We turn in our Scripture reading this morning to Luke 19. Luke 19, we read together verses 28 through 44. 28 through 44, the familiar account of our Lord's, what is called the triumphal entry. Our text this morning is verses 41 through 44, the last few verses of the portion we will read. Just prior to this, our Lord tells the parable of the ten minas. And we begin at verse 28 as we give our attention to the reading of the Word of God. After Jesus had said this, He went on ahead going up to Jerusalem. As He approached Bethphage and Bethany at the hill called the Mount of Olives, He sent two of His disciples, saying to them, Go to the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, Why are you untying it? Tell him, The Lord needs it. Those who were sent ahead went and found it just as He had told them. As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, Why are you untying the colt? They replied, The Lord needs it. They brought it to Jesus, threw their cloaks on the colt, and put Jesus on it. As He went along, people spread their cloaks on the road. When He came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen. Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest. Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, Teacher, rebuke your disciples. I tell you, he replied, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out. As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace. But now it is hidden from your eyes. The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you. Dear people of God, in Luke 9, verse 51, Holy Scripture says, As the time approached for Him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. How many times hadn't our Lord said to those that He had helped in some way, whether He healed them or cast out demons or did some other great thing, how many times hadn't He said to them, don't tell anybody about this, for My time has not yet come. Of course, we know that He said this to Mary, His mother, at the wedding in Cana of Galilee. Twice in John 7, Jesus says to His disciples, to His own brothers, My time has not yet fully come. And even John, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, says in John 7, verse 30, and in chapter 8, verse 20, No one laid hands on Him, for His hour had not yet come. You see, beloved, everything about the Savior's path to the cross was orchestrated by God. Everything was controlled by God, including the very timing of it. And as that time drew near, Jesus Himself turned resolutely toward Jerusalem to carry out this wondrous task. Resolutely, which is also translated in some versions as steadfastly, means He fixed His eyes on the cross. He would not turn to the right or to the left. He knew His purpose and no one, nothing could keep Him from fulfilling that purpose. But now as the path was getting shorter, as on that day which we call Palm Sunday, Jesus Christ was making His triumphal entry into Jerusalem. As the people placed Him on a donkey on their own cloaks and put their cloaks on the road for Him to walk over. And they shouted, Hosanna! Hosanna! Boys and girls, Hosanna means save now. Save now. Hosanna! That's what the people cried out. That's what they were asking for. Little did they know that that's exactly what our Lord was planning to do, only not in the way that they had thought. Yet as He laid His eyes on the city of Jerusalem, and as the multitude of His disciples said with a loud voice, Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest. As all that took place, Jesus saw the truth. He saw the truth that He was not coming into Jerusalem to be received and respected. but He was coming to be despised and rejected. He knew that His triumph would not be over the enemies of the Jews as they thought but that His triumph would be over God's enemy which had overtaken Jerusalem. And so, congregation, it's in that context that I preach to you this Word of God, the Savior's tearful path of triumph. First of all, reveals His anguish. Secondly, laments or grieves over the ignorance of Jerusalem. and finally prophesies of the destruction of the Jerusalem. Now, if any of you have ever traveled, which I suspect most of us have here, but have traveled through the mountains or through a very hilly area, then you know what it's like as you round the curbs and the bends and all of a sudden you reach the crest of the hill and the whole world, as it were, opens up before you. Well, on His way from Bethany through the Mount of Olives, our Lord's procession reached the top of the ridge where He beheld a panoramic view of the city of Jerusalem. There it was, all laid out before Him. There it was in all of its splendor and grandeur and majesty and glory standing tall and strong. You see, to see Jerusalem was to see a picture of strength and of security. Because this was the city of David. This was the city where God had chosen to place His name and dwell among His people in His temple. This was the central place of the Jewish religion. This was the city of which the psalmist wrote, Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God. John Calvin said Jerusalem was the sanctuary from which salvation would go forth to the whole world. Great things had taken place in Jerusalem throughout history, and now as his disciples sought, Jerusalem's king was coming home. He was coming to take his throne. What they still didn't understand was that Jesus was indeed going to reign, but it was going to be on high in heaven by way of the cross. You see, we have a contrast here, congregation. A contrast between dream and reality. Between celebration and sadness. The people were celebrating the coming of what they had been dreaming about. An earthly king to deliver them from the bondage and rule of Rome and to bring them earthly peace. That indeed the King was coming, but the reality was to deliver His people from the bondage of sin and to restore them to peace with God. And it's for that reason that in the midst of their joyful celebration, Jesus reveals His anguish. Verse 41 says, As He approached Jerusalem and saw the city, He wept over it. This wasn't just a silent cry, such as when we try to hide