What Does “Palm Sunday” Have to do with the Great Tribulation?
Yesterday was what is often referred to as Palm Sunday, or the Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. We think of the palm branches that the crowds waved and placed on the road, along with their cloaks, to make way for Jesus, as they shouted, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” (Luke 19:38)
Sadly, much of this very same crowd would one week later shout for Jesus to be crucified. They did not get it. The crowds were willing to praise Him and follow Him as He performed miracles and raised Lazarus from the dead, but if dying was this King’s goal, the people did not want Him.
The crowds did not accept a Messiah who came to earth to die for our sins. They wanted Jesus, the Christ, to take over the world in His day and usher in an earthly kingdom. However, if Jesus would have done that before His crucifixion and death, not a single one of us could be saved from our sin. Not a single person would ever be made right with God and able to enter Heaven. Jesus had to take the difficult road, and crowds don’t like roads of hardship and suffering.
When we, however, have a right grasp of our fallen nature, we become desperate for the remedy for sin. We come to understand that we need the God-Man to stand in our place and die for us, and then in His perfection and power, raise up from the dead in victory. Because He carried the guilt of our sin on that cross, we can be free from sin’s power and punishment.
Ironically, the next time we encounter palm branches in the Bible is in the book of Revelation, chapter 7, verses 9-10, “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!'”
Do you know who these people are? “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” (Revelation 7:14)
These crowds in the book of Revelation are people who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior, who trusted in His shed blood for their forgiveness, and endured the horror of the Great Tribulation under the tyranny and persecution of the Antichrist. They gave their lives for their faith, but they made it to Heaven.
In a wonderful conclusion to the Triumphal Entry, which demonstrated the spiritual blindness and shortsightedness of the crowds, these people of the Tribulation came to understand the vital nature of the blood of Jesus, and were able to rightfully wave palm branches and proclaim the salvation of God!
That salvation leads to an eternal existence in the presence of God, fully removed from sin and brokenness, forever to be comforted and thriving with the Lord and all the saints of God from the ages. As Revelation 7:17 declares, “God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
Let us reflect on the deep meaning of Palm Sunday. Let us read the Scripture and pray over the truth of God’s Word.
My prayer is that we would recognize the conquering King for who He is, the One who saved us by His blood, that we might reign with Him in the future New Heaven and New Earth. For now, there may be suffering, but our Savior will deliver us by and by.
Who knows, but we may be rapidly approaching the days of the tribulation. The one thing that matters is your understanding of the God-Man, Jesus Christ. Know Him.
– Shelli Prindle
***P.S. The Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem two thousand years ago, ended the “69th week” of Daniel chapter nine, and ushered us into the church age, where we now await the rapture of the church, before the “70th week” of the tribulation begins.***