Lay Down Your Cloak: The Humble King's Invitation

The king is riding on a donkey and doesn't ride into Jerusalem to execute his enemies. He rides to Jerusalem to be executed for them. The hands that hold the universe together will be soon nailed to a piece of wood so that you could be healed by his wounds. He does not bait and switch. He does not manipulate. He is exactly who he appears to be, lowly, humble, fiercely in love with you, worthy of your full surrender. [00:41:47] (48 seconds)  #HumbleKingSacrifice

Jesus is orchestrating the anti triumph. He arrives with no armor, no army, no weapons. He's riding on an unbroken donkey, an animal of peace. He's entirely exposed. He isn't flexing his muscle or trying to intimidate anyone. He's looking at this abused and cynical and broken people and saying to them, I am not like the other leaders who have hurt you. I am safe. [00:38:49] (43 seconds)  #PeaceNotPower

Imagine what our church would look like if we stopped hiding behind the armor, our cynicism and our guilt, that we wouldn't have to pretend that we had it all together. We could just be a group of broken people sitting in a circle, bringing our real selves to the king and allowing his love for us to set us free, allowing us to be who he created us to be, alive, free, loved, full of joy and peace. [00:49:43] (42 seconds)  #AuthenticChurch

As I watched them worship, God gently lifted the heavy cloak of guilt off my shoulders. He looked at my feelings of failure, and he grinned. He showed me that my ministry wasn't a failure at all, that the youth had learned the most single most important lesson, that they connected with him. They knew that if they gathered and worshiped him, that he would come by, that he would minister to them, that they would experience not a grimace but a grin, and that he would give them life, living water. [00:48:06] (45 seconds)  #GraceOverGuilt

It was their way of saying, I'm taking off my armor. I'm choosing to believe that you are who you say you are. I am surrendering my heart to you, Jesus. This morning, Jesus is riding into the chaotic, broken streets of your life, and he's asking for your cloak. Your cloak, it's cynicism, self protection. It's the thing that you wear to keep yourself from not being disappointed by others. [00:40:26] (42 seconds)  #TakeOffYourCloak

We often read this as people rolling out the red carpet for Jesus coming to town. But in the first century, a cloak was a poor person's ultimate protection. It it saved them from the freezing rain. It was the thing that you would carry with you to sleep with at night. It was your protection from the hard elements around you. To take off your cloak and to throw it in the dirt at the feet of the king wasn't just a sign of respect. It was a shocking act of vulnerability. [00:39:48] (38 seconds)  #CloakDroppedForKing

To let go of our need to control, our need to protect. Let our eyes catch yours, and may your heart strangely strangely warm ours, setting us free from all that fear and anxiety that lives often in the dark corners of our soul. Set us free. Set us free. So we might sing and worship and love you as you deserve. And, Lord, as you do that here in each one of our hearts, as you do that in our community, as we walk through Holy Week together, we pray that that culture would penetrate into our families, into our community, and spread a forest fire of love, hope, the world, in desperate need. Father, work that in us and through us. [00:56:34] (87 seconds)  #LetGoAndBeLoved

that you'd expect a look of disappointment, that you'd hear a long lecture of how you missed the mark. But when you do finally look up and your eye catches his, it won't be a grimace. It will be a grin. It's pure. It's holy. It's overwhelming love, compassion for you. I know it to be true because I have looked up in my shame, in my brokenness, in my own lostness, my own disappointment. He didn't lecture. He loved. [00:43:15] (59 seconds)  #GrinNotGrimace