When we think about Palm Sunday, we really are reminded of a coronation of a king. Or even if you caught Donald Trump being inaugurated on TV, you saw all of the opulence in that ceremony. The riches and the majesty that was given to him. And as my husband said, “the red carpet that was rolled out for him.” We see how the world does it for earthly dignitaries and earthly kings, when they put out the red carpet in a procession as they are waiting for him. The people will line the streets and they will throw flowers out to the king. They robe him with a robe and they give him a crown of treasure on their head.

Jesus' coronation on this earth we know was much more humble than that. He did not have dignitaries. He did not have the greatest CEOs that ran the biggest companies in the world. He did not have all of the treasures and the earthly things. But I tell you, make no mistake. He is the chosen king of God. His name higher. His name greater. His name more powerful than anything that we have ever seen. His government will have no end. His power will never cease. His rule will never die. Because He lives forever, He will be the king forever! Hallelujah. He is forever.

This Palm Sunday, we remember the story about how He rode into Jerusalem on that donkey. They put their cloaks in front of Him, lining the roads, and they waved their palm branches, shouting out, “Hosanna to the king. Blessed is the king of David!” It is a day of victory, my friends. This is a celebration of victory for what Jesus was about to win on the cross. You see, when he came riding in, He was declaring His Kingship. It didn't matter what the people understood or didn't understand. It didn't matter. He was declaring Himself as King. He was the King of Kings and the Lord Almighty. The Lord says in Psalms 2, “Be warned all you rulers. Be warned, all you kings, fear the Lord with trembling.” He was making a declaration in the heavenly realms to all the principalities, to all the dominions. “I am the Lord!”

He was about to have that great victory, as we know. The greatest foe that any of us could have ever had. Death, where is your victory? Death, where is your sting? Because Christ was about to have power and victory over you. Hallelujah. That is why we celebrate the triumphal entry. That is what Palm Sunday means.

All four Gospels give an account of this event, and because God is wanting us to pull and to draw all that we can from this story. So today we're going to be reading our text from the book of John. So if you'd open your Bibles to John chapter 12:12-16. Jesus is coming to Jerusalem as King. It's also on the board behind me.

“The next day, the crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on His way to Jerusalem. They took the palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the King of Israel.’ Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, as it is written, ‘Do not be afraid, daughter Zion. See, your king is coming, seated on a donkey's colt.’” 16. “At first, His disciples did not understand all of this. Only after Jesus was glorified did they realize these things had been written about Him and that these things had been done to Him.” And that's where I want to start today. At the end, at verse 16.

"Don't miss out on bringing down all idols and making Him the Lord of your life."

The disciples were there, and these were Jewish men, they had been studying and memorizing the scriptures since they were very young. And they knew that Zechariah 9:9 was what we just quoted there. That the Messiah would enter into Jerusalem riding on a donkey. So look out for it! Because when you see it, that is my salvation coming to you. That is my chosen king. That is the one I have sent to you to save you. And yet the scriptures tell us that as they watched it and as the crowd saw it, they would not put the prophecies together. It wasn't yet hitting them. They didn't understand that the scriptures were being fulfilled. My friend, do not miss the hour of your visitation. Christ is here. Christ is among us. Christ is in the house this day. And he's wanting to meet with you. He's wanting to touch you. They did not understand the greatness of the moment that had come upon them. Although God did everything He could to prepare them so that they wouldn't miss out. This day, don't miss out on your King coming in. Don't miss out on making Him the Lord of your life. Don't miss out on bringing down all idols and making Him the Lord of your life. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

You see the crowd, although they saw Him there, they were looking for Him to fulfill a different need. They were looking for a king that would be that sense in the earthly way. They were looking for Jesus to come and fulfill a kingdom that would come in the line of David. And so they thought that if He would be royal and they could get behind Him, maybe then they could overthrow the Roman government. So they were looking for a political salvation. And that may be us today, not understanding the fullness of why Christ has really come. But they were narrowing Jesus' salvation to just be that little piece of a circumstance. But God did not just come to save them politically. God had come to save them spiritually; to enter into the heart, to pierce the heart of man and to make His Kingdom known inside of us. That we would be transformed and that we would represent Him everywhere we go.

