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).
The Gospel of Luke recounts how Jesus fulfilled the words spoken by the prophet Zechariah as he entered Jerusalem in a “triumphal entry” during the climactic week at the end of his ministry (Luke 19:28-44). Luke tells us how Jesus instructed two of his disciples to go to a nearby home where they would find a young donkey and to bring it to him. He told the disciples that if anyone challenged them, they were to simply say: “The Lord needs it” (Luke 19:31). The disciples did this – explaining to the donkey’s owners what Jesus had told them.
This initial part of the story is interesting in itself. Jesus was, in effect, invoking the ancient principle of angaria (from a Babylonian word meaning “mounted messenger”) by which kings, rulers and other individuals with official responsibilities could requisition property for official use. Angaria originated in the earliest postal systems in the ancient Persian, Greek and later Roman cultures where an animal could be “requisitioned” from its owner to carry the mail on the next stage of its multiple-staged journey, somewhat equivalent to the “Pony Express” of the American frontier. In the Judea of Jesus’ day, under Roman rule, animals could be commandeered in this way for the emperor’s service, and the right was also expanded to include the needs of the king, and even magistrates and rabbis.
A Messenger Received in Joy
This incident was, then, the prelude to the actual triumphal entry in which the crowds provided what we would call today a “red carpet” entry for Jesus by covering the road with their capes and the branches of trees to welcome him as he rode on the donkey into the city (Luke 19:35-37). The scene was not unlike a humbler version of the great Roman “Triumphs” in which the grateful citizens celebrated the procession of heroes who had served the people. In fact, the similarity with a Roman Triumph is more than superficial, because the Triumph was a civil and religious ceremony which was held to publicly “celebrate and sanctify” the success of a commander who had led his forces to victory in the service of the people.
But Jesus rejected the aggrandizing nature of the pagan Triumphs which fed the cult of personalities in Roman and other cultures, and he did this by riding humbly on a young donkey – the antithesis of the great horses of conquering kings and heroes – while fulfilling the prophecy of Zechariah 9:9 in every detail. Yet Jesus did accept the people’s praise (Luke 19:40), and the details of the story from beginning to end show that a triumphal entry – a symbolic victory celebration – was intended.
The words of the crowds who welcomed Jesus in this triumphal entry are important. Luke tells us (Luke 19:38) that the crowds quoted from the great messianic Psalm 118 – which is why the Pharisees attempted to silence them (Luke 19:39). This is the same psalm that contains, in vs. 22, the statement so significantly quoted by Jesus in Luke 20:17: “The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” But also this psalm contains clear references to the triumphal entry of the Messiah:
* I look in triumph on my enemies (Psalm 118:7). * I will not die but live, and will proclaim what the Lord has done (vs. 17). * Open for me the gates of the righteous; I will enter and give thanks to the Lord (vs. 19). * Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. From the house of the Lord we bless you. The Lord is God, and he has made his light shine on us. With boughs in hand, join in the festal procession up to the horns of the altar (vss. 26-27).
Although Luke only cites a few of the words from Psalm 118, the psalm is in fact a full prophetic description of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem.
What Was the Victory?
But if this was a triumph, what was the victory? Jesus had not yet defeated sin and death on the cross, and he had not yet completed the work he came to accomplish in this regard. Yet there was one way in which a victory was surely celebrated. The primary purpose of the angaria, by which Jesus obtained the donkey on which he rode, was to deliver a message. And at this point, at the end of his ministry, Jesus had successfully delivered the news of the kingdom of God to the point that it was now established and would continue to spread throughout the world. He had also lived the perfect life needed in order that he could give himself as a sacrifice for all humankind.
In that sense, Jesus had fully triumphed in his work when he came to Jerusalem as “… your king who comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey” (Zechariah 9:9, emphases added). The entry of Jesus into Jerusalem prior to his death was indeed a triumph: it celebrated Jesus’ righteous life and the fact that he had succeeded in delivering the message that he brought into the world. There is surely a lesson in this for us. In following Christ as his disciples we do not attempt to mimic everything he did, of course, but we should certainly follow in many of his steps, as he commanded us. The dual nature of Christ’s fulfilled mission – of living in obedience to God and carrying his message – is a dual opportunity and goal for every one of his followers, also. To focus only on our own obedience or only on the message we were commissioned to carry is not a complete fulfillment of the calling we have been given. To the extent that we are able, with God’s help, to live lives pleasing to God and to serve him in carrying his message, we too participate in the victory of Jesus.
“When Jesus … saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them and healed their sick” (Matthew 14:14).
