Palm Sunday
“Dumber Than a Box Of Rocks”
A Sermon By Jim Hammond from Luke 19:40-41
Focus: Jesus said it
is possible to be dumber than a box of rocks.
The Most Important Week in History Began with Palm Sunday
The triumphal entry was an incredible event. The
riding upon the colt, the garments and palm branches in the road, and the
shouts of the multitude—all of this pointed to Jesus as the Messiah.
1/3 of the Gospels are about this week.
Ponder the emotion filled words about this week:
Hosanna, confrontation, betrayal, denial, trial, scourging, crucifixion,
tomb then the most electrifying sentence ever uttered—“He is not
here! He is Risen!”
The triumphal entry of Jesus entering Jerusalem as
the liberating king was of outstanding significance. Up to the time of
the Triumphal entry, Jesus had purposefully avoided publicity about his
identity as the MESSIAH. Then here, he reaches out for it. Why? Because
it was time.
THIS IS A DELIBERATE DEMONSTRATION THAT PUTS
INTO MOTION THE ETERNAL PLANS OF GOD:
Ø
These actions demonstrate who he is—He claims to be the
liberating MESSIAH.
Ø
Jesus knew these actions
Would ENRAGE THE HOSTILE LEADERS.
Ø
Jesus was forcing the Sanhedrin to change their timetable,
so it would fit with His Father’s timetable.
Ø
Jesus knew the crowd’s enthusiasm would force the leaders to
take action.
Ø
Jesus knew this action was a fulfillment of prophecy.
Ø
jesus showED the
crowds what kind of Messiah he is. The crowd cheers him, but not
really for what he is, but instead for what they want him to be. It is
strange that as soon as Jesus does not meet the expectation of what they
want him to be, their cheers turn to jeers, “Crucify him!”
Ø
Luke shows how Jesus knew that going to Jerusalem did NOT
mean he would come into his Kingdom immediately as the crowd expects.
There was going to be a delay that makes demands on his subjects.
Ø
Jesus knows he is the fulfillment of all the prophecies, but
he also knows the fulfillment will not be as the crowd expects! (notice
the comments that sandwich the parable he tells: First read Luke 19:11,
then 19:28 the explanatory brackets that go around a parable. Then read
the parable between these comments and you notice that Jesus knows there
will be a delay before he comes as the conquering Messiah they expect.
Ø
WHAT JESUS DOES HERE IS DELIBERATE. THIS EVENT IS UNUSUAL.
MOST PROPHECIES CANNOT BE DELIBERATELY FULFILLED. Most of the prophecies
concerning the Messiah were totally beyond the human control of Jesus to
fulfill, Prophesies such as:
- Place of Birth
(Micah 5:2)
- Time of Birth
(Daniel 9:25; Gen 49:10)
- Manner of Birth
(Isaiah 7:14)
- Betrayal
- Manner of death
(Psalms 22:16) Such as Piercing, yet no broken bones.
- People’s reactions
(mocking, spitting, staring, etc. ).
- Burial
Yet this prophecy about the Messiah entering the city on a donkey was one
Jesus deliberately fulfilled. Ironically, though the triumphal entry was
a public declaration of being the Messiah and it presented a direct
challenge to His enemies, it must have been a disappointment to many of
His followers even though the crowd is working itself up.
Pondering this passage this week while watching the jubilant
demonstrations of the crowd taking place in the cities of Iraq highlighted
some interesting parallels. There is a small similarity between the
shouting jubilant crowd in Jerusalem that day, and the scenes of
triumphant, joyful people in the city of Bagdad this past week celebrating
their liberation when the Marines came rolling in.
However, there is a strong dissimilarity also. Christ did not enter
Jerusalem upon a war horse of conquest but upon a donkey colt representing
humility. His kingdom was a different kind of kingdom. And the
definitive battle would be waged in a way nobody expected. This
conquering king was going to conquer by way of humble self sacrifice.
There would be no military display of power in this Triumphal Entry. I
like to call this entry the HUMBLE Triumphal Entry as opposed to THE
Triumphal Entry. THE VICTORIOUS TRIUMPHAL ENTRY, the one the crowd
expected is yet to come as described by Revelation 19 when Jesus returns
as the conquering Judge, with a sword and a warrior’s horse.
The Palm Sunday Humble Triumphal entry included Glory and Humility. Today
we will consider a Sound bite where Glory is the focus, and a Snapshot
where humility is the focus.
I. A Sound Bite: Rocks (Luke 19:40)
Luke 19:38-40 (NIV)
[39] "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 Jesus, "Teacher,
rebuke your disciples!"
[40] "I tell you," he replied, "if they keep quiet, the stones will
cry out."
1. Jesus is saying (nicely) that the Pharisees were dumber than a box
of rocks!
