The Lowly King: Palm Sunday

Mark 11:1-11

This Palm Sunday message explores the humble kingship of Jesus as he enters Jerusalem riding not on a war horse, but on a donkey. While the crowd expected power, overthrow, and immediate change, Jesus revealed a kingdom built on humility, sacrifice, and inner transformation. A timely reflection on whether we want the Jesus of the crowd or the Jesus of the cross.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Awesome. Now one more time for Paulie and the kids, man. Today's Palm Sunday. It's uh today's the first day of the last week of Jesus' life. And Paulie's given us a great insight there into the fact that Jesus he went ahead into and instructed some people to find a donkey. He rode in on this donkey, and then we we see the next step with this fig tree and then this temple courts. But I just want to talk today just about those few verses at the start of Matthew 11 where Jesus the um in in Mark and I think also in Matthew calls it the triumphant or the triumphal entry. When you read that, if I said to you, oh, there was a triumphal entry of a king or a dignitary into our city, you'd start to think, oh yeah, cool. Like uh recently at the Mawell prayer gathering, uh, that would have been at the it was probably um in the middle of February, Christopher Luxon and a few of the other dignitaries of our city were there, and there was a few like um sneaky security guards in the crowd, you know, those little FBI CIA airpieces, you know, and I was scoping them out, wondering if I could take them. I couldn't. And I was looking there, and and there's there's fanfare, there's motorcades, and there's there's protocol and process for these dignitaries that come, even in little old New Zealand. Imagine if you step that up and start to think about some of the major players of the G7 or the G8 or different prime ministers and leaders in the world, and it would be these um these significant moments. And we read triumph and entry, we think, oh, it must have been amazing. And here's Jesus fulfilling the prophecy from Zechariah 9, I think in verse 10, where it says that your king, the king of the Jews, will come into Jerusalem on a donkey, the foal of a donkey, a cult, one that had never been ridden. And so we have this picture of Jesus coming in, embracing his kingship on a donkey. I don't know about you if you've ever done um like horse riding at like a camp, like a like a family camp, and they have these horses. And you know, we watch horses on films, and like when you meet someone who knows horses, I know Tish, like for instance, loves horses and they had horses, and you got you see someone who loves horses and the way they take care of horses, or you know, uh Thomas Shelby on Peaky Blinders, kind of like a horse whisperer, and it's kind of cool. That was that that was deeper, you know, and um and a lot of nods there too, more than I was expecting. Hopefully, more for the Bible. And so we've got you got the my point is this, though, is that horses that they're awesome. And when you go to these family camps and they're like, we're gonna do horse riding, and you kind of roll out there, like, let's go, Aragorn, like I'm ready to ride this horse, Gandalf, and then they bring out the horses. And Seinfeld has got this bit where he calls them a U-shaped steed, and you kind of sit on the horse, but your feet are like on the ground as well, you know. You look anything but cool. There might as well be mules, they might as well bring out an animal that's just like a large dog. And here's Jesus of all the things he could pick. I wonder if you were the savior of the world, if you had the power to ask for anything, what you would ride it on. I'd be looking for a unicorn, you know what I mean? A giant, a griffin, I'll be looking for something off Harry Potter to ride it on because to announce my entry. But of all the things that he could have chosen, Jesus, Jesus picked this lowly animal. To say that he came low and humble, uh, I think I think is to understate it. I think it was um maybe humiliating. I think it's maybe embarrassing. My point is this is that there's not much that he could have done to embrace that scene as a king, but to be so low in doing it. And then you have the people. So happy, so thrilled. It's called Palm Sunday because they laid palm branches on the ground with their cloaks, and their cloak was a representation of their identity, their wealth, their dignity. They're laying it on the ground as he comes. It's like it's got this weird, maybe a dichotomy. It's triumphant and celebratory, and yet at the moment so humble and servant-like. It sort of reminds me a little bit of his birth. You have this moment where you've got angels announcing the arrival of Jesus, and shepherds also announcing the arrival of Jesus. I met a shepherd one time. Interesting conversations we had. Because this person wasn't used to talking to people. They spent all of their time raising and taking care of sheep. That you would have these magi, these angels, and then these barn animals. The celebration, this majestic wonder of his birth, but at the same time in a lowly manger. Always with Jesus, these these pictures, these, I think, um adversarial sometimes images of what's happening in