Matthew 21
Reading for February 4

The Triumphal entry into Jerusalem. It always strikes me when I read this passage of how Jesus enters Jerusalem as a “hero”; an honored and glorified King and then before the week is over he is killed. This dramatic entry into Jerusalem fulfills yet another of the Old Testament prophecies. “Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion!  Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”  Zechariah 9:9.

I wonder how many times we get all excited about a “mountain top” experience, close encounter with Jesus where we praise and glorify Him, where we promise to live a life that more closely resembles the life He wants us to live, and then before the week is over, we go back to our old bad habits, our old sinful nature and in effect “crucify” Jesus by our actions.

Jesus spends his last week teaching and preaching and trying to get in those last words before his death. You can almost feel the tension in his actions, the desperation to get across the words that we so need to hear. When Jesus enters the temple (which I’m sure he had done many times before and seen the money changers there) yet this time is different, this time he explodes into a rage throwing the cheaters, and thieves out of God’s house. A good lesson for us to remember that God’s house is a house of prayer. A place where we should never compromise the Word of God or to acquiesce, to concede to the culture around us. 

It is my prayer that we will stay true to God’s Word and not try to change the meaning in order to make it fit into a culture that is rapidly deteriorating into a moral-less society, where there is no more black and white, right or wrong and everything is becoming muddied or gray. A world where “politically incorrect” trumps Scripture. Where we only want to hear what our “itching ears” desire to hear. (2 Timothy 4:3)

This chapter has many other lessons to learn, please add your thoughts as well.

Blessings for the day!

Pastor Kathy