our tears from others. But the Greek word here is the word for a major crying, a weeping, with sobbing and lamenting and tears. Our Lord suffered deep inward anguish of heart as He laid His eyes upon Jerusalem. He was heartbroken. Why? When Jesus laid His eyes on the city, it wasn't the glorious thing spoken of Jerusalem that filled His mind. It wasn't the victories of David or the splendor of Solomon and the temple that occupied his thoughts. It wasn't the splendor and the majesty of the city that he saw. But as the text makes clear, he saw a hideous, smoldering ruin with thousands upon thousands of those doomed to meet death in a gruesome manner because of their sin and rejection of God. Yet, Jesus allowed the multitude to treat him as the king that they hoped He'd be. They lay out the red carpet before Him. They lead Him with shouts of joy, but He knew that the praises that were ringing in His ears were really hollow and meaningless. He knew that many of those same voices that today sang, Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord! That tomorrow they would shout, Crucify Him! Crucify Him! He knew that His joyful entrance in Jerusalem on that day would be followed in a few days by a mournful procession out again as they would take Him to the cross on Golgotha to die. But Christ's weeping wasn't a selfish weeping. He wasn't weeping because He would be betrayed and bound and beaten and whipped and spit upon and condemned and crucified. He did not weep because of what would be done to Him, but because of what would be done to Jerusalem and those who lived there. And even though the sight of Jerusalem cast a shadow over His suffering and death, this was not selfish weeping, it was selfless weeping. And even on the way to Calvary and as He hung on the cross, our Lord's attention was always on others. We read in Luke 23, 28 that Jesus said, Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. And on the cross, He said, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Woman, behold your son, behold your mother. Today, you will be with me in paradise. It should be no surprise to us, beloved, that our Lord wept. He experienced the pain of sorrow. He was a man in every way like we are, except without sin. There was anguish in his heart as he could see in detail the necessary destruction to come upon Jerusalem. And he was anguished. Because as God, He knows in fullest measure what it means for the holy to be rejected by the unholy. You see, Scripture points out that God is grieved by sin and by the rejection of His people. Make no mistake about it. God is grieved by sin. In Hosea 11, verse 8, we read, How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel? How can I make you like Adma? How can I set you like Zeboim? My heart churns within me. My sympathy is stirred. In Isaiah 1, we read, Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord has spoken. I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master's crib. But Israel does not know. My people do not consider. Our Lord's weeping reveals the very heart of God who said, As I live, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn. Turn from your evil ways, for why should you die, O house of Israel? God is grieved by sin. He is indeed merciful. But congregation, His mercy will not cancel out His justice. And therefore, Jerusalem's doom must be announced. And by His anguish, our Lord shows how awful the sentence would be, thereby showing how terrible is the result of sin. Yet His weeping is to be our encouragement to trust in the Lord with all our heart and lean not on our own understanding. Those who desire the salvation of the Lord by the grace of God may come to Christ without hesitating because His tears prove that He desires our good. And He has proved that by His cross. He who shed teardrops for those who were impenitent entered Jerusalem. in order to shed blood drops for His people. Even before He was arrested, He was covered with bloody sweat as He agonized over His work on behalf of His people. And the scars in His hands and feet and side are an invitation for the weary and the heavy laden to come to Him. And as Christians, as those who claim Him as our Lord and Savior, our Lord is to be our example of how we ought to desire the salvation of others. Congregation. We are to be grieved at the thought of those who are perishing. And never may we say, well, they're just getting what they deserve. We like to say that way too often. But never may we say that. They're just getting what they deserve because we all deserve to perish. Each and every man, woman, and child deserves the same condemnation. Charles Spurgeon said, that men should live without Christ is grief enough. But that they should die without Christ is an overwhelming horror which should grind our hearts to powder before the face of God and make us fall on our faces and cry, O God, have mercy upon them and save them for Thy grace and for Thy love's sake. Is that our attitude toward our neighbors who do not know the Lord Jesus Christ? Is that our attitude toward those even on the other side of the world who have never heard the gospel message. That's got to be our attitude, beloved. Because by God's grace, we have an understanding in part of what awaits those who die in unbelief. Beloved, Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem would not seem very triumphant because of the outcome. But He would be triumphant while those who rejected Him would perish. And that's why Christ wept over Jerusalem. Yet He makes it clear that this was not due to any injustice on the part of God as He laments or grieves over the ignorance of Jerusalem. Verse 42, there He says, If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace, but now it is hidden from your eyes. Jerusalem, as we know, was the religious capital of the Jews. But the spiritual life of Israel had declined so badly, led by their religious rulers, the scribes and the Pharisees. The scribes and the Pharisees, while they knew the letter of the law by heart, their heart was far from the spirit of the law, and therefore far from the lawmaker and the lawgiver himself. They