Episode Transcript
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This is the word of the Lord. Now, as they led him away,
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they laid hold of a certain man, siren, a Sirenean, who
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was coming from the country. On
Him they laid the cross that he might
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bear it after Jesus, and a
great multitude of the people followed him,
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and women also mourned and lamented him. But Jesus, turning to them,
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said, daughters of Jerusalem, do
not weep for me, but weep for
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yourselves and for your children. For
indeed the days are coming in which they
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will say, blessed are the barren
wounds that never bore and the breasts which
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never nursed. Then they will begin
to say to the mountains, fall on
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us, into the hills, cover
us. For if they do these things
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in the green wood, what will
be done in the dry, thus farthest
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reading of God's Holy Word? The
grass withers, in the flower fades,
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but the word of our Lord endures
forever. Please be seated. US pray.
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Lord Jesus, we thank you for
what it is that you've done for
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us. We thank you that you
have given your life that we might live.
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We thank you that you have taken
your life back up, raised from
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the dead, that we might live
forever and ever with you. We thank
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you, Lord Jes says, that
you have ascended on high, the Prophet,
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Greater Than Moses, the king,
Greater Than David, the priest,
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greater than Melchizedek. We thank you, Lord, that you have given these
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words for I edification. We pray
that you would bless this reading and preaching
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of your holy word, that we
might perfectly know you and love you more
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and more. Lord Jesus, we
ask this in your name. Amen.
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Well, today's palm Sunday and we
don't really make much of a big deal
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of it, but it is palm
Sunday and this is the the day every
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year when we commemorate Jesus is Triumphal
entry and the last week of his earthly
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ministry, and I'm sure we're all
familiar with the story. But one of
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the things I love about the Bible
is that, no matter how well you
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may know it, the more you
study it in the more closely you read
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it and read the whole thing and
become familiar with it from beginning to end,
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the more amazing it becomes. The
depth the nuance to the word of
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God just gets deeper and deeper and
deeper, and so this morning what I'd
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like us to do is to look
at what is one of the more obscure
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portions of the Gospel Account of Jesus's
life. I mean, we all know
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it, but it's rather obscure,
I think, but it's it is,
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I believe, an incredibly powerful story
that tells us a lot about God's heart
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for his people and for this world
which he's created. Now, it's been
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said that the best analogy for our
relationship with God is the relationship of a
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husband and wife in marriage, and
I believe that is true. And though
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it doesn't seem like it on the
surface, in the passage that we have
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before us this morning we get a
glimpse into Jesus's understanding of his Betrothal of
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the church to himself as his bride, and I want us to unpack that
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a little bit to see what it
is that he's going about, why he
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says what he says and why he
says it to the people he says it
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to, and I think we'll find
that we'll get a glimpse, perhaps that
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we haven't had before, of what
was in Jesus's mind on the day in
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which he was crucified, and I'd
like to do that in three parts.
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You know, there's the old saying
that most preachers either their sermons have three
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points or they're utterly pointless. So
I hope this is three points. But
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the first thing I'd like us to
look at is the women Jesus addresses.
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The second thing I'd like us to
look at is the command Jesus gives and
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third I'd like us to look at
the warning Jesus speaks. So the women
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he addresses, the command he gives, the warning he speaks. Now,
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as we come to our passage,
here in Verse Twenty Six, it's just
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after that long dark night when Jesus
was betrayed by Judas to the Jewish authorities
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and, as we know, all
of his friends and his disciples had fled
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from him and in terror and in
fear for their lives, Peter went on
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to deny him three times. Conscious
pilot, of course, had in severely
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beaten and he had him whipped until
his back was torn, the flesh was
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ripped, the blood ran freely down. He was spat upon, smacked,
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humiliated, mocked and abandoned. And
here in Verse Twenty Six, we find
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Jesus walking down the via Dolor Rosa
and Jerusalem, that's what we call it
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today, though the way of sorrows. And as he's carrying his cross out
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the via Dolor Rosa down toward the
place of execution, there's all these throngs
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of happy people pouring into the city
first thing in the morning to go for
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because it's the feast of the Passover. Remember, there are not all there
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for Jesus. These people are pouring
into the gates of the city for the
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most wonderful, happiest occasion in the
life of Israel. And so they're pouring
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into the city. And as he's
going through all of these places, carrying
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his cross to the place of Croupus, crucifixion, he stumbles under the weight
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of the Cross beam that he carried, because he is utterly incapable, in
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the condition he's in, beaten as
he is, to carry that cross any
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further. So the Romans grabbed hold
of this fellow from Libya named Simon,
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and they make him carry Jesus's Cross
and help Jesus get to the place of
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execution. And as Jesus is rising
to his feet, he turns and he
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sees this group of women who are
following the execution procession, and he sees
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that they're weeping. They're mourning,
lamenting over him, Luke says, and
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this is what he says to them. Old Daughters of Jerusalem, do not
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weep for me. Oh daughters of
Jerusalem, do not weep for me.