the life of Christ. And I think this moment is one of the best. I don't know if you remember, it was um April the 29th, 2011. It was the wedding of um William and Kate Middleton, Earl of Sussex and York, Yorkshire. And they got married. I'm not sure about that last part. They got married, and there were there were hundreds and millions of people viewing this wedding. I don't know if you saw it or if you've since had a look. Pretty cool, pretty amazing. I mean, everyone's there. I'm a Lakers fan, you watch a Lakers game, courtside Lakers, just all of Hollywood. They're just having a great time. Madison Square Garden, New York, next same thing. This was like that, but a wedding. Like they just, I think they had 1,900 invitations to Westminster Abbey. I mean, they had a red carpet. I mean, it's just like I wanted to be there. I don't even know these people. I love a good wedding though, love a good banquet, love the English, that would have been great. And we just, the whole world, whether you like weddings or not, whether you like the royal family or not, the whole world seemed to stop, at this massive, expensive, wonderful, brilliant, magnificent wedding. And then we have Jesus, who coming into Jerusalem, chose not to make it significant or powerful, but humble. Palm Sunday is the start of the last week of his life. Imagine what that would be like knowing that he came to be humiliated. He came to Jerusalem not for fame, not to be crowned a celebrity, but to be beaten and hurt, to pay the ultimate price and to be put on that cross. That this moment was the start of that week. That there was no palace, no army, no spectacle, just a borrowed donkey and an ordinary crowd. No royal robes, just cloaks on the ground. Kings and emperors announce their power through display. Jesus reveals his kingdom through humility and modesty. He empties himself in this powerful moment. The arrival of Jesus reveals, I think, a great misunderstanding of the crowd that was there. And I think that misunderstanding still stands to this day. The crowd was right about the fact that Jesus was king. But the crowd was wrong about the kind of king that he is. They misunderstood the purpose. They would have loved to have a military coup. They would have loved to have a political overthrow. They would have loved, we talked uh a couple weeks back about a bit of biff. They would have loved to have seen some action. And if we're ever going to see it, it's in the book of Mark, the shortest of the four gospels, but the one filled with the most action, a gospel full of the words suddenly, a book a book full of uh conjunctions and adjectives creating a sense of action, like a film. They would have loved to have seen it, but all they saw instead was their savior come in on a donkey. They misunderstood the situation. I don't know if you've ever misunderstood a situation before. I've had that happen to me a couple of times. My friend Andy Gale got married a few years back to his wife, her name is Alex. And we were in Canada at the time. He was a part of our church planting team there, and and he they they connected through us a like on social media, as is the story maybe of many people of our time. And the the like, the impression on socials then led to a DM and then a conversation, and she was in Florida, he was in Canada, then they met, and then, you know, and then happily ever after. And they got married kind of during the COVID era, and that was always tricky during that time to kind of like gather people, and it was all, you know, and Canada's got a lot of bureaucracy too, and they were strict on the rules. We know that was like. I don't want to trigger anybody, have some PTSD from those kind of lockdowns, but it was kind of in that zone. And then they said, hey, we want to get married, we'll have a celebration and a wedding later, but we just want to just, you know, just lock it in. Like an elopement is what I thought. And they said, Can you come down and sign the documents down at the city hall? And I was like, Yeah, yeah, no problem. And so as I left the house to drive through the snow to get to City Hall to sign the documents with my friend Andy and his fiancee Alex, I said to Nads, hey, am I dressed okay? And she's like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally fine. I think the issue with Nadia in that scenario is that she just always looks good. So even if she just leaves, looking bad potentially, it just works for her. Yeah, the family joke is you could throw a paper bag on her head, it would just look amazing, you know? So she's like, I think she just thinks that about everybody. Yeah, yeah, great, amazing. I was wearing a red plaid shirt, green camo pants, and Doc Martin's. That's what I was wearing. And so as I'm leaving, so it's and if if husbands, if you ever ask, if you need to ask, the answer is no, you don't look good. You need a you need to upgrade. And I think being underdressed is one of the most embarrassing things you could do. So I turn up to City Hall, and I'm still thinking, I should be good, but maybe not, but I got Nadia's stick of approval, that's all I need. And I get there, and um, and I thought it was just we're just gonna sign some documents, uh the legal documents to get married, like an