Facing Jesus #12 - Peter and John
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Matthew Mark Luke John
Words of Jesus are underlined
(Here we back up in the Passion Account. This section is intended to be used for Palm Sunday/The Sunday of the Passion in worship.)
It’s interesting to note that Peter and John are often found together after the Resurrection e.g. Acts 4:13. How did they face Jesus on what we know as “Palm Sunday?” Those two were sent by Jesus to prepare the Passover meal for the disciples. Perhaps they were also the ones sent to get the donkey and its foal. What did they think as they found everything just as Jesus said, and as they heard and participated in the shouts of “Hosanna!”, which means “the Lord save”? What did they see as Jesus wept over Jerusalem?
As that holy week wore on along with the plotting of the chief priests and the Sanhedrin, how did they face a Jesus who calmly sent them to prepare for the Passover meal?
How do you face Jesus? Do you joy to shout “Hosanna!”, but hesitate to follow Him to the cross? He is the Passover Lamb who takes away the sin of the world. Prepare His way for that world to receive Him!
Jesus Rides Into Jerusalem on a Donkey
When they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage at the Mount of Olives, Jesus then sent two disciples, telling them, “Go into the village ahead of you. At once you will find a donkey tied there with her colt. Untie them and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, say that the Lord needs them, and he will send them at once.”
This took place so that what was spoken through the prophet might be fulfilled:
Tell Daughter Zion, “See, your King is coming to you, gentle, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”
His disciples did not understand these things at first. However, when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him and that they had done these things to him.
So those who were sent left and found it just as he had told them. As they were untying the colt, its owners said to them, “Why are you untying the colt?”
“The Lord needs it,” they said. So they let them go.
They brought the colt to Jesus and threw their clothes on it, and he sat on it. Many people spread their clothes on the road, and others spread leafy branches cut from the fields. Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted:
“Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord—the King of Israel! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David! Hosanna in the highest heaven!”
Some of the Pharisees from the crowd told him, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples.”
He answered, “I tell you, if they were to keep silent, the stones would cry out.”
As he approached and saw the city, he wept for it, saying, “If you knew this day what would bring peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. For the days will come on you when your enemies will build a barricade around you, surround you, and hem you in on every side. They will crush you and your children among you to the ground, and they will not leave one stone on another in your midst, because you did not recognize the time when God visited you.”
Preparation for the Passover Meal
Then the Day of Unleavened Bread came when the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and make preparations for us to eat the Passover.”
“Where do you want us to prepare it?” they asked him.
“Listen,” he said to them, “when you’ve entered the city, a man carrying a water jug will meet you. Follow him into the house he enters. Tell the owner of the house, ‘The Teacher asks you, “Where is the guest room where I can eat the Passover with my disciples?”’ Then he will show you a large, furnished room upstairs. Make the preparations there.”
So they went and found it just as he had told them, and they prepared the Passover.
Jesus, Followed by Peter, is Taken to the High Priest
Simon Peter was following Jesus, as was another disciple. That disciple was an acquaintance of the high priest; so he went with Jesus into the high priest’s courtyard. But Peter remained standing outside by the door. So the other disciple, the one known to the high priest, went out and spoke to the girl who was the doorkeeper and brought Peter in.
(Matthew 21:1-5; John 12:16; Luke 19:32-34; Mark 11:6b-9a; John 12:13b; Mark 11:10; Luke 19:39-44; Luke 22:7–13; John 18:15-16 CSB17)
Peter and John were used to seeing miracles from Jesus. I suppose it was nothing new to find a donkey or an upper room that Jesus said would be there. Still…
What does the shouting of: “Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!” reveal about the thinking of the disciples?
Why did the Pharisees want the disciples rebuked? Why didn’t Jesus do it?
After Jesus was arrested, John followed into the courtyard of the high priest and is the only disciple we know of who was at the crucifixion. Can you see why he was called “the disciple whom Jesus loved”?
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