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So we have to ask ourselves,
dig a little deeper. Why are they
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weeping? What was in their hearts
to make these women mourn for him like
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this? Well, obviously these women
are sympathetic to Jesus Right. These are
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women who see this Nice Young Minister, this prophet and Miracle Worker from Galilee,
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they see him suffering so awful,
awfully, they sympathize with him.
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These are women, by the way, there who are not his disciples.
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His disciples all fled. These women
are not his disciples, but they are
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very sympathetic, it seems, to
his message and now they're crying for him.
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They're saying, Oh, this poor
man, how horrible, how tragic
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to see such a nice preacher and
a prophet die so horribly. They're very
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sympathetic to him and I think that
they see his situation as being utterly hopeless
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and desperate. They see Jesus being
helplessly carried to his death, unable to
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escape his doom. And so these
women are crying the tears that one would
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cry for a man who is utterly
hopeless. But then Jesus says to them
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not to cry. He says,
oh daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for
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me. Now it seems sort of
an odd way for him to address them,
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doesn't it? I mean he's on
his way to die, he's within
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an inch of his life already,
and he stops and he looks at these
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women he says, oh daughters of
Jerusalem, and when we see something like
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this, when we see something that
seems out of place when we're reading the
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Bible, we need to ask ourselves
why is this little odd tidbit here?
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I mean there's not one wasted word
in scripture. So why does he say
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this here? So why? Why
does he call them the daughters of Jerusalem?
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And notice that he doesn't say Oh, daughter of Jerusalem. The term
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daughter of Jerusalem or daughter of Zion
runs throughout the entirety of the Old Testament
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and refers to God's people, Israel, but he refers to them here as
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the daughters of Jerusalem. And I
think it's not just because it's more than
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one woman. I think what he's
doing here is he's referring to something in
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the Old Testament that you might not
expect, and what I think he's referring
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to is Song of Solomon. He
wants us to be thinking about something from
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Song of Solomon, and we all
know the story of Song of Solomon.
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I think it's the book in the
Old Testament about how Solomon the Great and
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glorious King in Israel, the son
of David, the Prince of peace.
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That's what Solomon means. He's the
king in Israel and we know in that
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story that he goes off and he
falls in love with a poor farmer's daughter,
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Shulimouth, this undeserving farm girl,
with all the beauties in the court
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in Jerusalem he could pick from,
Solomon falls in love with a girl named
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Schulimouth, this farmer's daughter, who's
got a terrible farmer's Tan and she has
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these hard calloused hands from laboring out
in the Field Day by day. But
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for some reason the king falls in
love with the farmer's daughter and he makes
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her his queen, and the whole
book of Song of Solomon is the story
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about how they fell in love and
courted and how they got engaged and finally
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it tells us about the wedding night. And Throughout Song of Solomon we find
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the only place in the Bible other
than right here, where someone is called
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the daughters of Jerusalem. And the
daughters of Jerusalem are the women of the
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court, these are the ladies in
waiting, these are the the fancy ladies
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who go to the balls and they
go to the fairs and the parties.
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And there the women, throughout the
story of Song of Solomon, who are
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observing the story and watching the love
butting. These are women who watched the
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king and his bride fall in love. They watched, they observes the engagement,
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but needless to say, they didn't
get engaged. These are women who
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perhaps heard of the wedding night,
but quite obviously they weren't there. Right.
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So these women watch, they observe, they hear, but they are
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not the bride. And here in
Luke, Chapter Twenty three, is Jesus
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is going to his death. He
calls them the daughters of Jerusalem, and
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the reason he does that is because
these women are not his disciples. These
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are some of the nice respectable people
in Jerusalem. These are the people who
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had listened for three years to Jesus
is teaching and preaching. They'd seem the
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things he'd done, they'd heard the
nice words and they wanted his blessing.
