JESUS, THE PASSOVER KING: Palm Sunday 2025
John 12:12-16
Introduction: It is Palm Sunday, a day when we traditionally remember the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem the Sunday before His crucifixion. I have decided to look at a passage we have read before on this day, jumping ahead in the Gospel of John (the only Gospel that actually specifically mentions “palms” at the Triumphal Entry!) to John 12. In view of our four months studying the Fourth Gospel (we started December 1st of last year) I wanted to see how John’s witness to this event might speak to us even more deeply with the additional context we’ve so far considered.
We’ve seen already in John that Jesus is Lord, He knows our need, He tabernacled for a while among us in this fallen world (Jn 1:14), and ultimately, He bore our sorrows and carried our grief (Isa 53:3,4). The four Gospel accounts testify to the truth about who Jesus is, and about why He came. The God who is has spoken! Today, we’ll focus on a small portion of John 12, and look at the story of the Triumphal Entry of Christ into Jerusalem in that context. What does this event reveal about Jesus and His work? Last week we introduced three questions to help guide our reading of John’s Gospel. The writer wants us to answer:
1) Who is Jesus?
2) Why did He come? And...
3) What does it mean to believe in Him?
It’s Palm Sunday, and surely on the one hand, we do want to join with the revelers celebrating Jesus, the coming King. But we celebrate Jesus from a different perspective than the crowd that day, almost 2000 years ago. We have the whole story. We know what they did not yet understand: it was Passover, the King is also the Lamb, He was both the Sovereign, who is in control, and the Sacrifice, that would open the way for us to enter the Kingdom as citizens and sons by giving Himself for us! He is Lord, in control, no one could take His life, rather it was His plan to lay down His life for His sheep. Today we’ll consider the witness of John to this pivotal beginning that final week.
John especially wants us to understand the deity of Christ and to worship Him. He wants us to marvel at His love demonstrated in the Cross and to love Him in return. He invites us to believe in Him: to submit to His Lordship and obey Him. In the Bible we see hundreds of prophecies that were made about the Messiah fulfilled explicitly in the life, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus. God had a plan, that plan was revealed, in part, in advance, in those Old Testament texts, yet most people simply did not yet get it. Palm Sunday leads us into the last week of Jesus’ life before the Cross. The story unfolds exactly as God had planned it—confirming Jesus’ identity, inviting us to consider how we should respond to Him.
Context: Since we’re jumping ahead in John, let’s remind ourselves of the context. 1) After the raising of Lazarus in John 11, the Jewish leadership conspired to put Jesus to death. Unwittingly, the High Priest even prophesies the substitutionary death of Jesus (cf. Jn 11:49-51). 2) John 12 begins with a reminder that Passover was only six days away. Since the first chapter the reader of the Gospel has had to struggle with the idea that Jesus is both Messiah (1:41) and “the Lamb of God” (1:29,36). How could this be? What did it mean? What did the approach of Passover portend? Both the anointing of Jesus “for his burial” (12:1-8) and the plot to also kill Lazarus (12:9-11) sound an ominous note as the story unfolds. The contrast between those scenes and what is about to happen is ironic. The crowds, even the disciples, did not understand the full meaning of what was happening, what it really would involve for Jesus to fulfill His role as the “King of the Jews” (see 12:16). As we consider this first Palm Sunday, we’ll see the King who is both Sovereign and Sacrifice…
The BIG Idea: Worship Jesus, the Passover-King, Sovereign and Sacrifice. He is our hope! We’ll see 1) He is King…; 2) He came in fulfillment of Scripture…; and 3) as Sovereign and Sacrifice!
I. Jesus is the King, yet most people don’t understand! (12:12-13).
The next day the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. 13 So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, "Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!"
As John tells us the story of Jesus, there is a much irony in how it unfolds. The Jews were expecting a Messiah, a King, a greater Son of David who would restore the kingdom to Israel. They had somehow lost sight of the truth that the coming King was also to be the Suffering Servant. The title “King” doesn’t show up a lot in John’s Gospel, that is until chapters 18, 19 when in Jesus’ trial and crucifixion it is the charge for which He is executed. Earlier in the Gospel, the few times it does appear, at key moments in the story, there are clues that John gives us early on about the kingship of Jesus…
The first time Jesus is called “King” in this Gospel occurs in the very first chapter, in the confession of Nathaniel in John 1:49, “Nathanael answered and said to Him, ‘Rabbi, You are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!’” Before this confession however, the reader has already heard John the Baptist twice call Jesus God’s Lamb. In John 1:29 we read, "Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! Then again, in John 1:36, “And looking at Jesus as He walked, he said, "Behold the Lamb of God!" We read that and take it for granted, we’ve heard the phrases and this language applied to Jesus in church. We sing songs about it. But imagine the disciples when they first heard it, imagine John’s readers when they first read this Gospel: for a Jew in the 1st century, “Lamb” whatever else it might mean, implied sacrifice. Lamb and King? Both Sovereign, and Sacrifice? How could this be?
