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Palm Sunday

Pietro lorenzetti 
Palm Sunday is the wind up to the big show. When I was a kid it reminded me that Easter was just a week away... Bring on the candy!!!

But let's look back in time to Luke 19-28 where Luke describes the Triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. Jesus knew His time was near. The friction with the Jewish religious leaders was about to peak. His reputation as a Rabbi, healer and miracle worker were well known. It was getting hard for Jesus to go anywhere without drawing a crowd.

It was time to celebrate Passover. So the disciples were instructed to find a young donkey. Jesus was fulfilling prophesy by entering Jerusalem riding on a donkey (Zechariah 9:9). The people of Israel were looking for the Messiah. Excitement spread among the crowd who gathered. People began grabbing palm leaves and throwing their garments in the path of the donkey. They began to sing,
Blessings on the King who comes in the name of the Lord!
    Peace in heaven, and glory in highest heaven!
This was a song from Psalms and was about the Messiah. The crowd was recognizing Jesus as the coming Messiah! The religious leaders condemned the praise, But Jesus said that if they stopped the rocks would cry out.

Jesus absolutely deserved every act of praise that day. He was coming to save the world, not just Israel. But I believe the crowd had a very different idea about how that was going to play out. The wanted someone who would overthrow Rome. Israel had been ruled by others for the last 400 years. Someone like Moses, Gideon or Deborah could lead Israel to freedom!

Jesus had a very different plan. Instead of attacking Rome, he spent much of the week calling out the corruption in the Temple and it's leadership (Matthew 21 and 23). At the end of the week, many of those people had to be confused, including Judas! So much so that Judas tried to force Jesus into action by selling him out. The crowd at the Trial of Jesus were shouting, "Crucify Him!" and "Give us Barabas!"

We do the same thing today. We pray for God to intervene for us. We pray for provision. We pray for help and healing. We know exactly how God should do it. But sometimes God answers our prayers in a way than we expect. Even after the Resurrection of Jesus, the disciples were still trying to figure it all out (John 21).

So how are we going to react when God's plan isn't exactly our expected plan? How do we react when life throws us a curve? The one thing we have in common with everyone in this story is that none of us know what will happen next. Most likely, it will be different than what we are thinking.

We are going through a lot of unknowns today. We have no idea how the epidemic will play out. We don't know tomorrow, but God does. He knows the perfect answer in the perfect time. So let's not lose our faith during all this. What the devil means for evil God will work for our good. Things may look very different when we get through this but God will be the same.

Let's fight the fight, let's finish the race, let's keep the faith.

-Peace




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