And last I heard, our king is still on the throne. So the triumphal entry. We've been leading up to this in the previous weeks. We've seen that the Jewish religious leaders have pronounced that they want Jesus of Nazareth dead. They envy Him, they want Him out of the way. They don't want to accept Him as their Messiah, as their King. And by the way, that's the decision that each one of us has. That's the essence of free will. You know, do you want to be, do you want to sit on the throne in your life and be your own King? Or are you willing to come off the throne in your life and allow the Lord Jesus to sit there? God created each and every one of us with a thirst for Him, but because we're fallen, we also have a drive for human autonomy. We want to be our own kings. We want to be our own bosses. What are you going to give into? This life is a test. If you want to do it your way, God has given you that freedom. But I would encourage you to reject what the Jewish religious leaders did and come off the throne in your life and acknowledge the Lord Jesus as your Savior and your Lord. Now, brief introduction here to the Triumphal Entry. I want to lead up to this. I want us to catch a glimpse of the messianic expectations of the Jews, of the fact that they were getting excited that they thought Messiah could be in their midst. And so this didn't just happen that some guy, just any old guy, entered Jerusalem on a donkey and they said, oh wow, he must be the Messiah. If a hundred people entered Jerusalem that day on a donkey, nobody would have done anything until Jesus of Nazareth entered Jerusalem on a donkey. And so I want to explain why that is the case. Now first off, you have numerous Old Testament prophecies of the Jewish Messiah being fulfilled. Now if you look at that handout, we're just going to run through them. I recommend you take them home, you read the Old Testament prediction, and then you read the New Testament fulfillment, how Jesus fulfilled these prophecies. Okay? But the Messiah is going to have to be a descendant of Abraham. Now it starts narrowing down, but he's going to be from the tribe of Judah. Remember Jacob? His name was changed to Israel. He had 12 sons. Judah was one of those 12 sons. The 12 sons were the heads of the 12 tribes of Israel. He's going to be from the tribe of Judah. He's going to be a descendant of Jesse, who was the father of David, and he's going to be a descendant of David. So now we're narrowing things down. Isaiah 7.14 says he's going to be born to a virgin. to a young lady who is not married and has had no sexual relations with any man. He's going to be born in Bethlehem. His birth will be announced by a star. He'll have a forerunner crying in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord. That was John the Baptist. So the people are starting to see these things, they're starting to scratch their heads a little, okay? And he's going to perform, I'll get back to nine, but he's going to perform miracles He's going to teach in parables, okay? He's gonna teach in true-to-life stories that teach spiritual truths, parables. And so, they saw these things coming about, but then there were a lot of predictions about the Messiah that they kind of ignored. Like American Christians, we like to just kind of dismiss the verses that bother us, and then really focus on the verses that we like. Okay? So if you want to cheat on your income taxes, you just kind of overlook, thou shalt not steal, or whatever, or submit to the governing authorities, whatever it may be. We just kind of push that aside, and we focus on the things that we really like, the passages that we really like. And so they ignored passages that said that Messiah would be rejected by the Jews, Isaiah 53, that Isaiah would receive a wide Gentile following, that he'd be betrayed for 30 pieces of silver, he'd be forsaken by his disciples, okay? He'd be silent before his accusers. He'd be crucified. His hands and his feet would be pierced. Soldiers would cast lots for his garments. These are all predictions, hundreds of years before Jesus walked the earth, and they're in the Old Testament. His bones would not be broken, though. His side would be pierced. He'd be buried in a rich man's tomb. And then finally, he would rise from the dead, ascend to heaven, and sit at the Father's right hand. So, they're seeing things, they're ignoring these suffering Messiah passages, the Jews are, because they're real patriotic. They don't want their ultimate king, the Messiah. The Messiah means the Anointed One, the man that God selected and anointed to rescue Israel from her enemies. That's the Messiah, the ultimate Jewish king, the descendant of David, the son of David, who