did not know what they ought to have known. They did not truly know their covenant God and His salvation. Now, Old Testament Scripture was clear that Israel's rescue would be spiritual, not physical. They should have known, but they did not know. Isaiah 53 teaches us that as we've been considering, that it would be spiritual, not physical. So does Jeremiah 31, verse 34. In Micah 7, verses 18 and 19, we read, Who is a God like you? pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgressions of the remnant of His heritage. He does not retain His anger forever because He delights in mercy. He will again have compassion on us and will subdue our iniquities. You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea. Then in Malachi 3 we read, For He is like a refiner's fire and like launderer's soap. He will sit as a refiner and a purifier of silver. He will purify the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver that they may offer to the Lord an offering of righteousness. But instead of knowing this, the Jews had their own idea of what the Messiah was to be like. Their own kind of Messiah was one of the earth. A political figure. An earthly deliverer. And therefore, Jerusalem despised the Redeemer who had been exhibited to her. And she did not embrace His grace. As he gazed at Jerusalem, Jesus' own words in John 3.19 rang loud and clear. And this is the condemnation that the light has come into the world. And men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. Again, the text says, Our Lord says, If you, even you, had only known on this day. Sometimes we say, If I had only known this or that, then that or this would have been different. This is how things are right now, But if I had known that, then things would have been that way. A comparison is made. But notice, Jesus never talks about the way things could have been. He stops short of that. And that's because things won't be that way. If you, even you, had only known on this day. But you don't. You don't. Yet He does mention what they rejected. What would bring you peace? What did they reject in their ignorance? Reconciliation and peace with God, which includes the joy and the assurance of the forgiveness of sins. It includes safety. It includes communion with God and fellowship with Christ. And it includes the eternal expectation of glory. Jerusalem didn't understand the things which belonged to her peace. And she was ignorant of the ways and the means of peace, namely Jesus and His blood, and she was blinded by her own wickedness. This was clear from the Pharisees' command in verse 39. Teacher, rebuke your disciples. And those Pharisees represented the hostility of Jerusalem toward the Savior. But you know, they had peace. They would be the first to tell you that. They had confidence. They had peace. But you see, it was a false peace. It was a peace that was nothing more than like a mirage on the desert floor which disappears just as soon as you dive into it. In anguish, Jesus cries, if you had only known on this day. You see, there was nothing better. There was nothing more important than this. The Savior was in their midst. In times of old, they had been warned by holy men of God, but now they had the very Son of God to preach to them. This was the day of miracles, of mercy, a day of the unveiling of gospel grace. Yet they rejected God's gift. And therefore now they could not see Him. The text says, But now it is hidden from your eyes. The Son of God, God Himself, stood before their very eyes as visible as the sun shines in the sky. But Jerusalem was blinded with the truth hid from their eyes. God was present in their midst. but she didn't see Him. Beloved, the Savior traveled the tearful path of triumph because Jerusalem rejected His visit. He traveled that path because of the sin of the world. And He wept over her because of her ignorance and because of what she had ignored and given up. And because she called down the judgment of God upon herself, she traded peace for punishment. You see, God is not responsible, congregation, for the lostness or the reprobation of those who go down in judgment. Those who are lost are lost because of their sin and rejection of Christ. Those who find themselves in hell one day only have themselves to blame. We are responsible for our sin, but God is responsible for our salvation. For those who find themselves in heaven, owe it all to the grace of God. Through his tears, our Lord then describes Jerusalem's judgment as He prophesies of her destruction. Verses 43 and 44. The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another because you did not recognize the time of God's coming to you. To summarize these verses, plain and simple, Jesus is saying that Jerusalem will be completely destroyed as well as those who live there. And in A.D. 70, Jerusalem's destruction was physically fulfilled even as Isaiah prophesied in Isaiah 29, verses 2 and 3. I will encamp against you all around. I will lay a siege against you with a mound. I will raise siege works against you. You shall be brought down. You shall speak out of the ground. Your speech shall be low out of the dust. Your voice shall be like a medium's out of the ground. And your speech shall whisper out of the dust. For three and a half years, from around 66 A.D. to 70 A.D., the Jews revolted against Rome. And our Lord gives a detailed description here of what took place. Rome built an embankment around Jerusalem which had a two-fold purpose. First, to protect Rome, the Roman soldiers themselves, from attacks from the wall of Jerusalem. but also to serve as a point of attack upon Jerusalem. Rome then completely surrounded the city, providing no way of escape from it. And eventually the city was demolished. It was flattened to the ground. The temple was destroyed. And all of this cost countless lives. And on the inside, there were the equivalent of terrorist groups from among the Jews as well as innocent Jews locked up together inside the city. And probably the greatest suffering was famine. And so that we can get a bit of a taste of this, allow me to read a few portions from the works of Josephus, The Wars