance, is 100% totally committed to the Father’s will to go to Jerusalem and get to the cross. He is completely undeterred by what men do.

Let’s look at it together. Notice I. A predestined arrangement. A predestined arrangement. Here in verses 28 through 34, we have this arrangement that the Lord has set in place that’s just going to play out as he gives instructions and goes through the motions of fulfilling it. You see, the plan is set. The plan has been set from the foundation of the world. Jesus now turns toward Jerusalem.

Look at it there in verse 28, “After He had said these things, He was going on ahead, going up to Jerusalem.” Now look: everything we’ve studied in the Gospel of Luke has been a preface, a building up to this point when he finally turns his body and sets his face like a flint heading to Jerusalem. He knows all that awaits him there. There are going to be false accusations. There is going to be a betrayal. He’s going to be arrested on false grounds. He will ultimately in one form or fashion be forsaken by every friend he thought he had. He will be brutally beaten. Scourged with a cat-o-nine-tails. Forced to carry his own execution beam on his back down the Via Dolorosa headed toward the Place of the Skull or Calvary. Then he will be nailed with nails through his hands and nails through his feet, he will be put on the cross.

He has been increasingly teaching his disciples that this was where he was going and this is how his physical earthly life would end. You remember, they struggled with that. It was so radically contrary to what they thought religion should be and how the Jewish religion in particular should culminate. They were looking for a Jewish Messiah who would come in and liberate Israel from Roman slavery and usher in this great new age. Many times his enemies have desired to kill him but he has avoided all of their snares. He is going to Jerusalem to die but not ultimately at the hands of his enemies or in the way his enemies may have desired. He is going there to die – now listen – in his Father’s will, according to his Father’s plan, to achieve his Father’s purposes.

When he goes to Jerusalem, the mightiest of paradoxes will occur. In crucifying him, his enemies will gloat and glory of their victory and of his demise and they will rest their minds that the power and control they were threatened would leave them because of this Jesus is now back safe in their hands with the demise of this carpenter from Galilee, but through the humility, through the suffering, and through his death, he will indeed secure his power and authority and his right to the kingdom. What a paradox. His enemies glory in their victory and while they’re glorying in their victory over him, he’s winning the victory. Interesting.

Philippians 2:8, “Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” Hebrews 5:8, “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.” Jesus, though being co- equal to God the Father, as God the Son nevertheless was a Son who obtained blessing and privilege from his Father by perfectly obeying his Father’s will. As he obeyed and honored the Father’s plan here, he earns the right to be King over the kingdom that is coming.

Now, in verse 28, the Bible text says, the New American Standard words it, “He was going on ahead.” I don’t think that’s just an incidental narrative statement. Going on ahead I think pictures the fact that he has no hesitation whatsoever to the Father’s will. You see, he knows his Father’s heart and he trusts his Father’s will. The wisdom of the plan that he is carrying out was wrought in divine intelligence and in divine love and in this case we get a good application for ourselves and that is: are we hesitant about the Father’s will? Are we quick about the Father’s will? Men, are you quick when the Scriptures are clear about your assignment in life and your duties in life? Are you quick about the Father’s will? Ladies, when it comes to when the Scriptures are clear about your assignments and your responsibilities in life, do you debate? Are you quick about the Father’s will? It matters not to Jesus that the entire ecclesiastical leadership of Jerusalem are not obedient to the Father’s will, Jesus is committed to be quick and be obedient. He goes on ahead. You see, there has been a time set from the foundation of the world when he will finish his last teaching session. He will perform his last miracle and he will turn to the pinnacle event for which he was born and he will die in Jerusalem and he goes on ahead without hesitation to the Father’s will. Back in Luke 12:50, Jesus said, “”But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished!” In other words, from the beginning of his life and ministry up until this point in time, he was in toil in his heart about, “This is my destination. This is my Father’s will and I am going to perform it perfectly.” By the way, since he did honor the Father’s will and since he did perform it perfectly, we are redeemed.