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But they didn't want to follow him. And I suspect that the most likely
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reason they didn't want to follow him
is because because of the company he kept.
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Right these are the respectable people.
And and Jesus, you know,
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he's awfully interesting. You know,
the Mahatma Gandhi once made the observation.
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He says, I like your Christ
I do not like your Christians, and
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I have a feeling these people were
the same way. They thought he was
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intriguing, you see. But his
friends, his friends, they're disreputable.
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I mean, he's got these immoral
women, foreigners, tax collectors, drunks,
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creeps, sinners of all sorts.
That's who he hung out with.
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And you know, I'm sure these
Nice, clean, cut upwardly mobile young
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women in Jerusalem saw the way that
the king of kings was courting these sinners
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and though they like the message of
love and grace and forgiveness, they could
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never understand why a guy like him
fell in love with people like this,
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like Schulimouth and Song of Solomon.
The women are the people Jesus hung out
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with. Were undeserving. There're scummy, they're disreputable, and these women that
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day in Jerusalem couldn't understand what Jesus
was doing, because they didn't understand that
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they too were just as disreputable and
sinful as the people that Jesus kept company
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with. And so they repeatedly sat
on the fence while Jesus called for repent
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sentence. But when the Nice words
of the Nice Young Prophet were being stopped
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by the execution, they wept.
But Jesus commands them not to weep.
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Oh daughters of Jerusalem, weep not
for me, but why not weep for
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him? This is a tragedy,
isn't it? This is a sad,
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awful, heartrending moment. I mean, look at the Romans are about to
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crucify Jesus, the most hideous execution
in the ancient world. He had just
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stall thought, stumbled and fallen because
he's exhausted. In the blood is coursing
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down his back in those awful thorns
are poking into his brow. He is
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helpless, isn't this horrible. Why
not weep at a moment like this?
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Well, Jesus commands them not to
weep because this is not a hopeless moment.
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What they don't get is this is
Jesus is greatest moment. These women
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think it's hopeless because Jesus is going
to die. They think that's a cause
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for misery because, from their perspective, Jesus is being taken against his will
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to suffer and die in vain.
That's their perspective. That's what they think,
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and they think think that because they
don't understand Jesus. They don't understand
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what he's doing or why he's doing
it. So think about it from another
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perspective. And Song of Solomon,
in that story of love and romance with
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the daughters of Jerusalem, had started
just bawling and hopeless sorrow the day Solomon
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went to go ask Chulimouth to marry
him. I'm would they have lamented at
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that great moment of joy when Solomon, the great king, takes the dowry
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down to the farmer's house and says
I would like to marry your daughter?
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Of course not. That that would
have been bizarre to see in the story
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wouldn't. I mean to put it
in our own context here. Can you
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imagine that if you were there when
Christopher got down on his knee to Rachel,
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going horribleut the other of the world
right? He wouldn't do that?
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Or when your best friend comes to
you and she says look at, look
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at, I got a big rock. Look at I mean, would you
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go no, of course you wouldn't
do that. That would be bizarre.
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You wouldn't cry at such a moment
unless it was tears of joy. So
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how much more bizarre is it when
the daughters of Jerusalem weep when the being
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of glory goes to betrothed his bride
to himself? In that great passage on
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marriage in Ephesians Chapter Five, Saint
Paul tells husbands that they should love their
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wives just as Christ first love the
church. He says that Jesus laid down
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his life for his bride, the
church, so that she might be spotless
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and without blame before him in love
to make her his own dear wife.
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Paul says that he gave up his
life so that the church and the Messiah
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could be united in the bonds of
love forever and ever. And there was
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no hopelessness as he did so.
There's no sense in which Jesus was coerced.
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I mean, come on, he
is God. He could have called
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down a legion of Angels to destroy
a Rome in Jerusalem and pilot in Augustus
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and the Jews and the Roman soldiers. He could have done it himself.
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With one word, he called all
things into existence himself. He could have
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destroyed them. But he didn't do
that, and that's because, contrary to
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what those daughters of Jerusalem thought that
day in Jerusalem, Jesus was doing this
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of his own accord, just as
a girl's bow will go and drop a
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huge sum for an engagement ring.