elopement. And um, no, I turned up. Alex was wearing, you know, a white dress. Not like a really formal bridal gown, and not just like a summer dress, right in the middle. And straight away I'm like, oh no. So I spent the next 45 minutes sizing up all the guests to see who's got a blazer that would um that I could fit. Just if I'm just if in the in the I'm just thinking in the photos, just from the top up. If I'm if I'm wearing a blazer, it can cover a multitude of sins, right? And I start trying on people's blazers, too small, too big, you know, it's like Goldilocks and the three bears, you know, like I just couldn't find, couldn't find the right thing. Then what happened was when we started the ceremony, though I was like, Yeah, cool, so we'll just sign it here on this on this desk with this clerk, you know, and they're like, Oh no, we're thinking a little bit more because we want people to be involved. I was like, what people? He goes, Oh, all the guests that are arriving. I was like, who's arriving? He goes, Oh, here they're here. 20 to 30 people start walking down the hall to us at City Hall. And I was like, oh, and I knew them, they were all from church. Be like, if you guys came, and then we would just laugh about it. Like some of them would go, bro, you know, I don't, just can we just laugh later? Let's be serious now, laugh later, you know. Then um, I don't know if you remember um, what was it called? It wasn't called Periscope, it was a live streaming app before they became just something that everyone had on their phone. It was like one of the early apps. Like I think only old Boomer mega church pastors used this app. And everyone was just like, bang, this was FaceTime, this was Periscope, whatever it was. This was, and that all of a sudden had like four or five iPads filming us do the wedding. And then they go, No, we need a better backdrop. So now we're walking through City Hall. This story's too long for the point that it's gonna make, but that's okay, you're used to it. And we and then we found this Christmassy backdrop with with fake snow, but snow outside the window, and beautiful, you know, sort of like Canadian pine trees and whatever, like a PC nativity scene, you know, sort of sans Jesus, you know what I mean? Like, but it was kind of cool, and then and then there we were, and so they're standing in the middle, and normally if I'm if I'm doing a wedding, you know, I'll be like kind of in the middle facilitating, but you definitely want to get out the way, but you've got to kind of you're kind of facilitating, but you want to get out of the way. Oh, for their wedding, I was standing so far away from any photo or any live stream, I'm like shouting, do you take this man? You know, oh man. I misunderstood the assignment, like too long, eh? Probably too long. Yeah, good. So self-critique, keep the story shorter, keep it moving, keep it moving. Misunderstood the assignment. The crowd is there and they misunderstand what's happening because they're happy. Imagine someone being happy, but you knew your life was about to end, but you couldn't tell them. Imagine a crowd being happy that you'd arrived, but you knew deep down it was about to go particularly bad. But imagine you've been trying to tell your closest friends, hey, like Jerusalem's gonna get ugly, and they're like, Yeah, crack up, you know, overthrow Rome. And he turns up on this donkey, I think, to even further illustrate. We've been talking about the kingdom of God for about the last six or seven weeks, and I think this donkey moment for me illustrates so clearly what it is that he's wanting us to buy into. Because if he came like a Roman emperor on a golden horse, our lives would try and reflect that. Oh now we become uber capitalists, or now we want to live high above others. Now we look look at people who need help and think, no, no, no, no, no. I rise above that and we're we're we're elite, we are the cream of the ultimate crop. But Jesus came so low to remind us that he's not here to reach the greats, but to reach the lowly. Palm Sunday. If you're taking notes, I just got a couple of thoughts for us today. The first thing is this, and this is clear from the scripture, nothing deep here. Our king rides a donkey. Our king, he rides a donkey. This should reveal everything that we need to know about our king and his kingdom. He's a donkey rider. Psalm 121, 1 and 2 says this. I lift my eyes up to the mountains. Where does my help come from? The psalmist says, My help comes from the Lord. I love that. Comes from the Lord, and it says, the maker of heaven and earth. I just love that verse. Where does my help come from? I look to the mountains. It comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. I think on the one hand, that verse says, My God owns the cattle on a thousand hills. Now, I don't know about you, but Nadia will say to me, and when I say, I don't think Nadia says this to you, but maybe your spouse or someone, your kids, we need a boat all the time. Every time, need a boat, we need a boat, babe, we need a boat. And I'm never saying, No, we don't need a boat. I'm saying your dad owns the cattle on a thousand hills. Ask him about this boat you want. The silver and the gold is not mine, it's his. Like, don't talk to