So this day, maybe we are like some in the crowd that don't understand all that Jesus had come to accomplish. And so this day, we will study the scriptures. My point today is to teach us that every day we must see that Jesus entering Jerusalem fulfills three needs for the Christian this day. And so we'll discover what those are.

First, Jesus becomes our sacrifice. He is the perfect and the final sacrifice that provides complete forgiveness and reconciliation to God - that's a mouthful. We know that Jesus becomes the perfect sacrifice of God. He was willing to be obedient unto the point of death and so Jesus takes our place. Some people in the world don't know that they need to be reconciled to God, and some people simply don't care. But I tell you, this day, that time is running out. Time is running out and judgment will come, and all of those that have shown contempt for God will have to face judgment. And I want to tell you, we know pastor says to us constantly, that there are no atheists in foxholes. When the day of trouble comes, when the day of judgment comes, they will cry out to God for His salvation. But my friends, salvation is found in Jesus Christ alone.

Jesus' entry into Jerusalem just before Passover is no coincidence. God is beginning to reveal to us that He was the perfect sacrifice, that He was part of the plan of God all along, that He is your perfect sacrifice this day. Amen? So the crowds, as we saw in the scripture, had already been gathered for the time of Passover. That's why there were so many crowds there. They had made a religious pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and they had come there like they had every single year for 500 years, even since the time of Moses when Passover was first instituted. They went there to honor the Passover and to commemorate the time that the angel of death spared their house, passed over them, and brought judgment unto the Egyptians. And that night we know that He brought deliverance from Egypt, from Pharaoh, and from his armies. God brought out a great deliverance that day and God wanted them to remember it from time, from generations to generations, that you would honor the day that God brought deliverance to you. And God gave specific instructions in the book of Exodus of how they were to make a sacrifice.

Exodus 12:3 says, “Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month, each man will take a lamb for his family, one for each household.” And we know this is the sacrificial lamb of the Passover. Each family would take a year-old lamb - unblemished, without defect, a perfect lamb - and they would sacrifice that lamb. They would take the blood and they would paint it on the doorposts of their house and over the top. This blood was going to be a sign to the angel of death that he was to pass over their houses and that He would bring deliverance to the people of God. This blood was a sign that the angel of death and destruction would pass over. And my friends, it is no different today for those who have the blood of Jesus posted on the doorpost of their heart. The angel of death will pass over you. No harm will befall you. No disease will overtake you. No waters will go over your head. No death will be able to separate you from the love of God. Hallelujah! Nothing will be able to separate you from God.

You see, the Passover, which was celebrated on the first month of their year, is upon us now. They call it the month of Nisan, and it was their new year. And so we see this as a foreshadow of what would happen centuries later when Jesus goes and rides into Jerusalem on the donkey, entering in to be their sacrifice. He had come to sacrifice Himself, that instead of the lamb, that it would be Him. We read our scriptures that we have opened before us; we know that they were approaching the time of Passover. John 12:1 just a little above, if you just take a peek, it says, “six days before the Passover, Jesus was therefore in Bethany where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead.” So six days before Passover, He's at Lazarus' house. He's among the crowd where everybody had seen all of their miracles. And so, then, God is so specific in His Word, not any one of those words was written by man, but it is all God-breathed and God-inspired. It is His Word. And as we move down into our scriptures, we can see that it says in John 12:12, it starts with three specific words - “the next day.”

My friends, the next day would bring us to the very day that we read about in Exodus, that on the tenth day of Nisan, you would take for yourself a lamb, and you would sacrifice it so that the angel of death would pass over you. This was the day. This is the day that we celebrate. He is the chosen Lamb of God. Hallelujah!

"He would cover the multitude of all sins, past, present, and future, dying once for all time to cover the sins of all humanity, reconciling us back to God…"

The scriptures prophesy of His coming, and the fulfillment is here written before us this day, that on this day the sacrificial lamb would be chosen. He entered Jerusalem to come in and to give His life in just a few days, that He would die once for sin, once for sin, and that He would cover the multitude of all sins, past, present, and future, dying once for all time to cover the sins of all humanity, reconciling us back to God the way it was always meant to be. Hallelujah. Jesus is our perfect sacrifice.