Verse 29, the Bible text says he sends out two of the disciples to go on ahead. They’re to find a colt, verse 30 tells us. Literally, it’s a donkey’s colt. Now, a donkey’s colt in this day was not the warhorse. Usually when you have the Greek word for horse it means a warhorse, a mighty, powerful battle horse. This is a very different word. This is a beast of burden. These little colts were used sometimes for plowing or maybe for riding. They’re the lowliest of the lot, if you will, but the lowliest and the despised become holy and exalted when they come in contact with Jesus. Jesus makes the unclean clean. Jesus makes the vile honorable. He mounts the lowly donkey’s colt because he is the Prince of Peace. Here again he avoids earthly grandeur. There is a meekness to his majesty.

I want to be careful here: the pope. The pope comes to America and he rides in a Fiat because he’s humble. Am I wrong for suggesting that that’s mostly pretense and show? If Catholics really want to be humble, just sell the Vatican and give all that away. It’s just a little bit elaborate, but anyway, Jesus in true humility, there is a difference. Be cautious and careful of those who wear a spiritual garment of always being out-humbling the guy next to him. Sometimes it’s just for show but not in Jesus.

Not only is it a humble colt and a humble and meek entering into the city, it’s a colt no one has ever sat on. I think that means it is sanctified. It was set apart for this very purpose and this purpose only. They go into the city in verse 30, he says rather, “Go into the city and bring it back.” And it is a reminder, again, a good application for us here that whatever goods we have, if the Lord needs it, we surrender it to the Lord. He said, “When you find the colt, get it and bring it back to me.” None of this is prearranged. There is no evidence whatsoever that any of this was prearranged, it was just that Jesus has authority over everything. He’s not stealing from anybody when he goes into town and takes a man’s donkey’s colt. Psalm 50:10, he says, “Every beast of the forest is Mine, The cattle on a thousand hills.” “It’s all mine anyway.” If God needs your stuff, then give him your stuff.

In verse 31, they go in there and he says, “If anyone asks, ‘Why are you untying it?’ you shall say, ‘The Lord has need of it.'” We have, again, proof here that this was a predestined arrangement. All this was settled beforehand. It’s all going to work out perfectly.

Then verses, if you will, 30-34, when you get down, well, we’ll start in verse 32, “So those who were sent went away and found it just as He had told them. As they were untying the colt, its owners said to them, ‘Why are you untying the colt?’ They said, ‘The Lord has need of it.'” And that settled the whole issue.

Now, I think in Christian doctrine we understand that when we give things, earthly things, to advance God’s causes, it’s very important that we have first given our hearts to the Lord. That’s why you’ll note when I exhort you to give an offering I say, “Do what you can do with joy,” because it just don’t mean anything to God and we don’t need it if you give it grudgingly or under compulsion. But if you first give your hearts to the Lord like 1 Corinthians 8:5 says, this not as we had expected but they first gave themselves to the Lord and to us by the will of God. These were the Macedonians who give such a generous gift to Paul’s missions work and to support the poor saints in Jerusalem and Paul said the key thing here, it was a great offering but the key thing was their heart was God’s and they were joyous to support us as God’s servants because first they gave their hearts to the Lord.

So in overarching, the overarching narrative here is: Jesus says, “I’m going on ahead to Jerusalem. I’ll need some disciples to go ahead.” By the way, tradition says it was Peter and John. We don’t know for sure, but they go on ahead. He said, “When you find a donkey’s colt, it’s going to be tied up, get it and when anyone asks you why you’re getting it, just say, ‘The Lord needs it.'” A predestined arrangement. All this was planned out.

II. Notice here a mixed pronouncement. As he begins to go down the road, they begin to cry out hosannas to him and praises to him. They are laying their garments so that the donkey could even walk over them, which was a common gesture in that day when they were honoring someone of royalty or special prestige. So here comes the King of Glory. He comes into Jerusalem, not riding on seraph’s golden wings, but on a lowly donkey’s colt, the foal of a beast of burden. He is meek and lowly, friends, because he’s going into Jerusalem to save the weary and heavy laden. This is a fulfillment of Zechariah 9:9-10, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation.” Wow, what a phrase! He is! He is! He is! “Humble, and mounted on a donkey, Even on a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim And the horse from Jerusalem; And the bow of war will be cut off. And He will speak peace to the nations; And His dominion will be from sea to sea, And from the River to the ends of the earth.” Now, typically as we see Old Testament prophecies, you have the first and second coming of Christ pieced together as one. The first verse speaking of his first coming, the second speaking of his final and second coming when he will indeed establish the kingdom on the earth.