me about a boat that needs to be the vertical. You need a vertical, don't horizontal, that nonsense. You need a vertical that. You need to pray about it, don't ask me about it. Do you think I have a boat that you don't know about? Do you think I've been saving in a boat fund that I've not disclosed to you? Where does my hub come from? It comes from the Lord. But I think also we need to understand that the Lord is the maker of heaven and earth, but the Lord is also the king on a donkey. Where does my comes from the Lord? And so we now can lay down our cloaks and our palms, knowing that Jesus came not to overthrow Rome, but to save our souls, and that this for him was the trigger, the start, the very first day of what would be the worst week of his life. The crowd expected a political liberator, a Roman overthrower. I just made a word up, a national victory. But Jesus came gentle, he came humble, Jesus came peaceful. We want quick victories, immediate solutions, visible power. But Jesus came quietly, he came subtly, he came sacrificially. There's a great book, a great leadership book called Legacy. It was written by a journalist who spent a period of time with the All Blacks. And he he was with the All Blacks because he was just astounded at what the All Blacks were able to do on the rugby field. Just a dominant force. And especially at that time, I think the book was written in the lead up to the 2011 Rugby World Cup, just a dominant force in world rugby. And he came and spent some time with them to learn. And he wrote 10 kind of tenets of learning from his time with the All Blacks. And one of them, I think the one that became the most, the most famous, the most tweeted, the most an easy pull quote, was that the All Blacks sweeped the sheds. And what happened was that they played a game and they were in the locker room. And then when everyone went to leave, uh Sam Whitelock, I think it was, the he's probably like a vice captain at that time, would end up playing, I think, 150 test for the All Blacks with Captain the All Blacks, one of the greatest locks of all time. He grabbed a broom and started sweeping the sheds. And had the room looking better than the way that they found it. And I love that so much. I think for some of us who've been in church, especially in churches that are um that may be um really trying to just emphasize growth, we might emphasize that humility and sweeping the sheds to be better than it we found it. But sometimes it's leveraged on because God is excellent, we need to also be excellent. But I love what's happening here, and what's happening in that picture of these all blacks is they are so great, man. Like the best at that time in the world, like an 85% winning percentage, the most winningest, which is a horrible word, winningest sports team in all the world. And here's the best player on the best team showing humility because it's a part of the fabric of that team. Here's the best player on our team coming in on a donkey, showing that the fabric of our team too is service. I mentioned that Mawell prayer event that was in like the middle of Feb, and Christopher Luxton was there. And whether you like his politics or not, I honestly I don't really care. Um, and that's not my point today to make to talk about his politics, but as our prime minister, he came and a few other dignitaries, and I watched the security guards kind of like, you know, sort of look after him. And he sat there on really what was sort of set up like a pie pie almost on the front row, and I was really close to it. I was kind of like I was walking with him in this porphyry. I don't know what I was doing, and then I ended up sitting next to him, and there was a chair available that someone ushered me into, and I was like, definitely not. But looking back, that would have been fun, you know? And he got up and spoke really well, spoke from the scriptures, and I thought what he said was great, but you know what blew me away from our national, from our nation's leader being at a very prayerful, thoughtful, horrible event. What blew me away was not what he said, what blew me away was that he was the last one to leave. He when I left, he was still there. If you were at that event, it started at 7:30, sun goes down probably like 10 past nine, it finished just before nine. Then people kind of, there's that first wave of people that leave. And is the second wave, then the third wave, he was still there. Then the production team came and packed up the stage and the lights and the sound system and the snake, which is it's a technical term, for cables run through an event called the snake. And they they called the snake, all the cables, all the production gear was gone, and there must have been about 10 to 15 people left just hanging around waiting to talk to the prime minister, and he and his couple of security guards kind of standing far enough away that they were doing their job, but they weren't kind of like lame, you know, and did it make him look lame? And he was just talking to people, and as I was walking off, again, it's not about me convincing you to vote for this guy. Um, heaven forbid that I would convince you to vote for this guy. Not that you would vote for him. That was the that was the pause. That was