You see, the lamb was a sacrifice of atonement. And I know that that might be a big word for some of us, but what that means is that the innocence of that lamb was going to be transferred over onto the person. There was going to be an exchange of the innocence and the purity of that lamb that would come on the person. And then through symbolism and through faith, that sin of that person would then be transferred over unto the lamb. And that is what we had at that time. The problem is that the blood of animals did not have the power to forgive sin once and for all. It did not have the power to cleanse the conscience. And therefore, these sacrifices had to be done year after year, over and over again. But my friends, this was just a foreshadow of what was to come. This was a foreshadow of Christ Jesus who would die once. He is the righteousness of our God and He becomes our righteousness this day.

Not a temporary and not a partial redemption, but truly to become the sons of God. He came to sacrifice His body so that through His death and resurrection, we would live. Now in the triumphal entry, Jesus enters in as the Lamb of God to be slain in just short days. Hebrews 10:8, if you could put that on the board for us. “Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings You did not desire, nor were You pleased with them though they were offered in accordance to Your law.” And don't we see that? Didn't God ask for the sacrifice? But they were not pleasing to God because they did not cleanse the conscience. They did not cleanse the heart of man. It didn't make man want Him any more. But Jesus then enters in, in 9, and then He said, “but here I am. I have come to do Your will.” No longer a sacrifice on the outside of the body, not robes, not a washing of hands, not the sacrifice of a heifer, or a bull, or a lamb, but it cost Him His life. It was a sacrifice of His will. It was His whole self that He gave unto God. This is why He is our perfect sacrifice. Only Jesus this day, only His name will we elevate in God's sight because He chose to give His will to God. I have come to do your will. The lamb was innocent. The lamb was perfect. The lamb was peaceable. The lamb loved God. And yet He was slain for you and for me. What does this day mean for the Christian? But today we know that Jesus is our perfect sacrifice.

Secondly, the triumphal entry shows us the way to salvation. We continue reading our scriptures in 13. It said, “They took palm branches and went out to meet Him, shouting, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the King of Israel.’” When Jesus rode in, He was bringing His message that He was both Messiah and King. And they treated Him like royalty. They were able to honor Him by throwing their cloaks down. They waved the palm branches and they shouted these praises unto God.

Historically, we know the use of these palm branches. They meant a sign of victory. And they would use them to celebrate a king in the past who had come back from battle and had victory. They would wave them to give honor to the king. The word “Hosanna”, meaning save me. It was them praising God. It was giving Him adoration. They were honoring the king. And that word comes from a Hebrew phrase, “hoshiyana”, which directly translates to, “God, save me”. Save me. Help me. You see, this was a plea that He would save them from their plight. But we need to know this day that God has come for so much more. We mentioned already that they wanted a political savior. They wanted to be rescued from their circumstance of Rome being over them. But this day, let us not limit the salvation that is found in Jesus Christ. It is not just about one area of our lives. It is not making Him Lord just on Sundays. It is not just about one circumstance that we have going on. He wants to be the Lord of your life. He wants to be Lord in your thoughts so that we would not think of dark things. He wants to be Lord over your tongue, that He would have control over what we speak. He doesn't want us to be king anymore. He wants us to lay down our crowns and make Him King, that He would rule over each and every one of us.

Would you make Him the Lord of your life? Would you make Him your Savior, knowing that we need to first be saved from ourselves? Our ways are far from God. Our ways are contradictory to His Word. Our thoughts are not in alignment with the Bible constantly, and we know this about ourselves. But Christ wants to be Lord over our thoughts, over our tongues, over our actions. Make him King of Kings and Lord of Lords in your life today. Not just Lord in one circumstance, but over everything.

How can we limit God's love and His restorative abilities in our life? Truly, why do we just put Him in a box thinking that we have to limit what He could really do in our life? He is a God of impossibilities and He wants to make you into a new creation this day. He is the master craftsman and He can do exceedingly more and abundantly than you could ever ask or imagine. More than you could ask Him for this day. If you would just surrender your heart to God and say, have Your will in my life. Do as You please in my life. Take over my mind. Take over my mouth. Take my life from me, because I've never been able to bring You glory. But God, if you come in, I will shine for you. Take over me this day.

