Free Grace Vernon

The Triumphal Entry | Matthew 21:1–11 | Pastor Ian Crooks 

On Palm Sunday, we remember the moment Jesus entered Jerusalem—not as the conquering king people expected, but as the humble King we desperately need. 

In this sermon from Free Grace Vernon, Pastor Ian Crooks walks through Matthew 21:1–11 and unpacks the significance of the triumphal entry. The crowds shouted “Hosanna,” laying down palm branches and cloaks in celebration—but many misunderstood the kind of King Jesus truly is. 

Join us as we prepare our hearts for Easter and see the beauty of a King who saves. 

Free Grace Vernon (PCA) 
1802 45th Avenue, Vernon, BC 
Sundays at 10:30am | freegracevernon.ca

Creators and Guests

Host
Pastor Ian Crooks
Senior Pastor | Teaching Elder

What is Free Grace Vernon?

Free Grace is a Presbyterian Church located in Vernon, British Columbia. We believe it is the Gospel of Christ that has power to transform people’s lives. To learn more about Free Grace Church www.freegracevernon.ca

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Some of you have heard the name Shadowfax. If I were to ask you what horse is that? Where is that horse famous for? Some of you probably know Shadowfax, let's do a quick show of hands, who knows what I'm talking about Shadowfax? Okay, we've got two, three, one, two, three, four, six, the rest of you okay, that's okay, that's fine, I didn't know till I looked up the name again, it's Lord of the Rings.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

That was the horse ridden by Gandalf, and there's a little scene in one of the movies, the Two Towers where Gandalf whistles for his horse to come, and there this lovely white horse, Shadowfax, comes running towards Gandalf. And he describes that horse, he says it is the lord of all horses, and then they ride off into the distance. If you haven't read or seen those movies, that's a good project for the spring. Now, when you think about that, you think what an appropriate way for the leading character, or one of the main characters to be transported in. And then you look at the story here of Jesus riding into Jerusalem, into the city of Jerusalem on a, not a white horse, but on a lowly donkey.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Yet his choice of that donkey was part of Jesus' symbolic action. As he entered into Jerusalem, his actions and his timing had tremendous meaning, not just for the crowds then, but for you and I here this morning. Go back in time with me, back to John's Gospel chapter two. One of the first signs that Jesus performed was at a wedding at Canaan in Galilee. They ran out of wine at the wedding.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Jesus' mother Mary came to him and said, Look, they've run out of wine, what are we going to do? And this is what Jesus said to his mother Mary. John two verse four, he said, my hour has not yet come. So hold that thought for a moment, my hour. Go back in time again, this time to John chapter six, where we have the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000, an amazing miracle.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Amazing provision by the Lord Jesus Christ. The crowds on that day, they had one thing on their mind. We want to make Jesus of Nazareth our king. But we read in John six fifteen, perceiving then that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by himself. He withdrew.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

In John two, his hour has not yet come. John six, he withdrew from the crowds. He's now ready to become a king. But now in this story, the narrative we've read this morning, we recognize as Jesus makes his way over the Mount Of Olives, into his view comes the Jerusalem temple on the Mount, the city of Jerusalem spread out, he recognizes as he comes there that his hour had now come to reveal his identity as the one true king. You could say it was time for public disclosure, it was time for Jesus to go public as to his identity.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

So if you have your Bibles with you, let's look together at this familiar story. We're gonna look at just two things in the story. First of all, Jesus' actions, and then secondly, the crowd's reactions. Jesus' actions, the crowd's reactions. Let's begin there verses one to five.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Jesus was fully in control of all of the events on that first Palm Sunday. His actions that Sunday morning were both planned and prophetic. First of all, they were plans. You read the story and you say, well, what was Jesus doing commandeering this beast, this donkey? After all, he had probably traveled all the way from Galilee on foot there to the suburbs of the city of Jerusalem.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Why now? Could he not walk the last couple of kilometers? Jesus here, as we see, he's making a statement. He is setting things in motion for an entry into Jerusalem that was symbolic in so many ways. Verse one tells us Jesus sent two disciples.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Luke's gospel tells us they were Peter and John. They've got their mission there. They go to this little town on the east slopes of the Mount Of Olives, Bethpage, and they go there to requisition these two donkeys for Jesus, probably a mother and her colt. The colt would bear Jesus on his back and the mother would be beside the colt, a kind of a reassurance given all the excitement and the hype and the noise as they made their way into Jerusalem. So what was the pass password there?