would sit on the throne of David and reign not only over Israel, but reign over the entire earth. And they were patriotic, these Jews. And their nationalism, their pride in their nation sometimes exceeded their love for God's Word, and so they ignored all those passages that Messiah would have many Gentile followers. They ignored those passages that the Jews would reject their Messiah, and they ignored those passages that Messiah would suffer and would die. But one thing they were looking for, they were looking for the Jesus of Nazareth to announce that he's the Messiah. Okay? Now, Jesus knew that if He announced in public that He was the Jewish Messiah, that the Jews would automatically take the word Messiah and define it as a military conqueror. Okay? So Jesus knew if he went around saying, I am the Messiah, I am the Messiah, I am the Messiah, they would gather swords, the Jews would, and think, okay, good, he's going to lead an uprising. You know, when Jesus multiplies the bread and the fish, and then the Jews wanted to make him king by force, those passages don't mean that they said, look, this guy performs miracles. let's force him to become king. No, they're not talking about making him king by forcing him to be king. What they're saying is they wanted to make him king by a force of arms by attacking Rome. And that's why Jesus always withdrew from them during those time periods. And so Jesus knew, if I call myself Messiah, they're gonna think I'm gonna fulfill their false expectations of a military conqueror. By the way, when he comes a second time, he's gonna conquer. He is going to defeat the enemies of Israel. The shelling that we see right now, you know, that could be the little spark that leads to a flame, that leads to a forest fire, that leads to the second coming of Jesus Christ to the planet Earth, where the Jewish Messiah returns to rescue his people. But they didn't see two comings of Christ. They didn't see their need to be saved from their sins. You realize, even as a United States Marine, when I was searching for meaning in life, in 1981, there was a period of several months where I started reading Hal Lindsey books, and I really believed Jesus Christ was going to return to the planet Earth and reign upon the Earth, but I didn't understand the salvation message. And all Jesus was to me was he was going to be this great conqueror from the throne room of God who is going to defeat the bad guys. And I couldn't wait for him to come back. And I didn't even realize I was one of the bad guys. I didn't even realize that I was a sinner bound for hell who needed to trust in Jesus for salvation. Those are the one paragraph in the Hal Lindsey books I never remember reading. Paragraphs where he taught you how to be saved, how to be born again, how to trust in Jesus for salvation. So I was thinking, man, when I get out of the Marine Corps, I'm going to steal an M-16, I'm going to grow my afro back and get a big... big bushy mustache and I'm gonna ride learn how to ride a horse and me and a bunch of four Marines are gonna whenever we want to eat food, we're just gonna go into Fred Meyers on horseback with machine guns and and and I thought boy when Jesus comes back that's gonna be cool and I didn't realize when Jesus came back if I If I didn't come to him for salvation, I was gonna be toast Well, the Jews wanted that conquering Messiah, but they didn't think, I need Messiah to come and save me from my sins. Okay? And, so they were ignoring a lot of this stuff. But even the specific time of His coming, that before the temple's destroyed, Daniel 9, Messiah's going to be executed. before the temple was destroyed. The temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. So, I mean, you can narrow it down. You can just look. How many guys claim to be the Jewish Messiah? By the way, hundreds of guys claim to be the Jewish Messiah. They usually led a small uprising against Rome. Rome crushed them, usually crucified the whole bunch of them, and that was it. Dead Messiah equals dead Messiah movement. Now, Jesus' Messiah movement died when he died, but then his Messiah movement came back to life. The only explanation is because that dead Messiah came back to life. that dead Messiah conquered the grave, and that's why the Jews could say, well, Jesus is still alive and he's gonna come back and he's gonna rescue us. Well, how can he? He died. Yeah, but he rose from the dead never to die again. So, you know, are you the Messiah? Jesus would call himself the Son of Man. And the Jews didn't even know what the Son of Man meant because it was just one vague passage about this heavenly character, the Son of Man, coming on the clouds of the sky. And so the Jews