The Lord is a creator. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, and darkness was over the surface of the deep. That's a really fancy way of saying there was nothing there. And God was able to make all that we see in creation. The immense complication of the human body, the stars. I learned recently that we know less about the ocean and the depths of the ocean than we do about outer space. God's mind is in creation. His creative abilities are seen in the world that we live in. John 1 says, “without Him nothing was made that had been made.” And I want to make a point very, very clear today. God did not use what was already there to create what He made. All 118 elements of the periodic table were created based on the abilities of God. His mind, His power, His creativity. And what's my point here is to say, He doesn't need anything from us. He is the creator that can make you new. He can make your life new. He can redeem your past life and bring you into His to resurrect you after Him and give you a new life. Hallelujah.

You see, the crowd may not have known it, but Jesus was demonstrating the way to salvation. He was showing them very clearly as He entered in, “Do as I do. Here we go.” He knows what was about to be ahead of Him. He knew the type of week that He was going to have, and yet, step by step, He made His way into Jerusalem. Why? Because He surrendered His life to God. And He said, “I know that You will not surrender Me. You will not abandon Me to the grave. You will be with Me and Your plans for My life will come to completion. I trust in You regardless of what I see with My eyes, regardless of what people are going to do to Me later this week. I know that Your plans for My life will come to fruition.” Church, this is the path to salvation.

This is the pattern that we must follow; to trust in God despite what we see. You see, it's faith in action and it's faith before seeing it in the natural. We must trust that God is doing something in the spiritual realms before it can be manifested in the physical. So Christ there was knowing what was going to be ahead of Him. He was still able to walk forward into salvation because He kept his eyes on God.

“Lord, You will see Me through. Lord, Your plans for My life will come and be revealed. Your plans for My life will not be thwarted by the plans of man.”

You see, we get thrown off course so easily, even when we know we're about to have a bad week. When we know we have meetings planned and our boss is riding us, and we know the pressure or the money that's on the line and we begin to panic and those things make us fear and run for cover and all of these things, but we have to say, “God is going to see me through even this week” But it's really even bigger than that, the perspective has to change, and it's really about your whole life. Whatever waters may come, whatever obstacles, whatever trouble comes, you will not die. You will not die until you see God, and He will make you live forever. There is nothing that can separate us from Him. Hallelujah.

Jesus did not just come for political oppression that the people were facing in that day. And I say to you this day, it's not just to free you from financial oppression. It's not just to free you from physical oppression when it comes to disease. He has come to break sin and death over us so that we may be free; Free to worship Him, free to love Him, free to be sons of God. Nothing that comes in your way is going to be able to stop you when you come into the Lordship and the Sonship of Jesus Christ. No chains, no darkness, no circumstances can take that away when Christ brings His life to you.

Salvation found in Christ and the one that He displayed and gave a pattern for was that of a new life. Christ has come to bring redemption to you so that you would no longer have to live guilty forever for your former life. When God makes it new, it's going to be new. And you no longer have to live every day, you know, not even wanting the sun to come up because we remember all of the bad things that we did or the bad things that we have said. He has died to give you the abundant life - a supernatural life that is only available for those that have the Holy Spirit. When we pray, we're actually praying heaven down like we've been talking about and the supernatural comes and is at the disposal of our hands. You see, God's authority, Jesus' authority, His Kingship, and His Lordship come inside of you and your prayers are able to accomplish much more than they ever were. This is the abundant life.

And finally, we know that He has come to bring that eternal life. That you would also be resurrected after Jesus and that you would live eternally with God the Father. That is the ultimate goal; that you would be reconciled with your creator, who knows you, who formed you, who knew you even while you were in your mother's womb. In the dark place, when you were still being knit together, it was God that spoke over you. It was God that created you. And that, with more love and more detail than anything else in creation that He has made, God has put His attention on each and every one of us. How could we keep ourselves apart from God? How could we resist his spirit? How could we resist His Son, whom He has given as a sacrifice so that we would be reconciled back to God, that we would live forever with Him?