the pause. Heaven forbid that you would vote for him, because that would say too much about what you think I think. That's not what I said, and there he was, just humbly talking with people from a hurting community in the country that he leads. And I thought to myself, yeah, not bad. Why did I think that? Because it reminded me of another leader that I want to be like. Not him, but he too, I think, is leaning into that palm sundae humility. That says, I don't come high. Jesus said, I come low. He rode a donkey. And that should say a lot. Number two, if you're taking notes, Rome wasn't the reason. I think they thought it was. Here he comes. And he's getting he grabs his disciples. Boys, bring it in. He says, go down there. It's like prophetic, isn't he? You know, Jesus the prophet. And then also coming in his kingly position, too. Go down there. There's going to be a couple, a couple donkeys. Grab the one that the younger one. If anyone asks, say, hey, look, I'll give it back. Don't worry about that. Just borrowing. And bring it here and then and then I'll um I'll I'll ride it. And you can imagine them that could, but they were they were privy to all sorts of stuff. You know, they're like, remember that other time he was like, boys, bring it in. So there's a blind guy. What I'm gonna do is this I'm gonna spit in the ground and put that mud in his eyes. So I just think there's lots of times where they were like, you know, when you get given an instruction and you double take? Honey, go to the thing, grab the paprika, because I need to, whatever. And you go. And you you know? Well, I'm gonna spit on this guy's eyes. Did he say what I think he said? You know, then they walk off and they're doing that, they're going, donkey, and then they walk, and then they go, they repeat it to each other. He said donkey, yeah. And bro's like, yeah, I think he said donkey. You choose, did he say horse? No, no, no, 100% donkey. Okay, then they come back and he's like, perfect, thank you so much. Jumps on this donkey, rides in, and the people think that he's riding in to overthrow Rome. Now, just to come back to our Chris Luxin illustration, regardless of what you think about our national politics, I would go so far as to say I'm not so sure that we know what it's like to be fully oppressed by a dangerous and militant, violent, tyrannical leader. I'm getting some nods. We have a national coalition, and they might not be favorable to different people groups or whatever, but it's not Rome. The Romans were oppressing God's people, and when they see Jesus come, they are thinking that there's a liberator coming to set them free from that oppression. I want us to understand today, and I think you could be thoughtful of this this week. Rome. But because it's comartu or olli, it's no, it's no problem. It's no problem. I would like to know later what the verse is, because it's probably what the Lord wants to speak to his people, you know? But Rome, my verse. Yeah, he is speaking. He's throwing the fano and under the bus now, too. My point is this is that Rome, for those that wanted him to overthrow Rome, Rome wasn't the reason. For those of us in the crowd that still want him to overthrow Rome, Rome wasn't the reason. So these days, what's Rome? Well, I don't think it's the national government. That's my point. I think Rome is Rome for me speaks of those external things that we want to change. How many times have you prayed for something external, but God ends up holding a mirror in front of you? Like, Lord, I pray that you change this. And then it doesn't change. And then he holds a mirror in front of you, and then you realize that what he's doing is building something in your life that will be with you forever. Lord, help me with this external thing, it's the worst thing ever, and nothing happens. And then he goes, Hey, the patience and perseverance I'm building in you will galvanize and be with you for the rest of your life. Lord, I really pray that you know, we laughed at camp. I said, How many people check their bank accounts regularly and hope that the last time you checked it, there's money in, you know? And everyone liked, what happened was this the response, everyone was like this. And then once I said, Oh, does anyone go to the fridge? Open the fridge, close the fridge, walk away, come back, same fridge? Everyone's like, definitely fridge. Then I was like, bank account again? Yeah, you got me, I do that with my bank account. We want, we want trees, the Lord gives us seeds. That's my point. We want to see the Lord do something great out there, but what he does as we open the fridge, we'll check the account is say, hey, he just wants you to know that if you look to him, all of these things will be added to you. That just because you're not getting through in your mind the situation that you're walking through doesn't mean that he's not with you. It just means that his purpose, sometimes in not changing things external to you, is to do the work in your heart. They wanted Rome to be overthrown. They were thrilled at the idea that Jesus would pick a fight with the emperor. But he didn't do that. He came nonviolent, humble, and sacrificial to show us what his kingdom was like. They expected salvation from Rome. Jesus brought