Today’s Scripture Reading: Psalms 24, 29, 103; Zechariah 9:9-12; 1 Timothy 6:12-16; Luke 19:41-48
Today’s Writer: Cody Bauer
“See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey.”
In antiquity and in this culture the donkey was a lowly, humble animal that symbolized peace. The donkey is contrasted with the warhorse in verse 10. This passage points forward to the triumphal entry of the future Messiah. Jesus comes riding into Jerusalem on a donkey declaring that God is setting up his rule and reign on earth as in heaven.
How do we create peace? How do we become peacemakers? Practice the following: Hospitality, Generosity, & Forgiveness.
N.T. Wright says,
“And you see we have resisted that. Our culture has resisted it. The last two hundred years the western culture has said the one thing we don’t want is theocracy. And one of the fears that people now have with the rise of militant fundamentalism in a variety of religions is oh no we don’t want theocracy.
We don’t want mad clerics thinking they’ve got a hotline to God and they can tell us what God’s will is and they’re going to impose it on us. We don’t want that. But when Jesus did theocracy it looked different, it felt different, it was different. Because Jesus didn’t believe in a big fat bullying God who was just going to reach down and clobber people if they got in his way.
Jesus believed in the God of Genesis, ‘who said let there be.’ And there were flowers, and elephants, and waterfalls and in the middle of it human beings. Jesus believed in the God of the exodus, ‘who said I’ve heard the cry of my people and I’ve come down to rescue them.’ Jesus believed in the God of Isaiah. Who said, ‘I’ve graven you on the palm of my hands.’ Jesus believed in a different God. The God of scripture that they were endanger of forgetting. And the perfect storm was when he embodying that God came to the place where the western wind of imperialism met the high pressure system of Jewish aspirations and Jesus rode right into the middle of it…
When God wants to change the world He doesn’t send in the tanks ,as people often want him too, He sends in the meek, the mourners, the peacemakers, the pour in spirit, the humble. And by the time the big bullies and the power brokers no what’s happened, the meek, and the merciful, and the peacemakers are quietly transforming the world a neighborhood at a time, an area at a time, a heart at a time. That is how the Kingdom of God is coming on earth as in heaven. And that concerns you and me…
Jesus is in charge here and now. And again and again he says it’s up to you, my people. I will give you my Spirit and then you will be my agents, my witnesses all around the world.”
Image by Dennis Larson (used by permission via Creative Commons).