Now, I think it’s very interesting that as we read through this, if you will, look at verse 35, as he’s going on into Jerusalem, they are spreading their coats. As you go down to verse 38, they’re yelling hosannas and blessings. Now, up until this time, Jesus would not allow them to publicly proclaim that he was the promised Messiah. Remember, he’d tell them to be quiet about that and there was a reason for that, because the people wanted to take him by force and put him on a throne. But now he’s no longer asking them to be silent. He’s even encouraging it.

Verse 36, “As He was going, they were spreading their coats on the road.” Verse 37, “As soon as He was approaching, near the descent of the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the miracles which they had seen.” Two thoughts here. Two thoughts: number first, first of all, remember when you see the word “disciple,” particularly in the Gospel narratives, it does not necessarily mean those who are genuinely converted. There were many, many folks who were clamoring around Jesus for one or a variety of reasons. First of all, he performed miracle after miracle after miracle after miracle and this enthralled the people. They were just gathering all around him. His teaching was not like any other teacher they had ever heard. He even confounded their religious authorities who lorded it over the common people so they loved him for that. He fed multitudes out of just a little bitty bit of food. It was a miracle. He even raised the dead and they had seen that happen. So “disciples” here doesn’t necessarily mean “converts.” Many of them were just amazed at what he could do and thought, “Man, I’m in. Count on me to be one of his followers as long as this stuff holds up. As long as the good stuff and the exciting stuff and the blessings and the provisions are there, then count me in. I’m in. I’m for it. I’m one of them.”

I think that’s the key phrase we see in verse 37. If you miss the last part of verse 37, you miss everything about Jesus’ final days in ministry. “As soon as He was approaching, near the descent of the Mount of Olives,” we’re in verse 37, “the whole crowd of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice,” here it is, “for all the miracles which they had seen.” Why were they crowding around? Why were they crying hosanna? Why were they worshiping him? Why were they hailing him as the Messiah? Because of the miracles they had seen. I mean, this was an amazing thing, but the vast majority of these folks…by the way, it just reminded me: remember what happened back in Capernaum? What was it? Maybe even a couple of years ago, early in the chapters of Luke? One of his first ministries was in Capernaum and he finally reached a point in Capernaum where he decided, “I’m not doing anymore miracles here. I’m not healing anymore people of Capernaum.” And the Bible says, “He turned and went to preach in other places,” and what did the people of Capernaum do? The Scripture says they became enraged at him. They got boiling mad because they wanted more blessing. They wanted more healings and he decided, “I’m not doing anymore of those in your town.”

These folks, now, here’s what they, hosanna, praise, blessing and honor and what? A couple of days later and they’re going to be yelling, “Crucify him!” And here’s what you’re going to say, “Why did they change?” They didn’t change. They didn’t change. As soon as the truth came out and they saw it, they didn’t want the kind of Messiah he was. They didn’t want the kind of Jesus he is. They didn’t change at all. They were about themselves and about having their best life now, right now and “If he’s not going to heal us, if he’s not going to defeat us, if he’s not going to liberate us, if he’s not going to bless us now, we’re not out. Then we don’t have any use for him, just crucify him.” The same bunch saying hosanna will turn around and say crucify because their hearts were never with him. They just wanted the latest blessing.

