Hosanna to Crucify Him: The Fickleness of the Crowd
First B Jackson
2026-03-29

Automatically transcribed. Where this and the recording disagree, the recording is the record.

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Thank thank you, Judy. Wow. That's time for children's church downstairs. Judy has been playing here for fifty years. Right?

Fifty years. Typically, in the second, when some of the words to the song she just played were, could we with ink the ocean fill and where the skies of parchment? We would think the ocean fill and where the skies of parchment made. Where every stalk on earth a quill and every man a scribe by trade to write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry nor could the scroll contain the hole. Though stretch from sky to sky.

That's powerful. Yeah. Thank you. Alright. Here we go.

It's Palm Sunday. So all week long, I have been wrestling between it's Palm Sunday. I need to preach about Palm Sunday but I do that every year or it's we're in Ephesians and Ephesians is awesome. In Ephesians three is the just pinnacle for me of this awesomeness and so which do I do? So, I prepared two sermons and you're going to hear both of them.

No, I'm just kidding. We're going to do Palm Sundays to begin with and we'll see how it goes. The next day, this is from John 12. Spoiler alert, if you're in the men's study on Thursdays, we're in John nine right now but John or John eight, I think. John 12, the next day, the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem.

So, they took branches of palm trees and they went out to meet him. So, every year, we kind of have the kids come in and wave palm branches and it's fun. This was more than. It was a it was different than that and if you're looking in the next day, the crowd, large crowd. So, they come to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover and they're getting there and they get there early and there's a lot of tailgating that's already happening, okay?

Pregame is already happening. March Madness, if you will. They took branches of palm trees and they went out to meet him. So, the context of this is Jesus has just raised Lazarus. Now, there are lots of things that Jesus did.

There are lots of miracles that we hear about but raising the dead in this kind of proximity to Passover at this time was something that drew a lot of attention. So, the backstory is that and it says, so they took branches of palm trees and they went out to meet him and they were crying out which we just sang. Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Even the king of Israel and so there, Hosanna, Hosanna are the shouts and they're calling him the king of Israel. They want to raise him up.

Now, you know that we have various Herods who have been in charge and literally have been the kings of Israel since Jesus was born and with the slaughter of the innocents trying to get him and John the Baptist proclaiming him and all of that. We see all of this. Who's the king of Israel? They're saying Jesus is the king of Israel when he's coming in. Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

That's the Hebrew on it and the Greek on it and the English on that Hosanna. This is, oh Lord, I beseech you and I think this is English standard version Maybe the NIV but English standard says, save now. That's what Hosanna means. There's a timeline to it and there's an an element of salvation in the Greek. It's day like, save us now.

Please. We need it. We're oppressed. We're oppressed and we want to rise up against our oppressors. You're the king.

You're the only one that can do this. Here's a palm tree branch. Oh Lord, I beseech you, send prosperity now. We don't want what we have. We want what you and you alone can bring us.

Save us, we pray, oh Lord. Oh Lord, we pray, give us success. This is from Psalm one eighteen twenty five twenty six. It is a ESV. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

We bless you from the very house of the Lord. We bless you and so Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it. There are parallels in the other gospels for this account too but this is all from John. Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it just as it is written in Zechariah, minor prophet that we have not yet gotten to on Sunday morning but we got to it in various Bible studies that y'all have been in and Zechariah is tough but this is a point of it's one of those silver linings in the very dark cloud of Zechariah's prophecy. Rejoice greatly, oh daughter of Zion.

Shout aloud, oh daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, for your king is coming to you. He is righteous and having salvation is he and he is humble and mounted on a donkey on a colt on the foal of a donkey and that is the way that Jesus entered into this triumphal procession from the Mount Of Olives down and up. Into the city. Fear not just it is written.

Fear not, daughter of Zion. Behold, your king is coming sitting on a donkey's colt. So, that is John explicitly attributing this. The just as it is written is this have been foretold for many many years and as we're thinking about it, Amos. Amos says, the Lord God does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants, the prophets first.

He's told you ahead of time that goodness is on the way. He's told you ahead of time and he's not just capricious and he doesn't do anything just willy nilly. He has a plan. He's working a plan. He reveals that plan in a veiled way.

We will say to the prophets but he doesn't do anything without revealing a secret to his servants, the prophets, and it helps greatly with your faith. If you know these verses and then you see them happening in front of you, that was what was happening with this group of people right here. Here we go. Fear not, daughter of Zion. Behold, your king is coming sitting on a donkey's colt.

