Hosanna

welcome to Midweek Insights this is

Pastor John from Popular Sim of God and

I'm here to share the word with you

today

um today we're going to discuss the fact

that this coming Sunday is Palm Sunday

and it's the beginning

of what they call Holy Week

um where Jesus comes into Jerusalem as a

king and then

he's taken put on

trial um his death burial and

resurrection happens this week

um he institutes the Lord's supper

there's a lot of activity happen but I

want to look simply at Palm Sunday

itself and so I'm in the book of John in

chapter

12:12 it says "On the next day much

people that were come to the feast when

they heard that Jesus was coming to

Jerusalem they took branches of palm

trees and went forth to meet him and

cried "Hosana blessed is the king of

Israel that cometh in the name of the

Lord." And Jesus when he had found a

young ass sat thereon as it is written

"Fear not daughter of Zion behold thy

king cometh sitting on an ass's colt and

these things understood not his

disciples at the first but when Jesus

was glorified then remembered they that

these things were written of him and

that they had done these things unto

him and uh you know one of the things

about Palm Sunday is Palm Sunday is

celebrated in a variety of ways all

around the world by different uh

Christian faiths in different ways

uh some people go out and they do the

triumphal entry and the stations of the

cross and and all working up towards uh

good

Friday um which according to traditions

is the day that Christ was

crucified and uh all everything focused

going forward towards that glorious day

of Christ's resurrection from the dead

which is why all of us are here to start

with we have we have our faith in Christ

because he rose from the dead just like

he said he would but there's something

important about Palm Sunday i think that

sometimes gets overlooked i mean we all

celebrate the hosana and and the palms

and everything but this is a fulfillment

of prophecy from the Old

Testament and basically is the

announcing

of Israel's returning king

um if you were if you watched um

Sunday's live stream or the YouTube

video of Sunday's live stream made

mention out of John chapter 10 where

Jesus is speaking about the good

shepherd and he refers to sheep that

were not of th of

this of those sheep but were from

another group of sheep but that he was

shepherd also of them and that he needed

to bring them in so that there was one

fold and one

shepherd and we as Christians and most

of us are not

um messianic Jews in other words we're

not Jewish people who've accepted Jesus

as the Messiah we are we're Gentiles

we're non-Jewish believers and because

we're non-Jewish believers we're part of

that other uh fold we're part of the

fold but we came from outside the Jewish

fold of sheep and so Jesus's entrance

into

Jerusalem first thing is he's riding on

an that has never been broken

it's never been

bridled um and he rides into Jerusalem

calmly on an

and the people when they see him coming

they take palm

frrons and and they lay them down on the

street as recognition of his royalty so

they're recognizing him as their

king um but they don't recognize

him as their savior

and these very same people who laid

these palm frrons down on the on the

entrance into Jerusalem when Jesus came

are the very same people that at his

trial are screaming crucify

him and the problem came from the fact

that the the Jewish

nation which was under the tyranny of

Rome was expecting the Messiah to lead

them out from under the rule of Rome

they totally missed everything that had

been prophesied about what Jesus would

do because both his first coming as the

suffering Messiah and his second coming

as the king of kings and lord of lords

are in the same sets of prophecies about

Jesus and all the prophecies lead

leading up to his death burial and

resurrection his birth his uh coming

into Jerusalem all of those things have

been fulfilled

what's still waiting to be

fulfilled is the rapture or the catching

away of the

church and then and and the resurrection

of the holy

dead and the return of Jesus to earth to

set up his kingdom and rule and reign

for a thousand years and

so Jesus had referred to the Pharisees

as being blind

um and that their sin was was

uh on them because they knew what the

scriptures said they knew what it was

what was listed but they never

recognized Jesus as the fulfillment of

those scriptures

most of them just considered him either

a teacher

um or perhaps

um a prophet but they didn't accept him

for what the Old Testament said he was

which was Emmanuel Christ on earth uh

God in the flesh uh God with

us and Because that what they were

looking for was not someone to come in

and redeem their souls and lead them out

of bondage to sin but they were looking

for the king of kings who was going to

establish his throne

forever and lead them out from under

Roman

rule and because of that they missed the

importance of why Jesus came to start

with

it was more important to God to restore

fellowship between man and

God than it

was for at that very

moment for Christ to come and lead

Israel out from under the rule of Rome

uh because the whole world needed to be

saved not just the Jewish nation

the message the gospel went to them

first but it also needed to be carried

into everybody else and the and the

disciples didn't actually get it until

Christ ascension into heaven which you

can read about in Acts Acts 1 and8 when

he told them to tear in Jerusalem till

the Holy Spirit came and that he would

send to empower them to witness in

Jerusalem Judea Samaria to the uttermost

part of the earth before he could come

back and set up his kingdom as king of

kings and lord of lords on earth first

he had to get salvation taken to every

living person

uh

worldwide and so one of the things we

have to keep in

mind is the things that Jesus did in his

earthly ministry were preparing the way

for salvation to be taken into every

part of the world and a lot of times we

miss that we miss that

connection that God first wanted to make

sure that salvation came to man he

fulfilled this promise that started all

the way back in Genesis chapter

3 and so everything in Jesus's

life right up to the point of he is

risen is focused from that perspective

christ coming to redeem man from their

sin

because eternal life was more

important than mortal life here on

earth because we all have to make a

choice and that choice has to be made

during our

lifetime and the choice truly is ours of

where we spend eternity jesus came to

make sure we had that choice that we

could choose to follow Christ receive

salvation secure a place in eternity by

serving Christ through our

our all of our being

or we could choose to reject Christ and

spend eternity separated from God and

and to

actually go to the same place that um

Satan is going to be cast into which is

an eternal lake of fire that was

prepared for him and his

angels and so the decision always comes

back to the individual

every person on the face of this earth

has to make that decision for themselves

you cannot blame mom you cannot blame

dad you not can't blame

anyone for where you spend eternity

because Jesus came and made that offer

to everybody john

3:16 so while you're making your way

through this Holy Week and are in

remembrance of the things that Jesus

said and did the fact that he is death

burial and resurrection set us free uh

from the penalty of sin if we choose to

take it keep in mind that Palm Sunday

was an announcement that the king had

arrived and the people totally missed

the significance of his arrival because

they were focused on the wrong thing and

we get ourselves in that same situation

of getting focused on the wrong thing

because we're looking in the wrong

direction

um I I've shared this many times

and the life of a Christian has an

outward focus not an inward focus my

inward focus is my relationship between

me and Christ my and I have to take care

of that first but my outward focus is my

relationship through Christ with the

world and reaching them with his promise

and his glory and he said "If I be

lifted up I will draw all men unto me."

So it falls back to me to make sure that

the things I'm doing are lifting him up

and not myself therefore I have to have

an outward focus and my focus has to be

how can I present Jesus to

someone so that they too can receive

what I received which was forgiveness

from

sins chew on that one this week think

about it as you're going through uh Palm

Sunday

um which is this coming

Sunday and then

um Good Friday Resurrection

Sunday and what it actually means

um because it's God taking the world to

himself to reconcile it with his own

blood and his own life that we might

have life and have it more abundantly

god bless you we'll see you next week