Embracing Tension: Palm Sunday and Following Jesus

They expect him to overthrow Rome and create his own earthly kingdom, but here's something we need to learn too as well that Jesus didn't come to set up an earthly kingdom. He's he came here to set up a heavenly kingdom because none of the governments or political figures can solve the problem of sin. And as king, he's proclaiming that only I have the power to do that. And here's the thing is that even with all their expectations, we know that later on, that same crowd was the one shouting, crucify him. And in our own lives, we do the same. [00:34:38] (44 seconds)  #HeavenlyKingdom

See, these people with these palm branches, they're not there by just happenstance, accident. They're not, like, texting each other, hey. Is Jesus on the way? Did you hear Jesus is coming? Actually, this is a divine appointment because the people would have celebrated the fact in their tradition that people would have palm branches ready to welcome the spotless land that would be brought into the temple as a sacrifice for the people. And guess who is riding through that Eastern gate at that exact moment? As the spotless lamb of God who would take away the sins of the world. [00:33:03] (45 seconds)  #DivinePalmEntry

So not only does he embrace his identity, he embraces his authority that would also bring some tension. Because in scripture, he talks about how he has the authority to heal, but also to forgive sin. And to the religious leaders, they don't like that because what does that mean? He's claiming to be God. If you were to look in Matthew chapter nine verse two to seven or Luke five verse 21, we read about the story about how Jesus heals this paralyzed man, and he says, well, which is easier to do? Is it to forgive sins or to say get up and walk? And guess what he does? He does both. [00:25:59] (41 seconds)  #HealAndForgive

We ought to learn from Palm Sunday that we can embrace his promises rather than the empty promises of tomorrow. Because in our world, we're counting on a lot of things to go right in order for us to follow Jesus. But here's the reality. If you wait for the right conditions to follow Jesus, it's never gonna happen. Just it just isn't. Today is your day to decide to follow Jesus because his promises never return void. They never they never have a moment where they haven't been right or it's or the promise has changed. [00:44:22] (44 seconds)  #FollowJesusNow

See, he will give us everything that we need to live for him. So how do we live in the tension? I think it's simple this morning. I think as we reflect on Palm Sunday and the celebration that it brought, I think we also need to reflect on the fact that just as Jesus knew that death was coming and that life was gonna come after, that we also need to die to ourselves and be raised up with him. It's time that we start to die to our sin, to deny ourselves, and to follow him fully in the life that he's called us. [00:48:50] (49 seconds)  #DieToSelf

Here's what I need you to know is that Jesus embraced all this tension leading up to Good Friday, and yet he never changed his mind about the cross. He never changed his mind. It would have been easy for him to say, this is not worth it. The pain I'm gonna suffer, the the betrayal I'm gonna have to endure, the disappointment in my disciples that I'm gonna have to work through. I mean, Jesus had every reason to turn back when he could and do it another way. [00:38:17] (40 seconds)  #UnwaveringCrossCommitment

But here's the thing, friends, is that Jesus loves you and I so much, this was the only way. This was the only way that he could demonstrate to you and I that even when there's tension, even when there's difficulty and there's uncertainty, that in all that, Jesus never changes his mind. And in fact, scripture would back that up. It says that God has never changed his mind. He is not a man that he would change his mind like we do. [00:38:57] (31 seconds)  #GodNeverChanges

And this is something I actually say to my students a lot, and, and here's the reason. So I I tell them this that we can't operate by our feelings. We need to operate by faith. Because here's the thing. If we all operated by our feelings, then we would be given every reason to not become more like Jesus, but to but to just use our pain and our loss, our suffering, our disappointment to justify our sin. And so we need to learn that we're called to more, that we have a purpose to live for, and that person is Jesus. [00:46:10] (39 seconds)  #FaithNotFeelings