said, Son of Man? I don't know what that means. So by calling himself the Son of Man, it allowed Jesus to define his own ministry, define it in his terms. And so they were waiting, you know, now he admitted to the Samaritan woman. that he was the Messiah. He told Peter, you got it right. Flesh and blood didn't reveal it to you, but my father who's in heaven when he called him the Christ, the son of the living God. Jesus acknowledged to the high priest, I am. the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and you're going to see me returning on the clouds of heaven. So in private, Jesus revealed He was the Messiah, but He had never publicly announced that He was the Messiah. That's where the triumphal entry is, Jesus publicly announcing, Jesus coming out of the closet and publicly announcing, you've been thinking about this, you've had this question on your mind for a couple years now, I am. the Jewish Messiah. He announced that he is the Jewish Messiah, but he did it without words by fulfilling Zechariah 9.9. Now let me say this. So people are seeing some of the prophecies being fulfilled. They're saying, man, you know, this guy is healing the blind, and he's healing the lame and the deaf here. I heard he raised the dead. He's got to be the one. How can Messiah top this? He's got to be the one. And then But you go back to 4 to 2 BC and there were whispers. We talked about this when we talked about the birth of Christ, about reports from shepherds that angels had led them to a manger. And this little baby was born. They bowed before this baby that the Messiah is here. So there were whispers running throughout the land of Israel. The shepherds said that Messiah has come. There were wise men from the east. There must have been, you know, we say three wise men. The Bible nowhere says three wise men. They gave gold, frankincense and myrrh. They gave three gifts, but there could have been a hundred of them. Coming all the way from the East, they probably had a huge party come with them, a huge group come with them. And the wise men talked with King Herod, and this news starts leaking out. And there's more whispers, the shepherds, the wise men, Herod slaughtering babies before the age of two in Bethlehem. There's Anna, the elderly lady in the temple, and Simeon in the temple, holding that little baby in their arms and prophesying that he is the one. And so there were whispers throughout Israel between 4 and 2 BC. And then about 9 to 11 AD, I'm sure there were whispers. The people in Jerusalem were saying, you know, there was a 12-year-old kid on the steps of the temple the other day. And people would say, well, what's the big deal about that? We don't understand, this 12-year-old boy, he was asking questions we couldn't answer. His understanding superseded the understanding of the Jewish rabbis who were shocked at his knowledge. You think he might be the one? And the whispers got a little louder. And that was about 9 to 11 AD. Then about 30 AD people started talking again. There was a carpenter from Nazareth He gets baptized by John the Baptist and a dove from heaven starts coming down upon him and a voice from heaven says, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. And John the Baptist points at this carpenter from Nazareth. And the people know that John the Baptist is a true prophet of God! And in the Jordan River, John the Baptist is pointing at this carpenter from Nazareth. And he says, Behold the Lamb of God! He takes away the sins of the world. The whispers are gone. There's not whispers anymore. There's talk. There's talk in the streets of Jerusalem. There's talk on the dusty roads in Nazareth. There's talks all throughout Israel. This could be the one. And so the whispers turn to talk. And then what does he do to start out his ministry? His first cleansing of the temple. He acts like the temple belongs to him or belongs to his father, and he cleanses the temple by force. And I think, what authority does this guy think he has? He says, you want to know my authority? Tear down this temple. I'll raise it up in three days. He was talking about the temple of his body. So now there's more talk. There's controversy about this carpenter from Nazareth. Then he starts performing these miracles and healing people and raising the dead and casting demons out of people. Even the demons listen to him. They're no longer whispering. They're talking. They're saying, could this be the one? could this be the one? How could Messiah be greater than this man?" Then his authoritative teaching, instead of saying, you know, you ask him a question about the Bible, instead of saying, well, Hillel, a great dead Jewish rabbi, once said this about that passage, or