His disciples did not understand these things at first. Can I get a witness? Do you ever feel like that? I'm his disciple and I don't understand these things at first. His disciples did not understand these things at first but when Jesus was glorified, so they had been this band of various people from zealots and pharisaical types all blended together, tax collectors, sinners, gathered together into this band and they're following after men.

We see them putting their foot in their mouth over and over and over again asking what we think now are stupid questions but they were seeing Jesus before he was glorified and we are seeing him after we've had a while to process through this, right? They didn't understand these things at first but when Jesus was glorified, they remembered that these things had been written about him and had been done to him and so, what are those things? Well, we know explicitly this one because he literally is sitting on a donkey, right? The foal of a donkey. He comes in on that and so that one's explicit.

That's the verse right before this. They didn't understand these things but then they remembered but there were a lot of others too. Psalm one eighteen, this is what they're calling out. So, this they're recognizing. I'm going to read the whole shebang right here.

The the last portion, that last half, I guess, of Psalm one eighteen. Shouts of joy and victory. We call this the triumphal entry. So, they are singing out shouts of joy and victory. They're resounding in the tents of the righteous and they saw themselves as being the righteous.

The Lord's right hand has done mighty things. The Lord's right hand is lifted high. The Lord's right hand has done mighty things. I will not die but I will live. I will proclaim what the Lord has done.

The Lord has chastened me severely. You hear the hint of oppression in there? But he's not given me over to death. Open for me the gates of the righteous and I will enter and I will give thanks to the Lord. This is the gate of the Lord through which the righteous may enter.

I will give you thanks for you answered me. You have become my salvation. The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is true of Jesus. It was true of Jesus when it was written.

It's true when these people are calling back on it and singing just a quick verse of it. The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. The Lord has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes. The Lord has done it this very day. Let us rejoice today and be glad.

Lord, Hosanna, save us. Lord, grant us success. Hosanna. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord from the house of the Lord, we bless you. The Lord is God and he has made his light to shine upon us with boughs in hand, palm branches in hand.

Join in this festal procession up to the horns of the altar. You are my God and I will praise you. You are my God and I will exalt you. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good. His love endures forever.

Forever. They were singing it back then. It's not just Chris Tomlin. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good. His love endures forever and that refrain goes throughout not just this Psalm but Psalm 136 and other Psalms and other places in the Old Testament.

It's a fairly frequent refrain that the has said, the sticky love of God endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good. His love endures forever. Perhaps, if you're this, if you know, you know, alright? Daniel nine twenty five, they may have been thinking about it.

This is not explicit. The other two are explicit but Daniel nine twenty five for especially folks from a dispensational background. You hear seven weeks and sixty two weeks and if you do the math on this, it's 4776977483 and Artaxerxes the first of Persian and Nehemiah dated 445 to 444. If you add to that 483, you come up with Jesus' triumphal entry. Okay.

I'm not saying it's not true but it's a lot more math than I usually do. It's from the time that the announcement that the temple was going to be rebuilt, it will be sixty nine seasons of seven before this happens and the anointed one will come into Jerusalem. That's Jesus. Okay. The crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead.

You remember that story? Lazarus, come forth. I love the story. I heard a guy say one time, the reason he said, Lazarus, come forth is because if he had just said come forth, everybody would have come forth. Lazarus, come forth.

He calls Lazarus out of the tomb. He raised him from the dead. Y'all take those grave clothes off of him. Those people continue to bear witness. So if you saw somebody literally one week before Passover and you believe that he might be the Messiah and then he calls a dead man out of the grave.

What's a really really good thing that you could have if you were hoping to proclaim war on the oppressive Romans. The ability to call back your soldiers from the dead would be pretty good. They continue to bear witness. I saw him do it. I saw the guy dead.

I know it was four days. It's not three days. It's not two days. It's four days. I know.

I was one of the mourners and then I saw him calling forth. They continue to bear witness about it. So, the raising of Lazarus in close proximity like this is how far away it is. Bethany is less than two miles. It's just on the other side of the Mount Of Olives from this shape, whatever that is, polygon is is the Temple Mount.

So from the temple, it's less than two miles to Bethany. And that's where Mary and Martha and Lazarus lived and that's where he was buried. And so for this to travel two miles, that's not a big deal. That's from here to the Maverick. Okay.

That's not far. Word gets around. If you raise somebody from dead at the Maverick, word will get around. So, crowd one is the witnesses to Lazarus' resurrection but it goes on from there and it says, the reason why the crowd though went out to meet him because the the crowd that was with Jesus at Lazarus' resurrection were staying with him but there were others that came to meet him and those that says, they had heard that he had done the sign and now, they're saying, this is our guy. This is our guy and these are the ones that are coming out with the palm branches.