The second time in John’s Gospel that the word “King” appears, is in Chapter 6, and comes in response to Jesus miraculously feeding the 5,000 with five small loaves of bread and a couple of fish. John 6:14-15 says,
Then those men, when they had seen the sign that Jesus did, said, "This is truly the Prophet who is to come into the world." 15 Therefore when Jesus perceived that they were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king, He departed again to the mountain by Himself alone.
In response to this miraculous provision, they wanted to make him king by force. Jesus knew their thoughts and intentions, and He went away. It wasn’t time for the king to be revealed. John had reminded the reader of the Gospel, just a few verses earlier: John 6:4 “Now the Passover, a feast of the Jews, was near.” After hearing John the Baptist call Jesus the lamb, the reader of the Gospel has a clue as to what is coming – the disciples still don’t understand. He is the King – but also the Lamb.
The third use of “king” in John’s Gospel comes that first Palm Sunday, the triumphal entry. The crowd quotes from Ps 118:25-26 which says,
“Save now [hosanna], I pray, O LORD; O LORD, I pray, send now prosperity. 26 Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD! We have blessed you from the house of the LORD.”
Notice that quoting from that passage they add something to the text in John 12:13, they “…took branches of palm trees and went out to meet Him, and cried out: "Hosanna! 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!' The King of Israel!" What they said was correct, and this time Jesus allows it, even though there is little doubt the crowd was still clueless as to what was about to happen, what had to happen. John is preparing the reader of his gospel. We’ve just been reminded in the near context:
1. Passover was coming in just a few days; the Lamb would soon be sacrificed (12:1).
2. Mary had just anointed Jesus, and he said it was “for his burial” (12:2-8).
3. The chief priests were plotting also to kill Lazarus, because his being raised from the dead was irrefutable proof that Jesus was from God, and they wouldn’t hear it (12:9-11). Even raising a man from the dead could not convince them, they would not consider the evidence that Jesus was the Messiah (see Peter’s word in Acts 2:22).
Part of the irony here is that the crowd, in quoting from Psalm 118 had apparently forgotten part of the context: Ps 118:22, “The stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief cornerstone.” That rejection would reach its climax in just a few days when the leaders insist: “We’ll not have this man to be our king! We have no king but Caesar!” They were looking for a king like the nations around them. Jesus is King, much more so than any merely human king. He is the King of kings, the Lord of all creation, our Creator and Redeemer. A merely human king can demand our obedience, but not our heart. Jesus is the Shepherd King who would lay down His life for his sheep. God showed us his love, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. That is the Big Idea: Worship Jesus, the Passover-King, Sovereign and Sacrifice! He alone is our hope!
II. He is the King, and He came in fulfillment of the Scriptures (12:14-15). John takes us from the shouts of the crowd, which were ironically true, even though they didn’t understand correctly who Jesus was, to the actions of Jesus, taken in deliberate fulfillment of Scripture:
Then Jesus, when He had found a young donkey, sat on it; as it is written: 15 "Fear not, daughter of Zion; Behold, your King is coming, Sitting on a donkey's colt."
The main point is that God had a plan, and every action of Jesus was taken in submission to and in fulfillment of the Father’s will. This week would lead to Calvary. The cross was not a failure, it was not an accident, it wasn’t “plan B.” Peter said on Pentecost that Jesus was delivered up by the predetermined purpose and foreknowledge of God. That speaks to God’s love to us. It points to His grace. It is reason to celebrate!
It also speaks to the reliability of His Word. The Scripture written centuries before was fulfilled precisely: He is the King. All four of the Gospel writers point out the fulfillment of prophecy, Scriptures written centuries before Jesus’ birth, as one more testimony, another witness to the messianic identity of Jesus. Ironically, even as He was rejected by the leaders of the Jews, their very rejection of Him fulfilled the Scriptures. Remember, after the resurrection, when Jesus appeared to the disciples on the road to Emmaus. And as they recounted to this “stranger” who walked with them what had happened in Jerusalem, revealing their confusion and shattered hopes. Jesus said,
"O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?" 27 And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself… (Luke 24:25-27).