Pastor Ian Crooks:

What was the password if they were asked what they were doing? Verse three, the Lord needs him. Just those four simple words. It seems to have been a prearranged by Jesus, someone who knew that Jesus could be trusted with his property, his livestock, and that Jesus had absolute authority over all that he possessed. So it is planned, this journey into Jerusalem.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Secondly, we see it is also prophetic. Maybe you ask, well, could Jesus not have slipped into the city of Jerusalem kind of unnoticed? Absolutely, he could have. The crowds were massive, they were thronging into Jerusalem all the time, and he could have slipped into the city. Instead, if you look at verses four and five, you read there that Jesus chose to make his entry in a way that fulfilled an ancient prophecy recorded by the prophet Zechariah.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

He wasn't riding into Jerusalem on a donkey because he was tired, that he needed a rest on those last kilometers. He'd chosen this form of transport as prophetic symbolism. It was a dramatic entry. It was an entry that fulfilled the scriptures. Two scriptures.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Look at the words there in verse five, say to the daughter of Zion, that comes from Isaiah 62 verse 11, And then you've got this quotation from Zechariah nine:nine, Behold, your king is coming to you humble and mounted on a donkey and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden. So this prophecy here answers the question for us, why did Jesus choose to enter Jerusalem in that way? Well, did so, his arrival happened in this way because it was a fulfillment of this five hundred plus year prophecy from Zechariah about the coming of God's rightful king. And this is why Jesus did not enter into Jerusalem on the back of a white horse or a war horse as the Roman generals or leaders or Caesars would enter a city on. He didn't come in that way.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

He came and stayed on a little animal that you would probably find today in a petting zoo. The little kid just perched on on their back, just little rides along this nice quiet donkey. What a contrast here. This was the the focus of Zechariah's prophecy. You go back there and and the word is clear.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Verse five, it's humble. It's humility here. God's Messiah was one who is humble and peaceful. He was no warrior king who was coming along there to just drive out the might of the Roman Empire. He was a a meek king rather than a warrior king.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We remember Jesus' words in Matthew 11 verse 29. Tremendous assurance for every one of us here today. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and lowly in heart. And you will find rest for your souls. Some of you here, it's just that rest that you need.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Turn to Jesus. He's gentle. He's meek, he's humble. And he is a king who in his humility came to bring for us peace with God. Think of those words that we read earlier in the service from Philippians two:eight.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

And being found in human form, he, that is Jesus, humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross. Jesus' entry into the city of Jerusalem would bring for him incredible suffering, humiliation, death upon a cross by crucifixion. It would take place outside those city walls. And remember the sign that was pinned to the cross of Jesus? Remember the words Jesus of Nazareth, the king of the Jews?

Pastor Ian Crooks:

His identity. A very different kind of king. Life with Jesus as our king means a life of total surrender to him as his citizens and his kingdom. Go back again to the words to the owners of the donkey, the Lord needs them. And so those owners with their donkey were able to present what they had to the Lord Jesus.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Again, we remember that whatever we have, the Lord needs. Maybe our time, it might be our money, it may be our gifts, energy, it may be our home or our vehicle that we use, whatever it is, maybe even our family, we're saying to the Lord, Lord, you are king. Lord Jesus, you reign. These belong to you. So as we follow Christ, our king, we die to personal autonomy.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We we follow instead his path of humility, and that humility is so important in his kingdom. This quote from the Christian counselor Jeremy Pierre puts it well. He says, gentleness is like a mallet that moves wood trim into place with a high priority on not damaging the trim. Now as you know, I'm no carpenter, but I know that if you wanna put that trim in place, you don't take a hammer, you gently tap it in with that wooden mallet. We know the danger, we know the damage caused by that hammer of pride or boasting or even our abuse of authority.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We recognize the danger is very real. So we have Jesus' actions here. What about the crowd's reaction? Turn with me in your Bibles there too. Let's look at verses six and seven there for Peter and John, it's mission accomplished.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

They brought the two donkeys back to Jesus, they used their cloaks, they made an improvised saddle for Jesus to sit on the donkey? How would the vast crowds react on that day to this figure of Jesus riding into Jerusalem on this lowly beast? Well, we're going to look at three action words there. Let's look together verses eight to the end, we'll see the crowd spreading, the crowd shouting, the crowd saying. Let's begin there, verse eight, there's this word spreading.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We read most of the crowds spread their cloaks on the road and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. So you have the cloaks, you've got the palm branches and they're spread on the road that Jesus uses, they don't want Jesus or even the animal he's riding on to touch the dust and the gravel and the soil of that path. It's an act of homage to their king as they give him, you could say it's the red carpet treatments. Maybe some of you, I don't want to even suggest you ever do what's the Oscar ceremonies, what a waste of time, but the Oscars have, as we know, the red carpets. The red carpet is so important, all these celebrities and guests and the winners of awards will come along the red carpet, make their way there.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

