Redefining Leadership

KEY VERSE: “They that went before, and they that followed, cried, saying, Hosanna; Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the LORD.” —Mark 11:9

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: Mark 11:9

ISRAEL CLUNG TENACIOUSLY to the hope that some day God would send a Messiah to release them from their oppressors who had dominated them for nearly two centuries. Since they had long been stripped of their political sovereignty, the people had great expectations that their long-awaited Messiah would be a great leader.

Messiah came to save his people but hardly in a way they could have expected, for obviously an oppressed people would seek a leader highly trained in the art of armed conflict. (Luke 3:15) At the close of Jesus’ ministry, the Jewish nation could have accepted Jesus as their Messiah, but did not.

Today’s lesson tells of this offer of the kingdom by Jesus and of the neglect of the Jews as a people, to accept it, for, “He came unto his own, and his own received him not.” (John 1:11) Jesus knew, however, that a prophecy had already declared he would be despised and rejected, and that his own people would hide their faces from him in shame. (Isa. 53:3) Jesus told his apostles what to expect, but they did not fully understand that their Master must first be crucified and then depart to a ‘far country’—heaven itself. There he would be invested with authority to return later and establish the kingdom which would bless the world.

The Prophet Zechariah portrays the humble messianic king, the prince of peace, expected by Jesus’ followers: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass.” (Zech. 9:9) In fulfillment of this prophecy, Jesus, at the mount of Olives instructed two of his disciples to bring a colt to him. They found the colt where Jesus said it would be; they loosed it, brought it to Jesus, and after they had placed their garments on it Jesus sat upon the colt.

In the procession to Jerusalem that followed, “many spread their garments in the way: and others cut down branches off the trees. … They that went before, and they that followed, cried, saying, Hosanna; Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord: Blessed be the kingdom of our father David, that cometh in the name of the Lord: Hosanna in the highest.”—Mark 11:8-10

Not all were enthusiastic in acclaiming Jesus, especially the scribes and Pharisees, leaders of Israel. They wanted him to rebuke the disciples, but he said, “I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out.” (Luke 19:39,40) Earlier Jesus had rejected them with the lament, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house is left unto you desolate: and verily I say unto you, Ye shall not see me, until the time come when ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.”—Luke 13:34,35

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