Expectations: Celebration and Confusion

This coming Sunday is Palm Sunday. It is the beginning of Holy Week. It is a reminder that we don’t always understand what God is up to and sometimes it is easy to get confused. But the crowd following Jesus didn’t seem to be confused. They lined the streets with their cloaks. They cried "Hosanna" and “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” They openly declared that Jesus was the one who had come to restore the kingdom of David. The air was thick with messianic expectation and hopes as Jesus rode into the great city. Could this be it? Could this be the day they have all waited for, the time foretold by the prophets? I would imagine the people were almost holding their breath with excitement.

Then (in Luke’s gospel) Jesus weeps over Jerusalem before announcing that the city will be crushed to the ground by their enemies because the people did not recognize the times that they lived in. What kind of king would say that?

Then Jesus went into the holy temple and chased out the people who were selling materials for worship. That kind of king would discourage activities in the holy temple?

This made the authorities mad enough that they were planning ways to kill him. But Jesus kept teaching and the people were amazed at his teaching.

This part of the gospel story is all about messianic expectation. The people had many different ideas about what kind of a deliverer God would send. It would have been nearly impossible for them all to agree on one idea. I think Jesus knew that the people’s expectations were not God’s plan and it didn’t distract him from the mission that God had given him.

So what do you expect from Jesus? Is Jesus meeting your expectations?