Shammai, a great dead Jewish rabbi, said this about that passage, instead of saying that and referring to the rabbis and saying, they're the authorities, not me, They'd ask him questions. And he'd say, well, you have heard. You have heard hundreds of years from brilliant intellectuals, the Jewish rabbis. Take that and throw it in the garbage can, because I'm here now. You have heard such and such, but truly, truly, I say to you. And those statements blew away the people, because he claimed his interpretation of God's Word held as much authority as God's Word itself. He was acting like he wrote the book. Okay? So his authoritative teaching, his miracles, then reports of the transfiguration where he appears white as snow with Elijah and Moses. No more whispers. Now there's talk, and people are talking and saying, why doesn't this Jesus just announce that he's the Messiah? If he's the Messiah, I think he's the Messiah, but he's never publicly announced that he's the Messiah. Instead he calls himself the Son of Man. What does that mean? Now he raises Lazarus from the dead. We covered that a few weeks ago. Okay? Again, is he the Messiah? The multitudes await his announcement. The Jewish religious leaders want to execute him. Everybody's thinking he's probably, he's a real serious Jew. He's probably gonna have to come. to Jerusalem, like He has every year of His life, He's probably going to have to come to Jerusalem for the Passover feast. And so now everybody's waiting for the grand finale, waiting for Jesus to announce that He's the Messiah, the Jewish religious leaders want Him dead. And so now Jesus publicly announces that he is the long-awaited Jewish Messiah. But he chose to do it without words. Look at Zechariah 9-9. This was a prophecy written over 400 years before Jesus walked the earth. Zechariah 9-9, "...Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you!" He is just in having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a cult, the fowl of a donkey. And there's the prediction that Messiah will ride into Jerusalem on a donkey. When Jesus rode into Jerusalem on that day ... By the way, there's estimates that there may have been one to two million Jews in Jerusalem on that Passover. We know there was 2.5 million Jews approximately about 30 years later to celebrate the Passover. So there might have been between 1 and 2 million Jews there. Every village that Jesus is going to and heading towards Jerusalem, they think he's going to conquer. So more and more people are coming. So now you got thousands of people, a multitude of Jews, following Jesus and cheering and waving palm branches even before he entered the city. So it's not like he just quietly came into Jerusalem on a donkey. He's already got people cheering. The crowd is already going nuts before he enters. And so when the gates open and he starts coming through, they turn and they say, who is that? And then somebody says, that's Jesus of Nazareth. And then he clicks. Our deliverance has come. Messiah has come. Thousands of years waiting for the Jewish Messiah, and now Messiah has come. That's why He received the King's welcome. The Deliverer has come. Messiah is here. And so, let's take a look in Matthew 21, verses 1 to 11, the triumphal entry. All four Gospels talk about it. I just selected Matthew to talk about it. Matthew 21, 1 to 11. Now, when they drew near Jerusalem and came to Bethphage at the Mount of Olives, then Jesus sent two disciples saying to them, go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied and a colt with her. Lose them and bring them to me. And if anyone says anything to you, you shall say, the Lord has need of them, and immediately He will send them." Okay? Let me just say there, you know, Jesus and the apostles approaching Jerusalem. He sent two disciples to bring Him a donkey and a colt. They told the owner, the Lord has need of them, and then the owner just handed them over. Now, I don't know. Did this guy have a dream or a vision? Someday I'm gonna ask this guy in heaven. I'm gonna say, well, dude, what was up with that, you know? Did he have a dream or a vision that, hey, this donkey, take good care of this donkey. You know, now we're talking about the red heifer and the rebuilding of the temple. Well, back then, this dude probably realized that's the donkey. Ain't nobody gonna ride that donkey. Because that donkey was created for one reason. And that one reason that donkey was created was for the Jewish Messiah to come and to sit on that donkey and ride into Jerusalem. And so I don't know if this guy had a dream or a vision or whatever. But he knew immediately, okay, if the Lord, the Jewish Messiah, needs it, he can have that donkey. Verse 