These are the ones that are coming out saying, this is the this is the one. Blessed is he. He's coming in the name of lord. This is the king of Israel. I don't care who Herod, which Herod is on the throne right now.

I don't care if Pontius Pilate is in charge as a governor. No. This guy is our king. So, I would call him national nationalists went out. They were Jewish nationalists and they were the crowd that went out to meet him when they heard that this and you might say, I don't know how you get Jewish nationalist from that.

Well, taking branches of palm trees is how I get to that. Palm trees were a symbol of Israel. They had been for a long, long, long, long time. And if you look at the coins from the Hasmonean revolt about a hundred and thirty five BC, you get that as a palm branch. You look at Maccabees.

Now, I know we don't have it in our Bible, but that that mean we can't read it. Okay? Y'all read Sports Illustrated too, don't you? So, Simon regains the citadel at Jerusalem. It says, the Jews entered in with praise and palm branches with harps and cymbals and stringed instruments and hymns and songs because a great enemy had been crushed and removed.

These were the salucids at the time. The salucids were a hundred and thirty five, hundred and forty four, hundred and forty one BC was when it happened but that coin that was minted was a coin in remembrance of this occasion and it had the palm branch on it because it's I hate to say it's like old glory but it's kind of like old glory. When you're waving the flag, you're waving the flag, you're saying something, you're stirring something up And that's what they were doing with the palm branches then, so that's a different coin. This is the coin of Herod Antipas who is in charge at this time. So you see the palm branch right there?

And this is kind of under the radar. This is like, yeah, the Romans are in charge but they're letting us mint this money. We're gonna mint the money the way we want to mint this money. Do you get it? It's on a lot of their currency.

It just keeps going. So also this the instruments are on there. It's celebrating that time. When you remember those bad guys that used to be in charge here and we kicked them out. That's the this is current currency at the time when this happened.

So, the background of the raising of Lazarus, I think is a big deal that you can't underestimate. Man raised from the dead, two miles from the temple, and he's coming in just at the right time. Something greater than Solomon is here. They're recognizing that. Humble and mattered on a donkey.

Now, I could say this, he did not enter on a big white Arabian steed, Clydesdale, Fargo, anything like that. It wasn't a big, strong war horse with armor. It's a foal of a donkey, humble, and mounted. Now, when he was approaching Jerusalem, it says in Luke, he saw the city and he wept over it and he was saying, if only you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace. He was not coming in for war.

Now, what they wanted was war. That's what they were going out to greet and blessed is he who comes in the name. He's our deliverer. Send prosperity now. Great is thy faithfulness.

But lord, great is our fickleness. Because we see it turn I forgot to put this in there. Great is thy faithfulness, oh God my father. There is no shadow of turning with thee, thou changest not. Thy compassions, they fail not.

As thou hast been, thou forever will be. Pardon for sin, a peace that endureth, thine own dear presence to cheer into God, strength for today, and bright hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine with 10,000 beside. Great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness.

Morning by morning, new mercies I see. And if God is offering us mercies, what should we be offering other people? Mercy. All I've needed, the hand has provided, great is thy faithfulness, lord unto me. Fickle.

God is faithful and he is good and he when he describes himself, he says that he is patient and long suffering. He's merciful and he forgives iniquity. But we are fickle. We are marked by a lack of steadfastness, constancy or stability, and we are given to erratic changeableness. Would you say that's true?

Yeah. Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it. Of mankind, I've got a few quotes for you. Of mankind, we may say in general, they are fickle, hypocritical, and greedy of gain. Machiavelli said that.

Don't quote him very often but so why am I doing this message on Palm Sunday? I mentioned it. But this, the next thing we get to, you know, this is where we just were. Hosanna, hosanna, triumph, triumph. That's 12.

John thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, and 17 are all with the disciples, upper room and then, we get the arrest in the garden and in John 19, it picks up right here. So, Pilate took Jesus and scourged him. By this time, he's already declared him innocent more than once. His wife has said, please have nothing to do with the execution of this man. He's took Jesus and scourged and the soldiers twisted a crown of thorns and put it on his head and they put on him a purple robe and then they said, hail, king of the Jews, knocking him.

And they struck him with their hands and Pilate then went out again and said to him, behold, I'm bringing him out to you that you may know that I find no fault in him. He's declaring him innocent again. And then Jesus came out. He was wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe and Pilate said to them, behold the man and therefore, when the chief priest and officers saw him, they cried out saying, crucify him, crucify him. Now, a week before, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Now, was it the same crowd? Pretty much. Now, maybe not. Chief priest, they always hated him and officers, they always hated him. Crucify him.

