Palm Sunday begins the Holy Week. Palm Sunday is the Sunday before Easter, known as “Resurrection Sunday.”
Palm Sunday began with Jesus and his disciples traveling over the Mount of Olives. The Lord sent two disciples ahead into the village of Bethphage to find a donkey for him to ride. They found her and her colt, as Jesus had said they would. The owners questioned them.
“Hey, what y’all doing there?” the donkey’s owners might have said. Maybe they thought the disciples were would-be horse thieves.
The disciples gave the answer Jesus had provided: “The Lord needs it.”
The Bible says this took place to fulfill what the prophet (Zechariah 9:9 ESV) said:
“Say to the daughter of Zion, / ‘Behold, your king is coming to you, / humble, and mounted on a donkey, / on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’”
The disciples brought the donkey and the colt and put their cloaks on them.
(Cloaks are sleeveless, long, outer garments made of single pieces of fabric that hang loose. Matthew mentions a donkey and her colt. Though Mark, Luke, and John mention only one young donkey, that does not mean there were not two. Mark and Luke indicated that the colt they acquired for Christ never had been ridden. Matthew omitted that information. Cornelius a Lapide’s commentary on the passage says that Christ first rode the donkey up and down the mount and then transferred and rode the colt into the city. Others say Jesus rode the colt while its mother was led nearby.)
Jesus rode a donkey for three reasons, according to amazingbibletimeline.com:
1. The first one is a fulfillment of the Zechariah 9:9 prophecy about making his entry while riding a lowly animal.
2. A leader rode on a horse if he was coming in war and a donkey to signify peace.
3. Jesus used the donkey to connect with the common people.
Jesus rode the colt as he entered Jerusalem.
Many people were headed to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover, the festival that remembers the escape of the ancient Israelites from Egypt. Jewish males were supposed to go to Jerusalem to the Temple for at least three “pilgrim festivals”: Passover (Pesah, a 7-day observance), Pentecost (Shavuot), and Booths (Sukkoth). On that Palm Sunday, a crowd probably was following Jesus because of his fame in Galilee.
“Most of the crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. And the crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting, ‘Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!’ And when he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred up, saying, ‘Who is this?’ And the crowds said, ‘This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee’” (Matt. 21:8-11 ESV)
“Alleluia, how the people cheer and palm leaves rustle as the king draws near,” said John Beavis.
“This crowd understood that Jesus was the Messiah; what they did not understand was that it wasn’t time to set up the kingdom yet — although Jesus had tried to tell them so (Luke 19:11-12),” gotquestions.com says. “The crowds looked for a Messiah who would rescue them politically and free them nationally, but Jesus had come to save them spiritually.”
People celebrated as Jesus rode a donkey into Jerusalem on the first Palm Sunday. They paved the street with cloaks and palm fronds. I believe Jesus enjoyed the moment, though he knew what was coming.
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