4, "...all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying," and then he quotes Zechariah 9, 9, "...tell the daughter of Zion, behold, your king is coming to you, lowly and sitting on a donkey, a colt, the fowl of a donkey." So the disciples went and did as Jesus commanded them. They brought the donkey and the colt, laid their clothes on them, and set him on them. And a very great multitude spread their clothes on the road. Others cut down branches from the trees and spread them on the road, giving him a king's—it's like rolling out the red carpet for a king. Then the multitudes who went before and those who followed cried out, saying, Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest! And when he had come into Jerusalem..." So this multitude is following him. So you've got... you probably have thousands following Jesus and proclaiming him the Jewish king. As he enters Jerusalem, then the millions turn and look, and now you've got tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands proclaiming that Jesus is the Messiah. And so they cried out, Hosanna! Save us now! Hosanna to the Son of David, the title of Messiah! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest." And when he had come into Jerusalem, all the city was moved, saying, who is this? So the multitude said, this is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth of Galilee. And he didn't have to say much more. He didn't say Jesus of Nazareth, and everybody knew he's the one who's been raising the dead. He's the one who started with little whispers early on, but now the whispers have become talk. And now they're shouting. And now they're shouting. That's like the guy who debated yesterday. He said, if James was the half-brother of Jesus and his brother rose from the dead, you'd expect him to shout it from the rooftops. It's like, dude, that's why we're talking about the resurrection 2,000 years later. They did shout it from the rooftops. In fact, James literally shouted it from a rooftop, from the roof of the temple. Jewish religious leaders in 62 AD brought him up there, said, tell the people to stop worshipping your brother. He gets up there and just starts preaching a good, solid Christian message, threw him off the temple. He was still alive, so they tried to stone him to death. He was saying, Father, forgive them, they know not what they do. And then a guy took a club and bashed his skull. They did shout it from the rooftops. If they didn't shout it from the rooftops, we wouldn't be here today. We would have never heard of Jesus of Nazareth. The whispers turned to talk, and the talk turned to shouts on this day as Jesus announced that he is the Jewish Messiah. So he fulfilled Zechariah 9.9 over 400 years earlier, the prophecy had been made, and he rode the donkey into Jerusalem, not a war horse, He's reminding his people that he's the prince of peace. He's not coming to make war. He had a great multitude following him from the trip to Jerusalem. Clothes and palm branches were placed on the road to make way for the king. The multitude cried out, Hosanna, save us now. Now, they should have been saying, Hosanna, meaning save me from my sins. Save me from myself. I'm my own worst enemy. Save me from the flames of hell!" Instead, what they were probably thinking was, save us from the Romans. We're the good guys, and the Romans are the bad guys, and they're enslaving the good guys. We're the children of God. Come on! Save us! And save us now from the Romans. They just didn't get it. They called him the son of David. They knew he was the Messiah who would reign on David's throne. They quoted Psalm 118.26, "...Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord." And the entire city, we're told, was shaken by Jesus' entrance. I mean, how much more exciting could it get when you're already celebrating the Passover feast? I mean, it can't get better than that, can it? Well, I guess it can. when the carpenter from Nazareth comes to town riding on a donkey and acknowledging the praise of the people and announcing that he is the Messiah. So he announced that he's the Messiah without using words. You know, I think about this There's been some great entries that I've seen in my life and sometimes most of them I see them on television. But what can you imagine if the President of the United States goes somewhere and you got the big motorcade and you know what an entry or when he flies in on Air Force One and then comes down he got all the security guys all over the place. The rival of a Pope. You know, Pope thinks he's the vicar of Christ. Thinks he's the representative of Christ on earth. I don't think so. I think the whole church, we're all representatives of Christ. Okay? We