Pilate said to them, you take him and you crucify him for I find no fault in me, declares him innocent again. He is innocent. He's innocent. And from then on, Pilate sought to release him. And what a lily liver chicken he was because he had the power to release him.

But he didn't because he was scared of politics of the situation. And unfortunately, human beings are pretty scared of politics of the situation. It just is that way in most situations. From then on, Pilate sought to release him but the Jews cried out saying, if you let this man go, you're not Caesar's friend. Whoever makes himself a king speaks against Caesar.

Now, when Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus out and he sat down in the judgment and he said to the Jews again, behold your king and then they cried out, away with him, away with him, crucify him. Pilate said to them, shall I crucify your king? And the chief priest answered, we have no king but Caesar. Really? They're the chief priests?

God forbid. We have no king but Caesar and then he delivered him to them to be crucified. So, they took Jesus and they led him away. We are a puny and fickle folk. Avarice hesitation and following are our diseases.

That was Emerson. I've got one more in there I think. Our criteria for doubt deciding what's good and what's bad is very fickle, in this country. This is from the seventies. Roberta Flack said that.

Oh my goodness. Killing me softly, Roberta Flack. Alright. Is the story just gonna repeat itself? Is it gonna just be that way where we want what we want?

I hope not. I'm a pray right here and then I've got fifteen more minutes. We're gonna do Ephesians two. Ephesians three also. Yeah.

Can I pray? Lord God, we come to you confessing that we are indeed a fickle people even when we don't wanna be, lord. Fear gets the best of us. We say we want you to be in our life and we applaud you but then we wander. We don't always want to listen to the truth that you are teaching us about ourselves.

And there are times, Lord, when we don't want to hear the truth. So if you want to tell us, if you won't tell us, Lord, what it is that we want to hear or if your truth makes us uncomfortable, uncomfortable, we often just listen to someone else. So today, lord, you're calling us to be more loving and you're calling us to be more compassionate. You're calling us to arrest our fickle behavior, our wavering between two opinions to fully trust in Jesus. You're calling us to strengthen ourselves in the faith.

So, you want us to trust that you love us. You want us to know and trust Jesus, not religion or procedure, protocols, politics, tradition, or even superior education. Lord, you're calling us to love you with our all, with our whole heart and mind and soul and strength and you're calling us with everything that we have in this world to put our relationship with Jesus first and in so doing, to love our neighbors as ourselves. You want for us to do our part to help make this world a place that's free from hate and brutality. You want for us to be doing that.

That's what Jesus came to do and we are the continuing body of Christ. Lord, help us. You want us to fill this world with your unconditional love and compassion through living out the gospel. God almighty, would you show us how in our day? Would you show us how?

You want us to demonstrate the kingdom of heaven on earth by loving others in such a way that you could call others to your grace and your repentance for them to earnestly seek your face and your truth. Lord, you want us to be with you forever and ever and not shrink back in fear or pull away in pride. Lord, I pray that you will speak and you will teach and that we will listen and we will learn. Amen. Amen.

So, Ephesians. Here we are. Ephesians three starts this way. For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles. He's in jail.

He hasn't mentioned that lately. He's gonna mention it again at the end of this chapter. For this reason, I, Paul, I'm a prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles. If indeed you have heard of the administration of God's grace which was given to me for you. Paul recognized this as God's grace to him.

He had a very daunting task of, well, I'll tell you what it is. Let me let him tell you. If indeed you have heard of the administration of God's grace, the form that God's unmerited favor took on Paul was you get to share this with the Gentiles. You get to share all of the history of the Old Testament and you get to frame it in a way that says, God loves you and he has a plan for your life. That by revelation, God revealed it to him.

There was made known to me the mystery. As I wrote to you before briefly, we don't have that first Ephesians letter. We don't have that note that we know of, okay? But he had let them already know kind of how it happened. I assume that he let them know the story of Acts on the Damascus Road and all of that sort of stuff but he says, you already know that story.

And the my insight into the mystery of Christ which in other generations was not made known to mankind. There have been years and years and years where we had a glimpse of it from the prophets but there have been a silence of four hundred years intertestamental silence. And so for at least four hundred years, the authoritative voice of God was just ringing out from the major prophets, minor prophets, Torah, and the books of the history, they're still ringing out but they haven't had an authoritative word from God until Christ, until John the Baptist, speaking of Christ, right? So, by referring to this, when you read and you can understand my insight into the mystery of the anointed one, Christ, Messiah, which in other generations was not made known to mankind as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles, the ones he himself sent out and prophets in the spirit. Those could be the old time prophets but he's saying that there are some who are prophesying now and we do have Agabus and a few others in the New Testament that were prophesying about Christ.