It’s easy to read right over simple verses like this in the New Testament and not notice things. First, it’s easy to miss what is actually said – that Jesus didn’t just have compassion on the sick in the multitude, he had compassion on the whole crowd which led to his intervening wherever there was a need.
That means that Jesus didn’t just see and have compassion on the noticeable members of the crowd – the blind, the lame and those clearly afflicted with diseases and problems. It means he had compassion on the ones who were helping carry the lame, lead the blind and support the weak. It means he had compassion on the ones we might not notice as readily in a crowd – the shy, the grieving, the lonely and the discouraged.
Second, it’s easy – of course – not to see what’s not said. When we read the accounts of Jesus’ works we tend to read them in a vacuum, but we have to remember how much the Gospel writers are summarizing each incident. When Jesus had compassion on the crowds we get only the highlights of the healings – a kind of Gospel triage in which the most important healings and significant signs were recorded. But in having compassion on the crowds – not just the sick in the crowds – would Jesus not have noticed people with less obvious problems and had compassion on them also?
Surely Jesus saw the loneliness in the eyes of some and, having compassion, offered them a warm and accepting smile. Surely he saw the discouragement in the faces of others (Luke 18:24) and offered a few words of encouragement. In every case in the New Testament where we are told Jesus had compassion on people, he followed it with action; and having compassion on the crowds doubtless meant he interacted with and helped many more than the few people on whom he performed miracles of healing.
Perhaps we may feel we do not interact with crowds in the same way, but the totality of people we see and pass by as well as those we actually meet and with whom we interact in a day is often a small crowd, and for some of us a large one. If we are followers of Jesus, do we have compassion on that daily “crowd”? Do we seek to encourage and to smile, to check that people are all right? These may seem like small things and may seem hard to do in our over-crowded and impersonal world. But following in Christ’s footsteps means doing the things he did to the extent we can.
We know that God pays attention and knows the hairs on our heads, though we don’t tend to think of that in perspective of the teeming world of billions in which we live. But God does see every face in the crowd, and in his physical life the Son of God doubtless did his best to do so also. We are not just a face in the crowd to God, and no one in the crowd should be just a face to us.
“Put on the full armor of God … with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:11-17, emphases added).
When we think of the “Armor of God” we all think, of course, of these inspiring verses in Ephesians, but the analogy was not original to Paul. We find in the book of Isaiah, in the Old Testament, the origin of Paul’s metaphor in verses that the apostle and his readers doubtless knew well.
The first of these verses appears in Isaiah 59: “He put on righteousness like a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head; and He put on garments of vengeance for clothing and wrapped Himself with zeal as a mantle” (Isaiah 59:17). The second group of verses that would have been well-known to Paul is found in Isaiah 11: “He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist” (Isaiah 11:4-5).
Paul does not simply quote the words found in Isaiah about the armor of God, however. Instead, he develops the idea in two ways. First he focuses on the elements found in Isaiah. Instead of the seven items of armor mentioned in the parallel verses in Isaiah, Paul lists six items of armor in Ephesians 6, and he adjusts and combines some items in order to do this. He combines the belt of righteousness and sash of faithfulness into the belt of truth. He also combines the only offensive weapons mentioned by Isaiah – the “rod of his mouth” and “breath of his lips” – into the “sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.” This is also the only offensive weapon mentioned in Ephesians 6 and is clearly the same thing, the “rod of his mouth” being the “word of God.”
Paul leaves out the “mantle of zeal” and “garments of vengeance” as these belong to God alone (Romans 12:19), but the “breastplate of righteousness” and “helmet of salvation” are identical in both lists. The only items of armor Paul adds to those mentioned explicitly in Isaiah are the “shield of faith” and the shoes of the “gospel of peace,” although the idea for the latter can also be found in Isaiah as well: “How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, ‘Your God reigns!’” (Isaiah 52:7) – a verse which Paul quotes in Romans 10:15.
More important than the minor adjustments to the individual items, Paul’s developed analogy of the armor of God differs from those found in Isaiah by applying the concept of the armor of God himself to the servant of God – the Christian. He also lifts the weapons of spiritual warfare out of the realm of things that we must somehow put together of our own strength, for the items of armor Paul shows we need so badly are, like salvation itself, the gift of God.
When David tried the armor of King Saul he could not use it as he had not “tested” or practiced with it (1 Samuel 17:38-39). Paul also reminds his readers that we must not keep these elements of armor on display or locked in some spiritual armory (Ephesians 6:11). The armor of God is something with which we must practice. It is a gift to be used.
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