are the body of Christ. But the Pope, he gets a pretty warm reception when he enters into a place. I remember one entry, I watched an old classic Mariner games, and what that usually means, the series with the Yankees, the playoff series that they won with the Yankees, back when Ken Griffey Jr., Edgar Martinez, Jay Buhner, Randy Johnson, these guys were all on the on the Mariners, but I remember that the Mariners were, you know, were down two games to one. If they lost the next game, they'd be out, and they came back and won. Well, they came back and won it, but Randy Johnson had just pitched the day before. There's no way that 6-foot-10 pitcher is going to come back in throwing 100-miles-an-hour fastballs. But they had him warming up in the bullpen. And I can remember the announcer saying the Mariners came back, this big comeback. Edgar Martinez, it's two home runs, one a grand slam. Junior homers, Buhner homers. They're down 5-0, and all of a sudden they come back, but they gotta hold the lead. And Randy Johnson's warming up in the bullpen, and everybody's saying, no, no way he's gonna come in. That guy just threw 100 pitches yesterday, and three days before, threw 100-some pitches. And the announcer's saying, there's no way that Lou Piniello's going to use Randy Johnson. But if the Mountains blow the lead, the year's over. All of a sudden, the gate of the bullpen, you know, in the old kingdom, you had to walk right across the field to come to the Mount. And here's the guy. You can recognize him from a mile away, because he's the only 6'10 guy in town. And everybody's watching Randy Johnson walking. And I'll tell you right now, the game was over. Just the fact Randy Johnson was going to take the mound, the Yankees had no heart left in them. And then it went to the final game and the Mariners won that. Then they ended up losing to the Indians, but whatever the case, that was an entry. When he was walking in for the bullpen, the fans were going nuts, but believe me, Yankee fans were probably standing there watching their television sets with their mouths open. That was a pretty big entry. King David entering Jerusalem with the Ark of the Covenant. Okay, it was a dramatic entry and a lot of music being played, but he's just worshipping God, so he's out there dancing in his underwear, so it's kind of a little weird too. But that was a big entry. You know, you've got a history of King Solomon revealing himself as the King of Israel to his Canaanite lover in the Song of Solomon when he shows up in town. That's a pretty big entry. The ground was probably shaking from the riding of the horses and the chariots a mile before they even got there. For me, it used to be like Muhammad Ali entering a ring. I was a big Ali fan. Back in... Back in the 1970s, I asked my dad, my dad was in his 80s, he was sitting down at the chair watching television. And I said, Dad, you used to take us to that theater in Newark. Newark was one of the most violent cities in the country. You'd take us to that theater and we were the only white guys there. But there was something different about it, you know. I've been places where I'm the only white guy and sometimes you feel a little out of place or whatever. But there was something, it was almost like the guys that were there were shocked to see us. And so I asked my dad, what was the name of that theater? And my dad said, it was called the Mosque Theater, M-O-S-Q-U-E. And so it was basically, it was a black Muslim business, a black Muslim theater. And we were not only the only non-blacks, but the only non-black Muslims. So they were shocked to see us when we showed up. But I'll tell you, and that was to watch Ali in closed circuit. It was the only place we could go. And that's this kind of New Jersey to watch Ali fight. We were big Ali fans. And my dad didn't have a prejudice bone in his body. And it was like my brother-in-law Tom, when my father said the mosque theater, I looked at my brother-in-law Tom and he said, your father was a very naive man. But whatever the case, let me tell you, when Ali stepped into the ring, Everybody, including my dad, my brother Mark, and me, we would start chanting, Ali, Ali, Ali. And let me tell you, I would tell you right now, we became honorary black Muslims at that moment. Because every time Ali landed a punch, there'd be some Muslim patting me on the back, and I'd go like that, and stuff like that. And all of a sudden, all the differences were gone. because muhammad ali was fighting on that night and it'd be nice if we had that kind of uh... that kind of unity in the church unity in christ where the color of our skin doesn't matter your nationality doesn't matter your favorite football team