Rather than causing one to doubt Jesus’ identity, the Passion vindicated His messianic claim! They needed to understand God’s plan: the Messiah is King, He is also our Passover who was sacrificed for us. By the way, notice that John leaves out a word from Zechariah’s prophecy: “Lowly” or “humble”. John was emphasizing Jesus’ power, control, sovereignty, and glory. He is the King of Kings! He is in control. Later, when they come to arrest Him in the Garden, we’ll see that they couldn’t even touch Him unless He allowed it. When He said, “I am He” [ego eimi] they all fell backward! But this King, the Sovereign who created and rules the universe, had chosen to give himself as the Lamb, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. *We are invited to worship Jesus, the Passover King, the Lamb upon the throne, in Him we have hope!
III. He is the King, the Passover-King, both Sovereign and Sacrifice (12:16).
16 His disciples did not understand these things at first, but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him and had been done to him.
John steps back for a moment and explains from his position years later what he and the other disciples were thinking at this point in the story, at first they did not under-stand. It was only when “...Jesus was glorified, then they remembered...”
The disciples didn’t understand at first what all of this meant. Even though he had repeatedly, explicitly told them about the necessity of his death and resurrection, they couldn’t grasp it. It was only “…when Jesus was glorified then they remembered…” In John, its especially on the cross that Jesus is glorified (see John 3:14,15). The cross was his lifting up, his exaltation, his glorification, because it proved who he was, fulfilling the Scriptures, and it accomplished what he came to do, giving his life for our sins. The fulfillment of prophecy was a vindication of His identity, proving, from the Law, that it was necessary for the Messiah to suffer (Lk 24:44).
Notice a little further down in the near context, John 12:25-28,
"He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal. 26 "If anyone serves Me, he must follow Me; and where I am, there My servant will be also; if anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him. 27 "Now My soul has become troubled; and what shall I say, 'Father, save Me from this hour?’ But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify Your name…"
In John 18:36-37 as Pilate questioned Him about His kingship, Jesus answered,
"My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm." 37 Therefore Pilate said to Him, "So You are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth.”
You see, He is the King, the Passover-King. That is truth. That demands a response from us, it is reason to celebrate! If He so loved you, how then must you live?
What is God saying to me in this passage? May we worship the Passover King, in Him we have hope! What the crowds said on Palm Sunday was true, but they didn’t grasp the full implications. Jesus was not a victim. He was in control. And as Sovereign, he fulfilled the Scriptures, and came to give his life as a ransom for many.
In Revelation 1:5 we read that He is “…the ruler over the kings of the earth… [He] who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood…” In Revelation 5, John sees in his vision sees Him as He appears, “…in the middle of the throne as a lamb that had been slain…” (Rev 5:6; cf. Rev 5-7, 22:1-3). A Lamb on a throne, the Passover-King, exalted, on the throne of heaven, worthy to open the scroll and loosen its seals. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain! The One who was, who is, and who is to come.
What would he have me to do in response to these truths?
What is God saying to me in this passage? Worship Jesus, the Passover King, in Him we have hope! What the crowds said on Palm Sunday was true, but they didn’t grasp the full implications. Jesus was not a victim. He was in control. And as Sovereign, he fulfilled the Scriptures, and came to give his life as a ransom for many.
In Rev 1:5 we read that He is “…the ruler over the kings of the earth… [He] who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood…” In Rev 5, John sees in his vision sees Him, “…in the middle of the throne as a lamb that had been slain…” (Rev 5:6; cf. Rev 5-7, 22:1-3). A Lamb on a throne, the Passover-King, exalted, on the throne of heaven, worthy to open the scroll and loosen its seals. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain! The One who was, who is, and who is to come.
What would he have me to do in response to these truths?
1) Consider why He came, God’s plan, from eternity past. Our response must be to stand in awe of the matchless grace of God, and to love the One who so loved us. Have you come here this morning to worship King Jesus? Maybe you were invited this morning, or perhaps you are listening online, and this is all new. Does it ring true to you? Do you feel hope welling up in your heart? It may be that God, by His kindness, is drawing you to repentance and faith. Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give to them eternal life and they shall never perish.”
2) If we believe who He is, the Lamb is the King, we must also recognize His authority. He has all authority in heaven and on earth! We belong to God. We are not our own, we were bought with a price.Later in this Gospel He will tell his disciples: “As the Father sent me, so send I you…” He is our Savior and Lord. Trust and obey, there is no other way!
3) The crowd on Palm Sunday did not yet, for the most part, believe. They didn’t understand fully who He is and why He came. Some of your neighbors are there. We know the truth: He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. People around us need hope. We are called share the Good News! Remember in our study last week, Jesus healed the nobleman’s son from twenty miles away. The man and all his household believed in Jesus. Only God had that kind of power! How did the family know what Jesus said? The man must have told them, he testified, and they believed. Is there someone you can invite next week? The King is Coming! And until He does, we are His ambassadors, we have a part in His mission! AMEN.
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