“Most of the crowd spread their garments on the road ahead of him, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road.” (Matthew 21:8 NLT)

Jesus rode into Jerusalem for the Passover celebration on a donkey, as a king would. And that’s how the crowd treated Him when He arrived—as a king. Jesus accepted their praise and worship, something He rarely did during His earthly ministry.

Matthew 12 tells the story of Jesus healing many sick people. “But he warned them not to reveal who he was” (verse 16 NLT). And in Matthew 16, after Jesus commended Peter for declaring Him to be “the Messiah, the Son of the living God” (verse 16 NLT), we find this statement: “Then he sternly warned the disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah” (verse 20 NLT).

Jesus issued no such warnings before He entered Jerusalem. He wanted everyone to know that He was the Messiah, the King they had been waiting for.

He understood that the people’s excitement was misguided. The crowds weren’t praising Him because He came to save the world from God’s punishment for sin. They cheered because they believed He was going to free them from Roman control (and taxes).

The people who lined the streets with palm branches and welcomed Jesus with open arms didn’t know that His actual mission was infinitely and eternally more important and more valuable than the military skirmish they envisioned. So days later, when their narrow-minded expectations were still unmet, their cheers turned to cries for His death. Their “Hosanna!” turned to “Crucify Him!” The people who hailed Him as a hero denounced Him as a fraud.

It’s interesting to note that the Romans, the ones who had the most to lose if Jesus had turned out to be the Messiah the Jewish people expected, apparently didn’t see His triumphant entry as a threat. Nowhere in the Gospels is there a reaction to Jesus’ arrival by Roman officials or soldiers.

The Roman military was stationed in Jerusalem to prevent rebellion. But they didn’t see Jesus or the crowds who gathered to greet Him as dangerous rebels. As far as Rome was concerned, the event was just a bunch of unarmed peasants waving broken tree branches to greet a local rabbi who was sitting on some old clothes as he rode a donkey.

Hardly the type of movement that could disrupt an empire. Or so they thought.

The Jewish religious leaders, on the other hand, saw an enormous threat. They received loud and clear the message Jesus communicated with His triumphant entry into Jerusalem: The Messiah had come.

The religious leaders had tried to rid themselves of Jesus since the earliest days of His ministry. But because His work had not been completed, they were helpless to do anything. With Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem, they faced another problem: His popularity with the crowd. As long as He had the people’s support, the leaders could do nothing to Him. So they bided their time and worked to undermine Him in the eyes of the people.

And because their plans aligned with God’s plan, they succeeded. The Hero of Palm Sunday would be Public Enemy #1 by Good Friday.

Jesus knew what was coming. Yet He willingly faced rejection—and much worse—to fulfill God’s plan of salvation.

Reflection question: What preconceptions about Jesus can get in the way of sharing the truth about Him today?

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