doesn't matter all that matters is jesus is number one in your life and he's number one in my life and that gives us unity i've seen dramatic entrances uh... throughout my life, but I've seen nothing like the triumphal entry. Okay? But Jesus' triumphal entry, believe me, though there's never been an entry like that before, there will be an entry. Probably through the same gate, coming down, landing on the Mount of Olives, coming through the eastern gate, it's walled up. My favorite, that's my favorite sight in Jerusalem. I can go to Jerusalem a hundred times, and I will love nothing more than to stand on the Mount of Olives. And to look down at the old wall, and to see the Eastern Gate, and the Muslims walled it up, because the Jews are expecting their Messiah to come through the Eastern Gate as well. And He is. But He's Jesus. And so then the Muslims, you know what they did? They built a cemetery, so there's dead Muslim corpses. Let me tell you. I read John chapter 11. Even the dead listen to Jesus. He's got authority over the dead and the living. Dead Muslims can't stop Jesus. Live Muslims can't stop Jesus. The Soviet Union can't stop Jesus. The Communists can't. The New World Order globalists can't stop Jesus. So I don't care how many slabs of cement you got walling up the Eastern Gate. Messiah's coming through. and nobody's gonna stop. That wall, that walled-up gate, that gate is coming down. The Messiah will return and rescue his people. Zechariah 14, he lands on the Mount of Olives, he enters through the Eastern Gate according to the Book of Ezekiel, and then Jesus is gonna win the Battle of Armageddon. So this, the triumphal entry we're talking about today is just a foreshadowing of the ultimate triumphal entry, the second coming of Jesus Christ to the planet Earth. And now let's take a look at the second cleansing of the temple, verses 12 to 17. Then Jesus went into the temple of God and drove out all those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the moneychangers and the seats of those who sold doves. And he said to them, It is written, My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves. Okay? And now let's read verse 14 as well. Then the blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them. Okay, several things I want to point out here. Jesus cleansed the temple the first time at the start of His public ministry, John chapter 2. Now He cleanses it at the second time. This is the day... by the way, if you go to, I think it's Mark's gospel, it says that it was the... after the triumphal entry, he left Jerusalem, went to Bethany, then came back, so it's actually a day later. Yeah, the day after Palm Sunday that he cleanses, the start of the Passion Week, that he cleanses the temple and overturns the tables and drove merchants out of the temple. Now, some of the Jews might have been thinking that 200 years earlier, when Judas Maccabeus went in and purified the temple after Antiochus Epiphanes had slaughtered a pig there and had desecrated the temple and set up a statue of Zeus in the temple. But whatever the case, Jesus goes in and it's like, Jesus, it's the time of your visitation, I'm the Messiah, and I'm going to cleanse the temple. He overturned tables and drove money changers out of the temple. And by the way, the word for temple here is hieron, not naos. Naos, N-A-O-S is the way we would spell it. Naos would be the temple itself, the Holy of Holies and the Holy Place, where only the priests could go, okay? And then the Holy of Holies, only the high priests could go once a year on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. That's naos, the actual temple itself. but after that you have the court of the men then you have the court of the woman the jewish men jewish woman could go and then you have the court of the gentiles where the gentiles are allowed to go and then they couldn't go any further well uh... hieron means all the whole temple grounds so i believe what he's talking about here is the court of the gentiles the jews said look we got so many acres why would we waste all this land let's make some money so you walk into the temple and you want to buy a uh... You walk into Temple and you say, I got a lamb, I want to sacrifice it. They say, sorry, we only accept Temple lambs. Get in that line. So you get in line and say, OK, going price of a lamb is $1, here's $1. Say, well, Temple lambs are special lambs. We charge $3. You say, wow, that's a ripoff. OK, here's $3. Well, we don't accept regular currency. You've got to go to the money changers over there and get $3 in Temple currency. So then you get in line. You wait a couple hours in line. Finally, you get up there, you say, here's $3, I need $3 in temple