Even so, Jesus is laying down his
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life, we're told, because of
the joy that was set before him,
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and the joy that was set before
him that day is he was rising back
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to his feet. was you and
me. He laid down his life gladly
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and willingly, so that he could
pay our dollarry, so that he could
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pay the penalty for all the sins
of all of his people, so that
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nothing would stand between his church,
the bride of Christ and the love of
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her beloved bridegroom. You see,
this isn't a tragedy. This is the
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Culmin Nation of everything that the prophets
had spoken of. A few weeks ago,
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we heard pastor mark quote from Zeph
and I ah chapter three. And
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in Zeph and I a chapter three, in the fourteen through seventeen verses,
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Zeph and I as says something that
I want to read to y'all. He's
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talking to the True Daughter of Zion, not the daughters who watch from the
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sideline, but the daughter, the
true and only one, of Israel.
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He says this seeing, Oh daughter
of Zion, shouts, Oh Israel,
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be glad and rejoice with all your
heart, old daughter of Jerusalem, the
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Lord has taken away your judgments,
he's cast out your enemy, the King
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of Israel. The Lord is in
your midst. You shall see disaster no
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more. In that day, it
shall be said to Jerusalem, fear not,
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Zi and let not your hands be
weak. The Lord God is in
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your midst. The mighty one will
save. He will rejoice over you with
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gladness, he will quiet you with
his love, he will rejoice over you
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with singing. This was that day. This, this lowest seeming of all
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moments, was the means of the
betrothal of the bride of Christ to her
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beloved. So then, why on
earth should you weep at a time like
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this? Oh daughters of Jerusalem,
weep not for me, for I am
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going right now to make her mind. But, having said this, Jesus
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gives these women a warning and,
starting in Verse Twenty Eight, he says
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this, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your
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children, for indeed the days are
coming in which they will say blessed are
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the barren wounds that never bore and
the breasts which never nursed. Then they
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will begin to say to the mountains, fall on us, into the hills,
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cover us. For if they do
these things in the green wood,
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what will be done in the dry? So why should they weep for themselves?
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What cause is there for this?
Well, Jesus tells them to weep
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for themselves because, as we said
before, they weren't his disciples. These
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women here are still sitting on the
fence. They're like so many people today
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who hear the word of God.
They like the nice sounding sentiments, but
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they don't want to go down that
hard road of discipleship. And that's because
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the hard road of discipleship is a
life of rigorous self examination. It's a
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life of self examination that uses Jesus
as sermon on the Mount and not how
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we measure up to the next guy. It uses Jesus as standard, as
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the yard stick of our self are
as our sinfulness. The life of discipleship
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looks at our hearts, not our
deeds. It looks at our motives and
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our goals for all of our words
and actions, not the things that we
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do as the judge of whether we're
sinning or not. And the only acceptable
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motive for any thing that we do
or say or think is the love of
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Christ, because of what he's done
for us. And the only acceptable goal
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for any of our thoughts or words
or deeds is the greater glory of God,
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because of what Christ has done for
us. Our motive must always be
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loved, our goal must always be
glory. But these women here are not
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his disciples. They don't want that
road of discipleship. Like the daughters of
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Jerusalem and Song of Solomon, these
are mere spectators between the love of the
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groom and the bride. And you
know that said even faithful Christians, when
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we come across passages such as this, have to ask ourselves. How do
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I stand in regard to Jesus?
I mean, remember, these women are
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members of the Old Testament Church.
But just listening to Jesus as words and
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having membership in the church and even
following him around wasn't enough. So I
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ask you, as we come to
the Lord's table, how are you this
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morning? Are you offense Si he
is there something about the road of discipleship
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that you don't want to undertake?
Do you look at the story and feel
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the emotion, but wonder if you
have any part of him? When you
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hear sermons about the radical nature of
our sin and of the love and grace
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of Christ for sinners, do you
say yes, yes, I too mourn
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over that my sin is so horrible
and I would have no hope in this
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earth except for the love of my
bridegroom for me. Or do you,
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like these women in Jerusalem, like
the nice words but don't see that you're
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quite as bad as the people you
compare yourself to? How do you stand?
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Well, Jesus tells these women what
fate awaits them if they don't at
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last repent. He says this.