Now, when we shout “Hosanna" today, my prayer is that it would sound different than the rest of the crowd. They were praying, “Lord, save me.” And we know that it was just for that political reason. They just wanted to be saved from Rome, but this day, I hope our perspective has changed. “Lord, save me. Make me new. Give me a new life this day. Hosanna! Hosanna! Lord, save me! Give me a new life.”

He has made the way for salvation. So we see that the triumphal entry first makes Jesus our perfect sacrifice. Secondly, He becomes our salvation. And finally, it gives the Christian a glimpse of the glory that is ahead of us (Whew, my favorite).

Jesus rode into Jerusalem and He entered into the temple of God. You see, this is a scene of a glimpse about what He was about to experience in just a few days when Jesus would die, that He would be resurrected, and that He would enter into the heavenly Jerusalem. Hallelujah! The temple on earth is just a model. That scene was just a model; It was just a practice. It was just there to show the people what was about to happen in the heavenly realms. You see, there had been kings in Israel, and they had entered into the temple, and they had left and maybe had some palm branches, but it wasn't that big of a deal. Jesus enters the true temple of heaven.

Can you put Hebrews 9:24 up? “For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made with human hands that was only a copy of the true one; but He entered heaven itself, now to appear for us in God's presence.” Jesus is entering into the temple on Palm Sunday. And when He walked into heaven, my friends, it wasn't just a bunch of people, you know, waving a little bit with palm branches. What was there waiting for Him? What kind of celebration was there waiting for Him? My friends, it was myriads and myriads of angels singing in joyful procession, giving adoration and praise to the King alongside the Patriarchs in heaven - of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob giving honor to the King of Glory. Hallelujah. Worshiping Him for He alone was the first man that beat death, hell, and the grave. And they gave Him praise and adoration. They shouted unto Him - the music, the opulence, the treasures of heaven, the crystal, the gold, and everything was there for Him - to celebrate the King of Glory. When Solomon - long ago when Solomon had dedicated the temple, said the glory of the Lord was so strong that even the priests could not enter the temple in that day. But I'm telling you, when Jesus, who enters the real temple of heaven - whew, how much different! You see, all the heavens were filled with His glory. This is the greatest day in history that Jesus had won. Jesus had had victory! He had won redemption for God's people to come back to Himself!

And my friends, in that day - wow, the opulence. You know, we thought that the inauguration for Trump may have been a big thing or Queen Elizabeth or whatever you have seen on the television. If you think that was a big deal, that is nothing compared to the coronation of Jesus Christ, who was given a crown of glory, Hallelujah, and who was given a great name that is above every name, power, and authority. He is given the seat of honor. He is over every dominion, power, and principality. He is the Lord Almighty, risen higher than any other lord and king. Hallelujah! For His obedience unto death, we celebrate Jesus. Hallelujah!

"We do not need to wait until we get to heaven to receive that glory. That glory is for the believer today."

Those who have the blood of the Lamb painted on the doorposts of their hearts will be received into heaven just as Jesus was received and the glory of the Lord will enter the one who makes Him King this day. We do not need to wait until we get to heaven to receive that glory. That glory is for the believer today.

Jesus said when He enters in - because He already is glorified, He already is crowned, He is the king - and when He enters in, He brings that light inside of you. He becomes your day. He becomes your sun. He becomes a lamp unto your feet and a light unto your path, guiding every day, showing you where to go, where not to go, closing doors, opening doors - He becomes your light, a light of hope, a light of joy, a light of newness, a light of everything that God can bring to you. All the treasures, all of the power of the Holy Spirit coming inside.

I'd like to read Isaiah 60, and I just picked out a few verses that speak about the light that is entering inside of us today. “Arise and shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you.” “Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn.”

“The sun will no more be your light by day, nor the brightness of the moon shine on you, for the Lord will be your everlasting light, and your God will be your glory.” Hallelujah!

Jesus, symbolically, He has come to give you the light today. We join into that procession. But this is a day like no other, and today we have a wonderful opportunity to crown Jesus, the King of our life. I welcome you to the coronation of Jesus Christ, that you would crown Him as the King of your life. That you would allow Him to enter into your heart for the very first time, just in the same pattern, in the same way that Jesus did - trusting that He wants to bring His fulfillment in your life.