So the vast majority, as we will plainly see as we go through the rest of Luke, are not true, devoted, cross-bearing disciples of Jesus Christ, they were just those enamored with the temporal blessings they hoped he would bestow and, by the way, cut them some slack, I think you would have done the same thing. I do think we would have done the same thing. These people lived in misery. They hoped for some relief. They knew the Messiah was promised to come and overthrow Rome and liberate Israel and usher in a utopia of love, joy, peace and blessing and prosperity and so when they saw him in weakness and they saw him not sitting on a throne, and saw him not overcoming their enemies, and they saw he doesn’t have the power to usher in this kingdom, that’s what they’re thinking, they thought, “We have no use for him now. We need some help. We need to eat better. We need to be cured of our diseases.” So they’re looking for this utopia they thought the Messiah should bring, but there’s one huge problem. You see, this final true utopia that Christ will indeed one day establish in the earth will be a kingdom established in righteousness. Now, are you hearing me this morning? That’s the key. Not just a kingdom of healings, though everyone will be healed. Not just a kingdom of wonderful provision of food and shelter and clothing and all the things, that will be wonderfully provided in the future kingdom Christ will set up on the earth. Not just a kingdom of no more sickness and pain and sorrow. Yes, that will be there but primarily and foundationally it is a kingdom of righteousness. You see, Jesus couldn’t just come to the earth and say, “Let’s get rid of all the problems and we’re all just going to have a great big blessed time here.” No, no, no, there’s a great big, big, big problem: all men are unrighteous and unfit for his righteous kingdom.

The entire kingdom that Christ will one day establish in the earth will be holy, including all of its citizens so Jesus at this time is not coming into Jerusalem to establish the physical kingdom of God in the earth. No, at this time he’s coming to Jerusalem to secure a righteous people to one day inhabit that kingdom that he will one day establish in the earth. To redeem that people, to make them righteous and to make them holy is going to require his humiliation, his suffering and his death. This truth that Christ must first go suffer, bleed and die as the vicarious substitutionary sacrifice for the sins of his people, this truth was something that even his truest and most devoted disciples were having a time getting their minds wrapped around. They just couldn’t get it yet. They just had a ways to go in full understanding.

So Jesus is coming in. This mixed pronouncement, I call it a mixed pronouncement because some were genuine but for the most part, most of them were just in it for the blessing and as soon as he stops blessing the way they want to be blessed, they’ll turn on him. Then verse 39, something else happens. “Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Him, ‘Teacher, rebuke Your disciples.'” In other words, “These people are worshiping you.” So the Pharisees are asking Jesus to do what really should have been asked of the pope when he was here, “Stop all this ridiculous nonsense of people worshiping you!” But Jesus is righteous. Jesus is holy. Jesus is God and it’s right to worship him.

So what does he say? “But Jesus answered, ‘I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out!'” Oh, the holy majesty of his person. The power, wisdom and beauty of his work that’s going to culminate at the cross. The love and mercy he extends and the suffering and sacrifice he will give for his children, all this he’s going to endure for them, everything and all that Jesus is and all of his work must absolutely be praised. He says, “If these guys stop praising me, I’m going to tell you, the rocks are going to shout.” Wow. The sheer magnitude of this scene inspires even the creation itself to praise him. I think the truth is the creation cannot be restrained from praising Jesus. At his death, the Bible says the sun refused to shine. The veil of the temple shrunk from its place. The earth trembled at the awesomeness of what God was accomplishing. The disciples at that point were intimidated into silence but at his death, the tomb opened wide her mouth and the earth quaked, praising her God. So this was quite a mixed pronouncement, “Hail, here comes the Messiah! Hallelujah, here comes the Savior!” A few genuine, for sure, even though their understanding still didn’t grasp it all, but the great majority were in it for the present blessing and if it wasn’t fun and if it wasn’t a blessing, then we’re out.

III. The prophetic denouncement. The prophetic denouncement. We begin with a heartbroken Savior down in verse 41, “When He approached Jerusalem, He saw the city and wept over it.” Now, this is a truth about Christ that we can’t enter into. How can it be that he was 100% God, as if he were not man at all, and at the same time he’s 100% man, as if he were not God at all, and here we see his humanity and in his humanity, his eyes affected his heart. He looks and sees the gross, widespread, brazen unbelief. Do you now understand this? Everything in Jerusalem, everything about the temple, everything about the Jewish system of religion pointed to him. It’s all fulfilled in him. It was all about him. He culminates every bit of it. It was to cause them to be ready for him and he’s here and they don’t see it and he watches that and he weeps as his eyes affect his heart. Then in the cycle, his heart affects his eyes and he weeps over this unbelief. Psalm 119:136 is a prophetic statement, “My eyes shed streams of water, Because they do not keep Your law.”

