God On A Donkey

Jesus gave instructions to two of his disciples. They are told to go to the village of Bethphage and find a mother donkey and her colt tied up. They are to untie them and bring them to Jesus. They are not told what the donkeys will be used for, only that Jesus needs the animals (Matthew 21:1-11). Jesus also tells them if anyone asks you what you are doing, “Tell them the Lord needs them.”

We wonder if Jesus had some prearrangement with the owner. Did an angel visit him during the night, explaining what would happen? Was the man simply a follower of Christ? We don’t know. We know that what Jesus told the disciples to expect happened precisely as he said it would.

The Lord told his disciples that he needed the donkeys. He did not need them to ride because Jesus had walked all over Israel from one end to the other. The reason Jesus needed the animals was to reveal who he was. They time had come to announce that he was the Messiah.

Matthew is the only one of the four Gospel writers who quotes Zechariah; this took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet: “Say to Daughter Zion, ‘See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’” (Matt 21:4-5).

Five hundred years had passed since Zechariah wrote those words. Jesus asked for a colt, and he was brought one and sat on it. Jesus fulfilled the prophesy of Zechariah. Matthew says, “They brought the donkey and the colt and placed their cloaks on them for Jesus to sit on” (Matt 21:7). The donkey had never been ridden before but was steady under the Messiah.

Jesus rode into Jerusalem that Palm Sunday, announcing that Israel’s Messiah had arrived, just as Zechariah had said he would. By mounting that small animal, Jesus said, “If you want to know to whom the prophet was referring, he was writing about me.” 

He had begun his ministry in his home town of Nazareth the same way. He went to the synagogue where everyone would have known him. He took up the scroll of Isaiah, read it, sat down to teach, and said, “Isaiah the prophet was writing about me. I am the Messiah. The people were so offended they tried to kill Jesus.”

Today, people will admire Jesus as a good example, a teacher who taught sound moral principles to live by. But Jesus will not have us thinking he is just a good teacher. He is the Messiah, or he is a lunatic because his claims were either valid or outrageous. But the gospels do not show us a lunatic or fanatic. On the contrary, they show us a man who is balanced in every way. When Jesus rode that donkey into Jerusalem, thousands believed and received him as the Messiah. What will you do?

From Fear to Joy

What we call Good Friday was really Bad Friday for the followers of Christ. On that day, all hope extinguished with Jesus’ gruesome death on the cross. Overwhelmed with fear, sadness, and loss, they fled behind locked doors and feared for their lives. Jesus’ abrupt end left them bereft of purpose.

On that dark Friday afternoon, two secret disciples, Joseph and Nicodemus, came out of hiding to claim Jesus’ body. Carefully, they took it down and carried it to a new tomb along with seventy-five pounds of spices. Then they wrapped the body in strips of linen, applying the spices between the wraps.  They did their work hurriedly because, with sundown, the Sabbath began. Then, early before the sun emerged on Sunday, Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James, brought their spices so they could anoint Jesus’ body. They fretted about the stone that blocked the entrance to the grave, but they did not expect to find Jesus alive or the tomb empty. 

According to Matthew, an angel descended from heaven, causing an earthquake, and he rolled back the stone (Matt 28:2-3), not for Jesus, but those who would inspect the tomb. Upon seeing the angel, the Roman soldiers guarding the tomb were parlayed with fear. The angel’s appearance was frightening as he sat upon the stone as if to say, “Who can hold God’s hand back?”

The women were struck with fear upon seeing the celestial being, but the angel calmed the women with his words. As they listened, their emotions changed from fear to joy and delight, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay” (Matt 28:5-6). The angel declared with authority that Jesus is alive and that he is not in the tomb. Come and examine it for yourselves, he said. He identified Jesus as the same Jesus, who was crucified. The heavenly messenger invited the women to observe the evidence “Come and see the place.” These two followers needed time to process what they were hearing and seeing.   

The women obeyed the angel’s command: So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them. “Greetings,” he said. They came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me” (Matt 28:8-10). What was it like for those two women to see Jesus alive in his resurrected body? It had to be incredible because they fell at his feet and worshiped him and could hardly take in what they were experiencing. They came to prepare his body for burial, and now he stood before them alive. No wonder Matthew says their emotions changed from fear to great joy.

We are living out something that we have never experienced before in our lifetime. Who could have imagined a few weeks ago that the entire world would shut down? Who could have anticipated that we would be battling a pandemic that would spread fear far and wide? COVID-19 may be new, but the fear it produces is as old as civilization. The greatest fear of humanity is death. Each morning we see the death toll rise, and we feel more fear. There is, however, only one person who ever conquered death, and his name is Jesus. He was raised from the dead, and God’s Word promises those who put their faith in Jesus will also be raised from the dead. That is why we celebrate Easter!

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