salvation from sin. They expected a quick fix, a government, a nation, and a world that reflected their values. What they got was a king who inverted the values of their time. Rome for them was this external power that they wanted God to remove. If God would just fix this, I think is our prayer, then everything would be right. Rome for us can be an external circumstance that we want changed, financial stress, political systems, or cultural frustrations, life situations. We often pray this: we pray, Hosanna, save us now from this external thing. But God doesn't want to save us from an external thing, He wants to bring transformation in our hearts. Jesus' primary mission is much deeper than overthrowing a government. He brings freedom from sin and reconciliation with God. Often I'll talk with people who, you know, in the last couple years, I've met a lot of people here in the mount, here in here here in the bay. And it'll be like uh trying to figure out each other's story. Hey, you know. If I grew up here, I wouldn't need to figure it out because everyone here knows each other, but I don't know that, and I don't know you. So then I'll be like, where are you from? Oh, so we did you grow up there? And and it's so funny how transient uh a city like ours can be. I met with someone this week who grew up in the two places that I grew up in. They're like, oh yeah. I was like, where'd you grow up? They're like, oh yeah, Torbay. I was like, I grew up in Tour Bay on the North Shore. Like, yeah, crazy. Then I moved to Mutawai. I moved to Mutawai, you know. This is um amazing, and now we both live here. Crazy doppelganger. Like we have these, we have these discussions about our growth and where we grew up and all that kind of stuff. And then the next question is usually, why did you move so much? Well, the reason I moved so much was because when I was two, my parents divorced. And my so they my my parents split up, and you know, I stayed with my mum. Shout out single mums. And me and my brother grew up with my mum, and we went from Torbay to Mirawai to Hawita, South Tatanaki to be with her family, then to Wellington when she got remarried, and then now she lives in Makatu, and I'm just up the road here in the mountain. Love my mum. Big fat mummy's boy, actually. During that time, as I'm being raised and protected by my mom, there's growing resentment in my heart towards my dad. It wasn't just that they divorced, it's that he then disappeared. And I wouldn't have seen him for years at a time. Years at a time. I'm 42 now, and now as a man, and he's probably in his late 60s, we now have a good relationship. Talk every week. And I love talking with people who are in their um late 60s or or sort of early 70s about life, because it just becomes this, we just have the same conversation every time. How are you going? Mate, weather's crazy. Oh, yeah, gnarly weather, amazing. How's everything else? How's work? Well, got such and such. Oh, same one as last week. That's right, you were listening, you know, and it's just like we just had the same, we have the same talk. The resentment in my heart, it wasn't about Rome. The resentment in my heart meant that I wanted God to do something external to me to change him. Maybe revenge would say, to hurt him, to do something, whatever it was, it had nothing to do with me. It was Lord, fix this, Lord, deal with him, Lord, judgment, Lord, whatever. But through Christian maturity and the Lord's gracious, loving kindness, he helped me realize that what happened had nothing to do with me, but the forgiveness was my decision. And forgiveness, my friends, is not external to us, and forgiveness is what Jesus came on that donkey to deliver. He didn't come on a high horse to bring revenge, because if that was the case, if the Lord had answered my prayers about my father when I was immature, that would have been ugly. I'm so glad he didn't. But the Lord was slowly, slowly building up this beautiful from seed, this beautiful garden plant, then this beautiful tree that bears fruit, and now other people can come under the shade of that tree that the Lord has built in my life. That's Jesus coming in on a donkey. Not to overthrow something external, but to build in me something powerful. Formation, discipleship, Christian maturity, all of these things are us taking one step, sometimes two steps backwards, one step, one inch towards being more like him. Seek first his kingdom at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, and all of these things will be added unto you. Matthew 6, 33. Seek first his kingdom. Don't pray for external things. Seek first his kingdom, and he'll build something wonderful in us. If you're taking notes, I'll close with this. Point number three is simple. And it's a question, I think, for us. Is it the crowd or is it the cross? This is where my long-winded illustration about being misunderstood comes in handy because you'll remember it. Do we want to be a crowd that misunderstands and we're so happy to see this king, and we thought he was going to do something, and then they were disappointed, and no one turned up to the cross. At the cross of Christ, there were a handful of people. A week earlier, when he came into Jerusalem, they sound like Warriors fans. They