You could say the Pharisees find themselves stuck between THE ROCK and a
hard place. They are about to stumble over the rock, and reject that
rock, the cornerstone. (By the way, I saw a great News Headline about the
war in Iraq. Here’s what the headline read: “Stuck between Iraq and a
hard place”
The Triumphal entry wasn’t all Triumph. The Pharisees want people to keep
quiet about who Jesus is. They don’t agree with the crowd’s praises. The
Arizona republic headlines this week read, “Sadaam Toppled.” At this
Triumphal Entry a confrontation takes place, unlike the Iraq conflict
where coalition forces confronted evil. In Jerusalem, the Kingdom
of Light confronts the coalition forces of evil, a coalition
between Rome, the Sanhedrin, the Pharisees, the Sadducees and Satan. All
of these have come together to do away with Jesus and Jesus himself brings
this clash to a head. He will not have the crowd be silent.
2. Jesus is saying that His arrival demands recognition and
response. If people will not respond creation itself will!
·
As a side note, God could make inanimate objects speak in a
snap. It would not be difficult for him to make rocks shout, after all,
he made people out of dirt. If this dirt clod (me) can praise God, so can
rocks.
Lesson: Be smarter than a box of Rocks and honor Jesus Christ for
who he really is.
You might be thinking. Tell us something that we don’t know already. How
hard is it to be smarter than a box of rocks? It’s not as easy as you
think. Consider history.
Consider history.
In history, many people have been dumber than a box of rocks.
·
How smart was Adam and Eve who did the only thing God said
“Don’t”?
·
How smart were the Israelites who rebelliously turned
against God in the Wilderness when they saw the evidence of his manifest
presence everyday? Every day there was the pillar cloud of fire by night,
and a pillar cloud by day. Everyday they were miraculously provided with
manna for food. Everyday God was made manifest…and yet these were the
least obedient and least faithful people of all of history. They died in
the wilderness for their hardness of heart.
·
How smart is a crowd that shouts their “hosannas” of praise
to Jesus as King on Sunday, and cry out “Crucify him! Crucify him!” on
Friday.
·
How smart is a disciple who says “I will never betray you”
but who snores while his savior sweats drops of blood in Gethsemane? Once
maybe, I could understand, but he does this repeatedly after being
awakened and warned to keep watch.
Can you admit that Sometimes WE are dumber than a box of rocks.
·
How smart is it to want to do something just because someone
told you NOT to do something? “Don’t Touch--Wet Paint” “Keep off the
Grass” “Speed Limit 65 MPH”
·
How smart is it to pray “Lead us not into temptation…” then
go as close as possible to the source of temptation as we can without
crossing the line. How smart is it to take it right to the edge and think
we won’t cross the line?
·
How smart is it to make money, passion, or power, the center
of our attention when we know these can become obsessions that inevitably
bring ruin to things which are eternal?
·
How smart is our obsession with appearances?
·
How smart is our total disregard of God’s word when it comes
into conflict with what we WANT.
·
How smart is it to disregard each warning signal our
conscience brings up before we decide to sin anyway?
·
I used to think, “How stupid can you be?” Until I
kept tripping up over the same dumb stupid behaviors over and over again.
I find that being dumber than a box of rocks comes naturally! I have
discovered one thing! I need help.
·
I’m dumber than a box of rocks. We laugh, but it can be
deadly serious. An illustration here makes this more vivid.
The Winter 1991 issue of the University of Pacific Review offers a
chilling description of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster:
There
were two electrical engineers in the control room that night, and the best
thing that could be said for what they were doing is they were "playing
around" with the machine. They were performing what the Soviets later
described as an unauthorized experiment. They were trying to see how long
a turbine would "free wheel" when they took the power off it.
Now,
taking the power off that kind of a nuclear reactor is a difficult,
dangerous thing to do, because these reactors are very unstable in their
lower ranges. In order to get the reactor down to that kind of power,
where they could perform the test they were interested in performing, they
had to override manually six separate computer-driven alarm systems.
One by
one the computers would come up and say, "Stop! Dangerous! Go no further!"
And one by one, rather than shutting off the experiment, they shut off the
alarms and kept going. You know the results: nuclear fallout that was
recorded all around the world, from the largest industrial accident ever
to occur in the world.
The
instructions and warnings in Scripture are just as clear. We ignore them
at our own peril, and tragically, at the peril of innocent others.
Citation:
Tom Tripp in
Fresh
Illustrations for Preaching & Teaching
(Baker), from the editors of
Leadership.
·
Don’t we ignore warning signals. Don’t we minimize them,
just as these men did. Let me suggest to you that our own disregard for
these warning signals may be having a greater long term impact, affecting
more people in ways we cannot see, and with farther eternal reaching
consequences than Chernoble which only effected physical things for a
limited time! Our disregard for God’s Will is more than deadly serious
because we are not messing with simple physical realities of nuclear
power. We are messing around with what we do not understand, we are
messing with eternal realities, with eternal consequences!
Don’t be dumber than a
box of rocks!
It is bad enough that
Sin makes you stupid. But that doesn’t go far enough. In addition to
making you stupid, sin puts you in personal opposition to God, and God
takes this personally. There’s no better way to see how personal this is
than to take a close look at Jesus!
