Palm Sunday, tomorrow, will be my final Sunday to preach at FPC and so I thought it fitting to show the marquee for this last sermon. The title reads "Givin' A Shout Out to Jesus" based on the Matthew 21:1-11 text where the crowd in Jerusalem loudly welcomes Jesus. I'll be focusing on:
1. Jesus, Lord of all (vs. 3)
2. Jesus, the humble King (vs. 5)
3. Jesus, the King who saves (vs. 9)
4. Jesus, the Prophet (vs. 11)
-->The problem with the crowds was that they welcomed him on Palm Sunday with shouts of "Hosanna (Save!) to the Son of David" but then they yelled "crucify Him" later in the week. Clearly they had all kinds of misconceptions of Jesus. And so do we!
We see, and restrict, Jesus to be our: ticket to heaven, or our fire insurance, or a nice guy who loves little children, or our homeboy who hangs with us, or our friend who only asks us to do easy and nice things, or our heavenly doctor who is at our beck and call to heal our diseases and aches and pains.
We mold him into an image of ourselves, what we would want, what we would be if we were God.
Therefore we avoid, myself included, his challenging statements of: the last shall be first, take up your cross daily and follow me, sell all your possessions and give to the poor and what you do to the least of these you do to me.
And so my question is, are we making the same mistake that the crowds made? Are we caught up in our misconceptions of who Jesus was and is? Or, are our thoughts about Jesus driven by what we see in God's Holy Word, specifically for my Palm Sunday purposes, here in Mt. 21:1-11?
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