currency. And they say, OK, that'll cost you $3.50, because there's an exchange rate. And these Jewish guys realize, I'm getting ripped off here. Now, the Gentiles are supposed to see the Jews praying. It's as close as they could come to the God of Israel without becoming a Jew themselves. And they're supposed to see Jews praying and talking about God's Word. Instead, they see Jews ripping off other Jews. And so, instead of being a light to the Gentiles, the Jews were causing Gentiles to blaspheme the God of Israel. They'd say, well, I could see this in our own pagan cults. So, Jesus is angry. And so, the Jews expected Jesus to get off the donkey go to the Roman headquarters and by force kick the Romans out of Jerusalem instead he went into the temple And he beat up on Jews on behalf of the Gentiles. The exact opposite of what they expected him to do. He said that they turned the house, God's house of prayer, into a den of thieves. So he unexpectedly beat up Jews on behalf of the Gentiles. Now what it says there, and I think we're going to just close with this, and we'll pick it up there next week, but then it says that he then healed disabled people in the temple. So you notice here that Jesus, he demonstrated his anger the most when confronting those who exploit others in the name of God. Okay? We got heretics on television claiming that they're true believers and they're exploiting people, ripping them off in the name of God. God is upset with it. You got Muslims killing people in the name of God, but it's a false God. God is upset. Exploiting people in the name of God is something that God deals with swiftly and harshly. So Jesus dealt harshly with the victimizers, but he was gentle to the victims. He cleansed the temple, but he didn't kick out the sick. Okay? Think about that. He kicked out all these guys that were making big money, they had nice houses. They were in cahoots, splitting the profits with the Jewish priest, the temple priest. The guys were real respected in their community. He kicked them out because they were exploiting people in the name of God. And I'm sure there's a few lame guys saying, please, please, son of David, I can't get up, I can't move. And Jesus is like, hey, you're all right. I didn't come here to kick you out today. I came here to heal you. And I came here to heal you. I came here to heal you. But I'm just kicking out those who don't really believe. They have no place in my temple. You know, Jesus said, many who are first will be last in the last first. And I rejoiced in that. I was a nobody. Just some kid from Jersey, didn't have much potential, grandson of Portuguese and Italian immigrants. Most people would have said, no, Franz doesn't have any potential, he's not gonna amount to much. I like the fact that God makes somebodies out of nobodies. I like the fact that the first can become the last, and the last can become the first. I like the fact that we got a God who humbles those who exalt themselves, and exalts those who humble themselves. And so I rejoice in that. But next week we're gonna take a look at Jesus's—closer look at Jesus cleansing the temple, and then a look at Jesus cursing the fig tree that didn't have bare fruit. So I want to tell you, brothers and sisters, Jesus will save anyone who comes to Him broken because of their sin and looking for His forgiveness. He will save us. He won't turn us away. But Jesus is still in the business of cleansing temples. He is still in the business of cursing fig trees that don't do what He created fig trees to do. He created fig trees to bear fruit, to bear figs. He created you to worship Him and to serve Him. He created me to worship Him and to serve Him. And I'm telling you, until Jesus comes back and we see Him face-to-face, Jesus has got to cleanse our temple. I don't want to be a fig tree that gets cursed because I don't bear fruit for God's kingdom. Okay? And so basically what I'm saying is there's a lot of rejoicing, Hosanna, save us now, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, the Messiah is here. But keep in mind, you know, when Jesus proved himself to Peter, what did Peter say? Get away from me, Lord, for I'm a sinful man. The holy God has entered Jerusalem and has entered the temple. Praise God, but then remind yourself, our God is a holy God and he calls us to be holy people. So this week, we need to reflect. We're going to start reflecting now. We're going to start examining our consciences now. We're going to receive the Lord's Supper. We're going to ask John and Chris to come up and lead us in the Lord's Supper. Examine your conscience. The Lord is still in the business of cleansing temples. At last I heard Our king is still on the throne