II. A Snapshot: Tears (Luke 19:41)
Luke 19:41 (NIV)
As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it
Jesus takes the sins of the crowd
personally!
Why Tears Now?
Imagine the crowd and include yourself in it. Imagine the various
backgrounds, expectations, and emotions.
·
Imagine Peter walking with his chest beginning to expand
enjoying the throngs & the cheers of the crowd - maybe with one hand on
his sword just in case something went wrong - thinking to himself, "Maybe
it was worth it to leave the fishnets & boats. Maybe at last we are going
to get what we’ve been waiting for."
·
What about James & John? Do you suppose they were thinking
about Jesus being crowned King - so that they could be on His right & left
hand in positions of authority & power?
·
What about Judas? Do you suppose he’s really happy at what
he sees? It’s going according to his plans for greatness.
·
Imagine those who have first hand experience with the
miracles. The talk spreads like wildfire throughout the audience. Did
you hear about how he raised Lazarus from the dead? “Yeah, I’m Lazarus”
·
Countless stories…countless lives…countless expectations.
·
Imagine the other side also in this crowd. The Pharisees
and Sadducees wringing their hands thinking that now for sure they are
going to have to do something.
·
Imagine the Roman Soldiers watching to see if this was going
to escalate into a power struggle that grows into a revolutionary frenzy.
·
The predominantly expressed emotion is elated joy. The
happiness and joy is contagious. The emotions are growing to a clamouring
uproar. [Pause]. But then the procession stops.
·
Imagine Jesus stopping. The whole parade bottlenecking into
a traffic jam. What is Jesus looking at? Why does he look so sad? What
goes through the disciples mind? They are wondering what he is thinking.
They don’t wonder long as he tells them.
Luke 19:42-44 (NIV)
[42] and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what
would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. [43] The days
will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you
and encircle you and hem you in on every side. [44] They will dash you to
the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave
one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s
coming to you.”
(why the tears now?)
·
As happy as this occasion should be with the crowd finally
declaring who Jesus is, Jesus knows how shallow is their declaration. The
shallowness of their declaration makes him weep.
·
The consequences of their rejection make him weep even as he
declares judgment.
·
Jesus looks at the city and weeps, he sees what is coming. I
believe he sees it in a vivid soul shaking vision that causes him to
weep.
·
Notice Jesus reference to stones again. This time the
stones/rocks in Jerusalem are reduced to rubble. Archeologically
speaking, these rocks ever since have been loudly proclaiming, “He told
you so, it happened just as he said it would.” Are not the rocks
doing God’s will now at Jerusalem, after Jerusalem’s rejection? The
rubble speaks.
How deep does your declaration go when you hail him as King? Who has been
king of your life even this last week?
SIMILAR TEARS
Philip. 3:18-19 [NIV]
For, as I have often told you before and
now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of
Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and
their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things.
This message
would have been perfect words to apply to the Palm Sunday Parade Crowd.
Yet Paul was addressing a different crowd. Many in the crowd following
Jesus are still very much like the crowd in that parade.
Reflect:
·
“Many live as enemies of the cross”? Enemies of the
cross are found in the parade following Jesus! They don’t consider
themselves enemies of Jesus, yet they “live as” enemies of the cross.
·
What does it mean to be an enemy of the cross. Paul spells
it out. It means “their god is their stomach”. It means their glory is
misplaced. They do not glory in the cross but rather their glory is in
their shame. Their passions are misdirected.
·
It means their mind is not on heavenly things but on earthly
things. That is where they get their meaning, pleasure, and that is where
their passions are aimed.
·
It means they practice the way of indulgence rather than the
way of self denial.
·
It means a shallow confession but actions that are dumber
than a box of rocks as the cross is avoided.
·
The dangerous thing about this description is that it might
describe some confessing “followers” in the parade. I must admit that
there are times that I shy away from the cross, and instead of humbling
myself there, I go my way rather than his way.
Make eye contact with Jesus.
Today, just like the crowd in Jerusalem, we find
ourselves clambering in the procession of Jesus. Let’s pause right here
in the bottle necked crowd that stops and looks into the eyes of Jesus
moist with tears. Would you do that right now? Make eye contact with
Jesus. I wonder what He finds when He looks into our faces?
What about you, oh follower of Jesus, waving the Palm
Branches of confession.
Ø
Have you been serving yourself as god? Have you been
serving your flesh as Lord of your life?
Ø
What has been your “glory”, do you glory in your shame? Are
your passions misdirected? Have you dulled the correct desires in your
life? Has your mind and heart been stuck in the wrong places?
Ø
Forgive us, Lord, help us to draw near to the cross again.
Help us to deny ourselves, pick up my crosses, and follow you. Fill us
with your spirit and wash our hearts clean.
Ø
Thank you for your Triumphal Entry, and your willingness to
go all the way to the cross for me. Thank you for your willingness to
absorb my sin, and release me. Lord, here I am beneath the cross. I
humble myself there. Wash me clean and make me new again so that my
confession is not shallow or false.
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