AND HE’S GOING TO DO IT AGAIN!

Today, two thousand years ago, Jesus made His triumphant entry into the Holy City. In His thirty-three years of life, He had entered Jerusalem many times before. He first did so as an infant in his mother’s arms. Then, we’re certain from Scripture, He did so at age twelve. As an adult, He entered at least three times a year. But, this entry, this time, was different. This was His official entry as King. I’ll never forget my experience of cresting the Mount of Olives from the east and suddenly, for the first time, seeing Jerusalem stretched out before me on the parallel Mount Zion, highlighted by the just-then-setting sun. The bus stopped at a vista, and our tour group poured out eager to gaze at the Holy City. My eyes riveted on that holy skyline, I tried to let its image brand itself on brain. Suddenly, I was gripped by a mesmerizing awareness that I was seeing what Jesus saw that day He, making His first entrance as King, descended the Mount of Olives’ slope, crossed the Kidron valley, ascended the opposite side into the City. Oh, I knew that, though the Mount of Olives is virtually as Jesus saw it, except for more numerous graves, the addition of churches, and asphalted paths and roads, Jerusalem was different. The walls were newer, probably built in the 1500s. The tallest, most noticeable edifice in the view is no longer the Herod’s Temple of Jesus’ time but the golden Dome of the Rock, brilliant, but 1 ½ times shorter. Still, the stones and semblance of the buildings and walls were the same. Night soon closed around us requiring a return visit the next day. The next morning the bus deposited our group back at the vista point and from there we walked down the hillside towards Jerusalem. The path we walked between bordering cemeteries was the very one, our guide pointed out, that Jesus traversed at His triumphant entry on that first Palm Sunday. In the bright morning sunlight and crisp winter air, I could almost hear the clop of Jesus’ donkey’s hooves muffled by the garments laid on the path before Him. Shouts of “Hosanna” seemed to echo out of the past, surround us, and grow in volume until it was as if our tour group had been joined by the worshipers who had been there that day. You could almost hear the whooshing sound of waved palm fronds. I was overwhelmed with, “This really happened. Jesus really descended right here and entered Jerusalem as King.” On the heels of that poignant thought came another, “And, He is going to do it again. A second time.” Jesus is coming again. To the crest of the Mount of Olives, He will descend from heaven. Splitting the mount from its ridge downward, Jesus, bursting through the sealed Eastern Gate, will enter Jerusalem as King. The first time He came on a donkey as a king came in peace. The second time He will come on a white horse as a king came in war to conquer and judge. The first time He descended with tears in His eyes. The second time He will descend with fire in His eyes. The first time He descended to hang on a cross. The second time He will descend to sit on His throne. His first entrance as King was a literal, physical, personal fulfillment of the prior prophecies of Scripture. That is reason to believe that His second entrance as King will be a literal, physical, personal fulfillment of prior prophesy. We have what they did not then have—a past occurrence of the event. Since He has done it, there is every reason to believe that, as has been foretold, He will do it again. The King is coming! As real as the Mount of Olives on which I have stood, are the promises of His coming upon which I stand. The King is coming! Again!

AND HE’S GOING TO DO IT AGAIN!

Contact

Follow Us