sound like Warriors fans. Because apparently every year it's going to be our year. And then what happens is this it's not. And the fan base shrinks. And all this vintage Warriors gear is up for grabs cheap at a thrift store. And then the next year starts, and we're back at Palm Sunday. This year is our year. He's the second coming. We could do some. Sorry, no, I was gonna critique the team. We don't need that. Palm Sunday, the crowd, or Easter Sunday, the cross. Palm Sunday, the crowd, or Easter Sunday, the cross. What's the difference? I think the misunderstanding was the difference. We can save ourselves a lot of heartbreak in following Jesus by just getting our understanding right of what he was trying to do in the first place. He knew that his path was to the cross to pay the price for our sin and our mistakes and our poor decision making to bring us that forgiveness, to bring us that redemption lowly on the donkey. If we're thinking that a king might come and do external things for us, I think we are backing up the proverbial, the wrong tree. The real triumph of the story is not Palm Sunday. The real triumph of this story is Easter Sunday. Palm Sunday shows us that Jesus is the true King. But his kingdom comes through sacrifice and not through force. Do we want the Jesus of the crowd? Or do we want the Jesus of the cross? The crowd wanted political victory. Jesus gives forgiveness of our sin. The crowd wanted external signposts of success. Jesus offers internal transformation through his Holy Spirit. The question that I think Palm Sunday asks every generation is simple. Will we welcome the king who comes on a donkey? And will we then follow him all the way to the cross? Palm Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week. I think it's our chance for reflection. I think it's our chance for repentance. It's our opportunity to ask what we want. A God who changes our circumstances or a God who transforms our heart. On every seat or in front of your seat is a little communion, little communion cup. I could not think of a better opportunity for us to receive communion than today. There may be some seats that don't have communion, eh? At the back? What about you guys? Probably don't have some, eh? Yeah. Can we maybe pass some back? Could you pass some back if there are some spare ones? Maybe a brookly next to you? Yeah. Nice one. Yeah, Heidi, I think you're on it. Yeah, lovely. Oh, that's great. Look at the church at work. Brings a tear to my eye, right? As you grab that communion in your hand, I'll just give you a minute just to uh just to settle back down for a moment. I'll just say this one thing and then I want us to take a moment. In a world where it can be hard to find the Lord, by that what I mean is he's readily available, but our life is so busy and so noisy, the world, that we can we can miss him. There's one thing that I love about the promise of when we come around communion, as this as we take these symbols that represent his blood and his body, is that he promises that he will be with us when we receive it. Earlier this week I was having a conversation with somebody about um, look, they just you know going through some challenges, and I said, find the area of that challenge in your life, that place, that room, those conversations, that person, whatever's what wherever you walk into and you you get entangled in that, go to that place and receive communion. And just believe that the Lord will speak to you and be with you in that place in that moment. Next Sunday for Easter is like too late to remember. Because that's what that's what that's what they did. Like he died, and then they're like, dang, that's right. Oh, Jesus, I wish I was there for you. We have a week now to go. You came lowly on a donkey. I want you in my life. Let me be thoughtful and repentant about what can happen in my heart, and we get to take this next week, the tail end of Lent, holy week, just to go, Lord, shape me, speak to me, guide me, and let us start with this moment right here. I'll pray, I'll ask you to receive it in your own time, and then we'll sing a song of worship. Thank you, Father. We are grateful, Lord, for this opportunity to receive this communion as a church family. Father, we um we misunderstand too. We would love a strong leader to quell all of the global challenges. We'd love to see you bring the petrol prices down, that'd be great. Diesel, more expensive than unleaded. What's wrong, Lord? We need you in our world. There's famine, there's war, there's innocent children dying all over the globe. There's pestilence and plague, there's civil war, there's there's so much. We could talk for hours about the things that we want to see changed in our country and beyond. And we pray, Lord, that you do. But we also know that you work in the secret places of our hearts, that you come to transform us with your love and with your spirit. And we will continue to pray for you to change those things out there. But Rome is in our hearts, and we ask, Lord, that you would shape us, fill us, transform us, love us. As we receive this communion together as a family, as we are ministered to by the song, we are just praying for your presence and your love and your life. And we believe that in Jesus' name. Amen.