The days are coming in which they will
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say blessed are the barren wounds that
never bore in the breasts which never nursed.
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Then they will begin to say to
the mountains, fall on us,
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into the hills, cover us.
For if they do these things in the
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green wood, what will be done
in the dry? Now these words are
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an echo of Joseiah chapter ten and
revelation chapter six, and in those two
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passages the words that we see here
the last words that the damned utter before
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the Lord casts them into Hell at
his return and glory. These words are
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death wish on the part of those
who are doomed, and that's because when
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they finally see what happens to those
who do not accept their need for Christ
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to take away their sin while there's
still time, they're going to wish that
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they would be utterly destroyed rather than
face the eternal fires of hell. See
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this that Jesus is talking about is
the fate of the of the lukewarm.
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We read about that for our reading
of the law this morning. We saw
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there what Jesus says about the lukewarm. He says, because you're lukewarm and
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neither cold nor hot, I will
vomit you out of my mouth because you
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say I am rich and have become
wealthy and have need of nothing and do
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not know that you are wretched,
miserable, poor, blind and naked.
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I counsel for you to buy from
me gold refined in the fire, that
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you may be rich, and white
garments that you may be clothed, that
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the shame of your nakedness may not
be revealed, and annoint your eyes with
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eyes have that you may see as
many as I love. I rebuke,
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can chasten. Therefore, be zealous
and repent. Turn around behold. I
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stand at the door and knock.
If anyone hears my voice and opens the
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door, I will come into him
and dine with him, and he with
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me. To Him who overcomes,
I will grant to sit with me on
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my throne, as I also overcame
and sat down with my father on his
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throne. He who has an ear
to hear, let him hear what the
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spirit says to the churches. Jesus
had labored for three years in Israel preaching
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the good news to people like these
women, but they refused to hear.
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For three years, perhaps unbeknownst even
to themselves, they were hardening their hearts
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against Jesus, just as Pharaoh had
hardened his heart against Moses, but now
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Jesus is offering them one last chance
to hear his message. Even as he's
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rising back to his feet after falling, as Simon the Serenian is beginning to
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drag that heavy cross for Jesus up
to go Gotha, even as the blood
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from his head in his back is
mingling with the spit of his tormentors on
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his skin. Even then, Jesus
was still pleading with these women to hear
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him, and Jesus Beckons to us
this morning as well. He calls upon
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us to make a choice. Will
we be like the women here? Well,
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we be like these daughters of Jerusalem
who just observe the love story without
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getting engaged? Will we listen to
sermons about our sin and the grace of
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God in Christ and say, you
know that sure is swell for those people?
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Or will we be like shoe almouth
and Song of Solomon? Sulimouth was
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a woman who knew that there was
nothing good in her. She had no
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reason to expect that the king of
Israel would fall for the likes of her,
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but he did, and once he
did, she couldn't keep herself from
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looking into her beloved eyes. As
her heart melted, she couldn't restrain herself
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from telling the daughters of Jerusalem about
the wondrous beauty of her Lord. King
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Solomon Shulmouth was well and truly wooed
in one as Shakespeare would say, she
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was smitten, lost in love.
She was sure with the most wondrous man
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that any woman could ever fall in
love with. And today we know that
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the king of kings died to make
us his bride. Shulmouth, the Lord
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of Glory, went in his humiliation
to his death, beaten, crushed,
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whipped, abused and utterly victorious.
Today, this palm Sunday, we remember
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the beginning of the last week of
Jesus's Earthly Ministry. We remember that he
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came in his triumphal entry into his
royal city with one mission in view,
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namely the redemption of his beloved people
and Nest. Next Week is Easter,
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the resurrection. He is risen,
indeed, isn't he? And he has
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risen to prepare a place for you
and for me, and some day soon,
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and very soon, he is coming
back to take us to his father's
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house for the wedding banquet and the
consummation where we will live with him in
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love forever and ever, world without
end. A men and a men,
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and that is because nothing, nothing, not your sin, not your guilt,
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not your wickedness, not his death
or his burial, nothing could stand
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between your Lord and his love for
you. And even at that last day
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he was seeking and saving those who
were lost. This, you see,
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this is the depth of his love
for you and for me and for all
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the world. And that, my
friends, that is good news. And
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then