Christ weeps as a human with a sorrow for others but no man weeps as he weeps because no one could feel as he feels. You see, he alone could feel and understand the value and worth of a human soul. He alone could grasp how – now listen to me – how great a vile crime was committed by them not receiving him as their Savior and only he could understand the extent of the just wrath that should come against sinners in hardened unbelief. So as Christ is taking all this in, in his humanity he pauses and weeps.

A heartbroken Savior but notice also the hardened sinners. Verse 42, they are distorted in their thinking. Whenever you’re in the hardness of sin, your thinking gets twisted. Your thinking gets upside down. Your thinking has a crook on it. It’s perverse. Verse 42, he’s weeping and saying, “If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace! But now they have been hidden from your eyes.” They could not see their sin and they could not see their Savior. You see, there is one thing that is deeper, or rather a deeper danger than being a sinner, it’s being a sinner and not knowing it. These guys in Jerusalem thought they were fine. “We’ve got our religion worked out. We’ve got our system going. It leaves us in power and control of the people.” By the way, are you listening to me? I don’t care whether it’s Roman Catholicism or the Muslim religion or whatever it is, every religion that is based on you keeping laws and the holy men decide what the laws are, is an entrapment and is a control and it’s all about power. It’s not about God. The Christian religion liberates you from church ecclesiology. It liberates you from a bishop or a pope or a hierarchy. You only have a preacher to help you know the Christ who liberates you. Not to control you. Not to cast some law on you and say if you don’t keep that law you’re going to go to hell and if you don’t keep it well and give well your parents will suffer in purgatory. That’s a radical, unbiblical heresy birthed out of hell to control men and keep them under dominion of someone other than the gracious Lord Jesus Christ. Did I make that clear enough?

But, you see, these guys in Jerusalem had devised a religion and camouflaged it and woven into it truths and Bible verses and the heritage of Abraham and Moses and the prophets in order that they could exercise a dominion and a control and a power over the people. They thought they were fine. They were delusional in their thinking. That’s one of the reasons why we pastors have the wonderful privilege and at the same time woeful duty of faithfully proclaiming to people the depravity and sinfulness of man because you must see your need for a Savior. These folks didn’t see it. They see no need of a lowly and meek Savior because they had been deluded on the narcotics of works religion. Isaiah 1:3-4, “An ox knows its owner, And a donkey its master’s manger, But Israel does not know, My people do not understand. Alas, sinful nation, People weighed down with iniquity, Offspring of evildoers, Sons who act corruptly! They have abandoned the LORD, They have despised the Holy One of Israel, They have turned away from Him.”

So here the truth of their homage and their praise comes forth. These people mostly, not maybe every single one, but mostly they were praising him out of not knowledge but simple passion. I want you to think about that. Christianity is a teaching religion. We are always to know, worship and honor God out of a rich knowledge of the truth revealed about that God. Are you hearing me? We’re not just about passion, we’re about passion that sets a flame by sound knowledge. Are you with your pastor this morning?

I reminded you earlier that if you’ll read church history you’ll find some of the good and faithful men of our past. When a revival would break out and God was doing some good things, there was always a counterfeit that started and these good men would warn against excitements, people who got wrapped up in the passion of the movement but didn’t have knowledge of God because that never lasts and that’s the way they are. They’re all excited. They’re moved to a fever pitch, if you will. He has done the miracles. He has performed the signs and wonders. “Our tradition holds that he would come from the rural regions of Galilee and he would come into Jerusalem and he will reign as the King and finally we’re liberated!” They knew it was coming but they didn’t have all the knowledge. They were still ignorant in many ways and so in like manner, by the way, passions and emotion turn just like this. Just like that, they just turn. Hosanna and in just a little while crucify him because they didn’t have knowledge. They didn’t know God’s will. Jesus weeps over their blindness, hardness and unbelief. Another application question for us: do we? Do we weep over the extensive religion of the Southeast that has very little true knowledge in it of the true God and the true Gospel and true conversion?

