When Jesus Comes: A Meditation on Luke 19 for the 1st Sunday in Advent

And when he was come nigh,

even now at the descent of the mount of Olives,

 the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God

 with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen;

Saying, Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord:

peace in heaven, and glory in the highest.

 

And some of the Pharisees

from among the multitude said unto him,

Master, rebuke thy disciples.

And he answered and said unto them,

I tell you that, if these should hold their peace,

the stones would immediately cry out.

 

The entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem recorded in Luke 19 is a fulfilment of the Old Testament prophets to whom God granted vision to see the first coming of the Messiah centuries before.  It is an event marked by both faith and unbelief, by misunderstanding of some and active resistance by others.  Jesus’ disciples, together with the crowd who had traveled with Him and seen His miracles on the way to Jerusalem, lined the way with shouts and thanksgiving for the coming of the Messianic King.  The Pharisees were appalled by this spectacle, but were powerless to stop it.  The crowd seemed to think this coming of the King would usher in a physical overthrow of the Roman occupation and restore the fortunes of Israel, while the Pharisees seemed to think Jesus was a threat to civil and religious order that would bring about their destruction.  Few, if any at this point, understood that Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem would culminate in His betrayal, crucifixion, and death, and perhaps none other than Jesus Himself knew that His victorious Resurrection would usher in His Kingdom without end.  Jesus was indeed fulfilling the Old Testament prophecies of His first coming, but the people were confused, even as they either lauded or derided Him.

 

This should give us some pause in our presumptions about understanding Biblical prophecy.  The people of Israel had roughly 500 years to ponder the prophecies of Jeremiah and Isaiah; nearly 1000 years to consider the messianic prophecies of David in the Psalms or Solomon in the Proverbs; and over 1500 years to weigh the prophetic writings of Moses.  The scribes and scholars, Pharisees and Sadducees, and everyone taught to read and hear the ancient Scriptures across many generations, still didn’t fully understand what Jesus was doing when He came the first time.  Looking backward from after the Resurrection, with the benefit of Jesus’ teaching and His Apostles’ inspired written witness, it is easy to sit in judgement upon the ignorance of 1^st century Judea having not connected all the threads of the Prophets.  But in reality, fallen human beings are notoriously thick headed and hard hearted when it comes to trusting God’s Word, and this flaw in our fallen nature showed up even as Jesus approached Jerusalem, just as it had when Jesus was conceived in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary, born in Bethlehem, raised in Nazareth, or preached in Galilee.  Like all our ancestors before us, we are slow to hear and to see and to understand what the coming of Jesus means.

 

We know that in just a few weeks, we will celebrate the first Advent of Jesus, to whom holy angels and humble shepherds sing their praises.  We also know that Jesus’ birth on that first Christmas was for a purpose far beyond the dusty streets of Bethlehem, which would be shown forth just 33 years later on Calvary.  The disciples, including Mary, didn’t have to understand all the details and implications of what was happening, they just needed to trust the Word of the Lord.  And as they did, they beheld the Word of the Lord made flesh and dwelling among them, full of grace and truth.  Whether it was the crowds that lined the road approaching Jerusalem with palm branches and their own clothes shouting hosanas to the Son of David, or those who gathered near the manger on that first Christmas, or those who huddled in fear during the early morning hours of the first Easter, the challenge was not to fully understand everything which God was doing, but rather to trust Him in all that He said and did.  The trouble with fallen human beings reading prophesy, is that our darkened minds don’t often fully understand it until after it happens.  But empowered by the Holy Spirit, we can still trust and believe the Word of God, even when we can’t fully comprehend it.

 

Likewise in our day, we look forward to the second coming of Jesus.  We know from what He has told us through His Prophets and Apostles that He is coming back, that He will gather together His people from every corner of heaven and earth, and that He will usher in the New Creation where sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil are forever put away.  We know that the mystery of His Incarnation, Crucifixion, and Resurrection will be fulfilled and complete in that Day, as His people join Him in His eternal victory over every enemy of the human race.  We know that despite the turbulence and tribulation that will precede His second coming, Jesus has already secured for us a life without end that no one can take away from us.  We know that no matter how dark our days may become, no matter how the devil and his minions wail or threaten or lie or deceive, that nothing can separate us from the light and love of God in Christ Jesus our Savior.

 

So what is left for us to do, but to be faithful in His Word until He comes, rejoicing in the grace of His salvation accomplished for us through His first Advent?  We need not try to fill in the gaps of our understanding with assumptions and presumptions about all the intricacies of His second Advent, because we know from both the prophecies and testimonies of Scripture that it will be far more magnificent than we can imagine.  What we do know is that He is coming again, and as He came before, He will bring salvation to His people that no enemy can overthrow.  In this hope we prepare our hearts and minds to believe all that the Prophets and Apostles have testified by the power of the Holy Spirit, that when He comes again, we might sing with His faithful people of every age, Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord:

peace in heaven, and glory in the highest!  Amen.