That red carpet costs $25,000 US dollars. It takes an 18 person crew, 18 people to assemble, taking six hundred man hours. Now, I'm not sure it takes six hundred hours to put a carpet out there at Hollywood, but again it's that red carpet treatment for someone or for people who are in this world's esteem seen as incredibly important and prominent people. So this is an even more extravagant gesture here towards Jesus. The crowds were willing to lay down that most valuable item of clothing.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Took off their cloaks and put them on the ground there before Jesus. So they pay homage to the Lord Jesus Christ. They're replaying a scene from their history. You don't have to look at it now, but in two Kings nine thirteen, the news came of how the prophet Elisha had appointed Jehu as king of Israel. And we read, and haste every man of them took his garment and put it under him on the bare steps.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

King Jehu turned out to be a wicked king. Here Jesus enters the one true king, the king and fulfillment of all those other kings of Israel and Judah. He's come, he's here, he's in Jerusalem. So they come there. So we have the spreading.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Let's look on verse nine, we have their shouting. The crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting. So we get the sense here of the convergence of the crowds coming out of Jerusalem towards Jesus and the disciples, and you've got the crowds behind Jesus traveling with him from Galilee, and they come together and they are shouting at the top of their voices. What are they shouting? Well, there are words taken from the last of six Psalms that were sung at the three great annual festivals for God's people Israel.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We're there in Psalm 118 verse 25. Again, we read it earlier. Save us, we pray, O Lord. O Lord, we pray, give us success. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We bless you from the house of the Lord. The Lord is God's. He has made his light to shine upon us. So from those lyrics, we recognize that the sense of messianic expectation is incredibly high, it's right off the radar you could say. The crowds may not have fully understood everything about the nature of Jesus' kingly rule, but their words reveal a lot about who Jesus truly is.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

There's a word there, Hosanna, meaning save or save us. It was partially prayer to the Lord, the Messiah, but it's also an expression of praise as the crowds lifted this word on their lips, it was as if they had the victory already, it was as if they had already triumphed over Roman oppression. This was the king that they were looking for to lead them to victory. And yet that was a deliverance that Jesus had never promised to bring. And then you can read on Jesus in Acts chapter one speaking to his disciples as he is about to ascend again to heaven.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We read that the disciples there, they too were struggling. They had this messianic expectation of a military leader and king. In Acts one verse six, say, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? They didn't get it. Go on, you can read the expressions there, Hosanna in the highest verse nine.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Again, they're echoing the praise of the angels at the birth of Jesus. Remember, out on the hills outside of Bethlehem, remember the angelic choir there, glory to God in the highest. The crowds hear, see in the Messiah, the gift of God who dwells on high. And then you've got the words there, Hosanna to the son of David. Here they make this astounding claim that Jesus of Nazareth is the king in the line of David.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Again, the prophet Zechariah had pointed to him, he they believe was the king. And again, another nationalistic chant here from the crowds. They want to picture this Davidic King just leading them like an army into battle. And then at the end of verse nine, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Just one more shout of acclamation, they're saying blessed or happy we could say, are those who follow God's chosen King.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

So in all of this, in all of the shouting and all of the singing, they fail to recognize Jesus just wasn't the kind of King that they were looking for or expecting. So maybe we ask this morning, well, what kind of King is King Jesus? What kind of King? Well, the Apostle Paul, as he writes to his young friend Timothy, he understood what kind of king Jesus was. He writes in one Timothy one fifteen, The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am the foremost.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We can put our names right there with Paul, can't we? You and I were there with Paul. Jesus came to save sinners, not just Paul, the writer of the letter, not just Timothy to whom the letter is addressed, not just to the crowds on that day, on that first Palm Sunday, but to every one of us here today as we acknowledge our sin and our rebellion against the authority of Christ as king. He's the king who came to dethrone those rival idols or kings that have taken up residence in our hearts. You know what those kings are.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