of the Jews, which he wrote. Josephus was born in 8037. He was a Jewish historian who followed the Pharisaic form of Judaism. And just a couple of things that he wrote regarding this time in history. It was now a miserable case and a sight that would justly bring tears into our eyes. But the famine was too hard for all other passions and it is destructive to nothing so much as to modesty. For what was otherwise worthy of reverence was in this case despised. In other words, all decency was gone. In so much that children pulled the very morsels that their fathers were eating out of their very mouths and what was still more to be pitied, so did the mothers do as to their infants. And when those who were the most dear were perishing under their hands, they were not ashamed to take from them the very last drops that might preserve their lives. Those who snuck out to gather food were first whipped and then tormented with all sorts of tortures before they died and were then crucified before the wall of the city. And he writes, Then did the famine widen its progress and devoured the people by whole houses and families, The upper rooms were full of women and children that were dying by famine, and the lanes of the city were full of the dead bodies of the aged. The children also and the young men wandered about the marketplaces like shadows, all swelled with the famine and fell down dead wheresoever their misery seized them. And then he records that eventually they threw the bodies over the wall because there was no place for them anymore in the city. There were robbers in the city, going back to these terrorist groups as I called them, robbers in the city that would steal the clothes off of the dead and they would, as if playing a game, stab the dead bodies with their swords and even thrust some of those through that still stay alive upon the ground. But for those that entreated them, begged them to lend them their right hand and their sword to dispatch them, in other words, those who begged to be put to death, the robbers were too proud to grant their requests and left them to be consumed by the famine. And then one more excerpt. Many who deserted the city to the side of Rome, you see, had swallowed pieces of gold because they were so malnourished. Once they were given much food, their swollen stomachs couldn't handle it, and they still died. But it was discovered that they had swallowed the gold, so some dissected them to retrieve that gold. And then he records that in one night's time, about 2,000 of these deserters were dissected. congregation these excerpts provide only a small window into the hideousness of the devastation and destruction of jerusalem others have said that the city itself was a banqueting hall of death there is nothing in history they say to exceed this horror as we consider this destruction the words of isaiah 57 21 must be heard there is no peace says my god for the wicked beloved of the lord when we consider the destruction of jerusalem as well as other massacres that have taken place in history such as the holocaust of world war ii indeed these are tragic they're beyond our comprehension we can't understand it but even these are nothing you see compared to the destruction of the soul jesus said in matthew 10 28 and do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul, but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Our Lord wept over lost souls. The death of the soul is the most tragic because it is the death that never ends. It is the separation of the soul from God, which is the most complete of all deaths. And as Jesus gazed upon Jerusalem that day, He described that which represents the destruction of all those who reject Him. You see, the wrath and punishment of God is worse than the destruction of Jerusalem. But Jesus Christ rode into Jerusalem to face that on behalf of His people. For those who believe on Him by grace through faith, they can confess that His triumph is my triumph. And for them, His tears of sorrow are then tears of joy. Paul quotes from Isaiah 49, verse 8, when he says in 2 Corinthians 6, In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you. And then Paul adds to that quote from Isaiah, Behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, now is the day of salvation. And beloved, once again this morning we have been visited by the good news of Jesus Christ. By the Gospel message. And the promise which we have heard many times is this. Seek the Lord while He may be found. Call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake His way and the unrighteous man His thought. Let him return to the Lord and He will have mercy on Him. And to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. That's our confidence. Unshakable confidence. What is it we are to know? In Jeremiah 9, we read these words, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, let not the mighty man glory in his might, nor let the rich man glory in his riches, but let him who glories glory in this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord, exercising lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth, for in these I delight, says the Lord. Congregation, the Savior's tearful path of triumph was so that we could glory and rejoice in salvation. Do you rejoice in that salvation? Do you know Him? You see, don't trade eternal peace for eternal punishment. We are called to repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and enjoy eternal peace because He has already paid the eternal punishment. Amen. Shall we pray? Father God, what an amazing truth it is once again to consider the work of our Lord Jesus Christ in our place. Oh, Father, we so often forget that or we fail to consider that. And therefore, we sometimes romanticize His suffering and death, but we cannot do that. We must not do that. We are called to remember that He took our place and to believe that His precious blood was shed, His body was broken, unto a complete remission of all our sins. We praise You, O Lord, for Your grace, Your mercy, and Your peace poured out upon Your people. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank you.