To be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body and they are fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the good news, the gospel. So, this section right here, he's saying that's the specific part that I am here to tell you about. Like, if you go back, this is the mystery that is being revealed that it's not just for the Jews. So, if you add this to my triumphal entry and the nationalistic tendencies, it's if you're going to be the victor, you're going to conquer over someone, right? He's saying, it's for everyone.

The gospel is to go forth for everyone. Christ says, love your enemies. Oh, really? The Gentiles are fellow heirs. They're fellow members of the body.

They're fellow partakers of the promise in Christ through the gospel of which I was made a minister. This is the gift that he's given to me. According to gift of God's grace, his unmerited favor towards me means I get to be the spokesperson that tells this, that the gospel is for everybody and it always was. We were misunderstanding. We're no longer misunderstanding.

It's for everybody. Of which I was made a minister according to the gift of God's grace which was given to me according to the working of his power, Dunamis. His power, his spirit. To me, the very least of all the saints. He means that.

He's he recognizes that it's God's grace that it's not merited, that he had been opposed to the way and now, he is the spokesperson. He knows he doesn't wreck. He knows that he doesn't merit it. To me, the very least of all the saints, this grace. Now, this grace was given.

The grace that was given Paul was to preach to the Gentiles. Christ and to enlighten all people as to what the plan of the mystery is which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things. To preach to the Gentiles and to enlighten all peoples. I could put an S on them that. To clap your hand all you people.

When they were singing that triumphal entry song, they were just singing to me my four and no more, just us, right? We're the victorious ones. God's going to save us. Paul recognizes that God is going to save through us. Yes, he saved us but he's going to save through us and that is the mystery.

He's saying, I'm supposed to preach to the Gentiles unfathomable riches of the anointed one. Jesus, he's the only one and to enlighten all the people as to what the plan of the mystery is which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things. Why? So that the multifaceted wisdom of God might now be made known. If you sit with that and go, God is infinitely wise and his infinite wisdom is now being made available in all its different forms through the church.

Now, I'm gonna capitalize the C on church. Okay. Through all of the believers and all in Christ throughout all the eras, the ones who put their faith in God for Messiah. So that the multifaceted wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and to the authorities in heavenly places. If you go back to the first chapter, I didn't break this all down.

I didn't think I have this much time. Sorry. On the slides, right? But if you go back to the first chapter, he says that you are alive in the heavenlies. Though you were dead in your trespasses, you are have been made alive in the heavenly places.

This is already true. Now, be acting on that, right? So, this is how God is going to make known. When I say that we are the body of Christ or when we say as the church that we are the body of Christ, we are continuing the mission that Jesus began. He did stuff that we cannot do but because he has done that, the proclamation of that falls upon us.

To proclaim this to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places to the whole cosmos. That God is using the church. The ones who have taken him at his word and trusted him to proclaim the goodness of God to the whole cosmos and this was in accordance with the eternal purpose. He's working a plan. He's got a plan and he's working the plan.

Now, Jesus was the plan from the beginning and those who trust in him is the plan from now on, okay? From now to the end of the time, the church is plan A. There is no plan B. If you want to be a part of that, you want to be in accordance with the eternal purpose which God the father carried out in Christ Jesus our lord. It's in him, Christ Jesus, our lord, that we have boldness and confident access through him, through faith in him.

Now, that takes us back to the last chapter where it says, it is by grace, unmerited favor. Through faith and it is our little measure of belief. It's our little measure that God has given us, our ability to place our faith in Christ. We can place it in anything but it's only saving faith if it's placed in the savior and so, we have confident access and boldness and we can be a part of the plan of God for the rest of the world because this is his plan for the rest of the world. Through faith in him.

In whom? In Christ Jesus. That's right. And I think that's the last slide. Is that the last slide?

Yeah. That's the last slide. So the last song we're gonna sing today, and I might come back and hit on Ephesians three, but I told Van I'd preach it today because he's preaching in two weeks and he needed to know where he was going to be. Verse 13 is Paul just reminded him and saying, oh yeah, don't worry about me being in prison. I needed the rest.

Okay. I'm fine. It's for your glory. It's not a big deal. It's fine.

That's verse 13. Would you stand? Judy's going to play. Maria, would you come forward and sing? And we're going to sing, were you there?

We're only going to sing the first three verses. Now, I know that y'all know the story and y'all know that resurrection is coming and that's what we're celebrating next week. We'll sing the fourth verse next Sunday.