At the last part of verse 42, Jesus says, “You don’t receive me. You don’t see it.” Then he says, “These things are hidden from your eyes,” which shows the sovereignty of God behind all of this. They were hardened in unbelief and then God joined in and said, “Okay, you want to be hardened?” And God hardened their eyes. Hardened their hearts. Hardened their understanding. That’s a part of God’s judgment. He seals them in their condition. Now listen to me: the radical, unbiblical, vile perversions that are being promoted in our land today and people claim they’re free and they’re liberated, they’re not, they are hardened by God and they can’t let go of their sins. The fact that they are in that stronghold is part of the judgment of God. Jesus says, “You’re in your place partly because God has acted upon your hard hearts and hidden these things from your eyes.” Lastly, sub point C: the destruction promised. The destruction promised. Verse 43, “For the days will come upon you when your enemies will throw up a barricade against you, and surround you and hem you in on every side, and they will level you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.” Secular history, not church history necessarily but secular history records that in 70 AD, Titus of Rome comes against the city. He builds barricades around Jerusalem, then methodically he comes in and destroys everything. You see, those who will not bow beneath his scepter shall fall beneath his sword and rejecting Christ at one point and we’ll see this later as Jesus is being crucified. The chief priest says, “We have no God but Caesar!” Wow, what a statement. It’s as if Jesus says, “Okay, you want Caesar? Caesar you shall have,” and Caesar marches in under Titus and destroys everything. Jerusalem is burned. The temple is destroyed and burned. History records that the elderly were put to death. The children and young people were sold as slaves. Some ended up in the mines of Egypt and others were sold off to be gladiators for Roman entertainment. It was an awful, awful horror that came against Jerusalem. Anguish added to anguish. No hope and no salvation. Of course, this ancient destruction of Jerusalem is a type of the final wrath of God that will come against all men and all sinners and all unbelievers.

He said, “You did not recognize the time of your visitation.” They didn’t know who he was and, by the way, they didn’t desire to know. You know, when I first began preaching 36 almost years ago, I was convinced that churches would change if I could just show them what the Bible says. I was very idealistic. I thought if I can just show them what the Bible says about church membership, what the Bible says about holy living, then they will just love me and embrace me and thank God that I came along. Do you know what happened? They didn’t. Some of them even said, “I don’t care what the Bible says. This is the way we do it. This is the way my daddy did it. This is the way my granddaddy did it. This is the way my great-granddaddy did it and they couldn’t all be wrong and we don’t like what you’re telling us.” They couldn’t see it. Did not desire to see it until you called me and some of you had the audacity to say, “If it’s biblical, pastor, let’s do it.” And that has been 35 years.

So it tells us that thought many and in this context certainly most were hardened in unbelief, listen, God always has his remnant. God always has his remnant who will believe. We learn from looking at this episode as the Lord is heading into Jerusalem that grace always offers mercy but, listen, grace also has limits. These people had seen and heard the Incarnate Christ. These people in this day had such a great advantage. Think about it: they had seen miracles no one has seen before or since. They had seen signs and wonders through Christ no one had seen before or since. They had heard the Gospel preached from Christ himself like no one has ever heard before or since and for their unbelief, Jerusalem was punished like no city perhaps ever has before or since for their unbelief.

I don’t know about ending there that this was a triumphal entry. It’s a powerful denouncement against unbelief and so let me use this as a chance to cast to you an encouragement. Are you an unbeliever? Have you kind of made up religion like these guys had that suits you and is comfortable with you and kind of fits what you like or dislike? You mustn’t do that. You must not follow Jeff Noblit’s religion but you must follow the biblical religion. What saith the Scriptures about Christ? Turn to him today and he will save you, he will forgive you, he will redeem you and make you his very own. All any of these Jews in Jerusalem would have had to have done is said, “Yes, we believe you’re the Christ,” and he would forgive them and save them. It’s just that simple. What about you this morning? Don’t, don’t, don’t continue on religious, using the Bible, going through rituals and motions like these ancient Jews were doing, but Jesus looking at them and saying, “You don’t see it. You don’t see it and you don’t understand so wrath is coming.”

Would you pray with me? Would you pray?