I know what those kings are, he came to dethrone them. He came to claim his rightful place on the very throne of your heart this morning. So they were spreading those branches and cloaks, they were shouting their praises to the Lord. Finally, look at verse 10, they are saying, the whole city was stirred up saying, who is this? And that little term there stirred up gives us our word seismic.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Imagine you're walking downtown Vernon and there's an earthquake and the whole downtown is just shaking. The whole city is shaking. There's a seismic event. That's what was going on there in the city of Jerusalem. The whole place was stirred up.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Again, we've had a little echo here of Jesus earliest years. Remember when the Magi came from east to find the one who was to be the King of the Jews? Remember how King Herod saw the threat of a rival king and we read that all Jerusalem with him was troubled by this rival king. The crowd's curiosity is raised where they ask the question, who is this? It doesn't mean that they had no idea that this was some kind of complete unknown, they needed him to be ID'd, it's not like they're shooting a movie in this area of the Okanagan and we come upon a crowd, there's a famous celebrity, but we don't recognize who they are.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

And we say, well, who is that? Well, what's the big deal? No, the crowds knew, but look at their answer. It seems to be a bit of an anticlimax, doesn't it? Look at verse 11, this is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth of Galilee.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

And this is not so much a wrong answer, he truly was a prophet, but it was more of an inadequate answer. They didn't really understand that this was not just one in a long line of Old Testament prophets. They probably didn't understand that Jesus was to be the prophet like Moses that is referred to in Deuteronomy 18 fifteen-eighteen. It was an inadequate understanding. Now it's easy to share that inadequate understanding of Jesus Christ.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Perhaps even at Easter, we sing familiar songs of praise and church services, we keep our Easter traditions whatever they are and we don't really fully grasp the nature of Jesus' kingly reign in our lives. I love this second novel, Lord of the Rings is good, but better is the Chronicles of Narnia, just saying that now, you can talk to me afterwards. In it, have these words from the talking beaver, Mr. Beaver. The story is about Aslan, the lion, the kind of a figure of Christ.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Mr. Beaver says, Aslan is a lion, the lion, the great lion. Oh, said Susan, I thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Safe? Said Mr. Beaver. Who said anything about being safe? Course he isn't safe, but he's good.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

He's the king, I tell you. He's the king. Don't try to domesticate the king. Instead, honestly answer the question that the crowds were asking on that day, who is Jesus? Don't treat him as merely a good man, as an exceptional example to follow, Jesus hasn't given us that option.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Don't look to him as that kind of elusive leader or political figure who is going to lead us and deliver us from all the the woes of our land today. Don't regard him as just one more voice to speak into your life like another life coach or mentor or best friend or personal assistant or whatever. No, he's more than just an advisor. Instead he calls us to look to him in faith, to surrender our lives to him, to submit all of our ambitions, hopes, our plans into his sovereign hands. So Jesus later would confront Pilate about the nature of his kingly rule.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

John 18 verse 36, he said to Pilate, my kingdom is not from the world. You see Jesus was no military threat to the might of the Roman Empire. He was no five star general. He was no gladiator. He was not there to dethrone the Caesar from his position.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Instead, as we read this morning, Jesus turns our concept of kingship on its head. He is a spiritual king. He rules over a spiritual kingdom. He is advancing his kingdom around the world today, one life at a time, as he brings about the conversion of lost people. And his kingdom is being established and his church, this Easter can make it known.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Let's end with this quotation from another PCA pastor, Sean Lucas. He said this, it's an important quotation, he says, unbelievers should be able to look at the church for a sneak peek of what God's reign looks like. Under God's reign, men and women love one another, submitting to one another under the rule of God's word. Under God's reign, men and women worship God, being led by the spirit in the renewal of our communion with God. Under God's reign, his people serve one another laughing and crying together as we wander as pilgrims together through the wilderness on our way to the city of God's.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

As sinners saved by God's grace, we are not traveling into Jerusalem this morning, we are headed towards another city. We're saved not by Jesus slaying his foes in Jerusalem, but going outside that city and allowing himself to be nailed to that cross, to be crucified, to die for our sins outside those city walls. He is the king, He is goods. He is on his throne. Buy dying this morning.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

Worship him and submit to him as his as king. Let's pray together. Lord God, we praise you for the coming of your king. We praise you, Lord Jesus, that you came humble, one who is meek and peaceful. You're the one who calls us to take your yoke upon us and to find rest for our souls and you alone.

Pastor Ian Crooks:

We pray, Lord Jesus, that you would indeed reign in our lives, in every single aspect, in every single area of our lives today, that we would exalt you and submit to your absolute authority as the one true head of your church, Lord Jesus. In your name we pray. Amen.