The King rides into Jerusalem on a donkey
21
📚And when they drew near Jerusalem, and arrived at Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples,21:1 The Mount of Olives is to the east of Jerusalem. From its top one can look down on the city.⚜
2 📚saying to them, “Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied up and a colt with it. Untie them, and bring them to me. 3 📚And if anyone says anything to you, you shall say, ‘The Lord needs them’, and he will send them at once”.
4 📚All this was done so that there might be a fulfilment of what was spoken by the prophet, saying,
5 📚Tell the daughter of Zion,
Look! Your King is coming to you,
meek, and sitting on a donkey and
a colt the foal of a donkey.
21:4-5 Zech 9:9. The King rides into His royal city. This was an entrance suitable to the meek and lowly one (Matt 11:29), but not what men in general would count suitable. “Daughter of Zion” means Jerusalem. Note on “daughter” at Isa 1:8; 23:12.⚜
6 📚And the disciples went and did as Jesus commanded them, 7 📚and brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and had him sit on them.
21:6-7 Christians have the privilege of serving a King who knows all that is going on and Who gives them the clearest instructions. All they need to do is obey.⚜
8 📚And a very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road. Others cut down branches from the trees and spread them on the road.
21:8 Compare 2 Kings 9:13.⚜
9 📚And the crowds that went ahead and that followed, cried out, saying, “Hosanna to the son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!”
21:9 Hosanna comes from Hebrew and was a prayer meaning “save”. But it became a way of expressing praise, indicating that the one who could save was present. Note on Son of David at Matt 1:1. Some were willing to accept Jesus as Messiah, God's appointed King (Ps 118:25-26).⚜
10 📚And when he came into Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred and saying, “Who is this?”
11 📚And the crowd said, “This is Jesus the prophet of Nazareth of Galilee”.
21:10-11 Jesus had spent very little time in Jerusalem and had little public ministry there. The leaders knew Him but many of the people did not.⚜
The King drives merchants from the temple
12 📚And Jesus went into the temple of God, and drove out all those who sold and bought in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers, and the seats of those who sold doves,
21:12 Mark 11:11, 15-18; Luke 19:45-47; John 2:12-16. Jesus was gentle and humble in heart (Matt 11:29), but bold as a lion when God's honor was involved and mighty in strength to fight evil (Rev 5:5). Mark's Gospel makes it clear that this event occurred the day after Jesus entered Jerusalem.⚜
13 📚and said to them, “It is written, My house will be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves”. 📖
14 📚And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them. 15 📚And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying out in the temple, and saying, “Hosanna to the son of David!” they were very displeased,
21:15 Note on priests at Ex 28:1. They were not indignant because of the evil going on in the temple compound, but when great good was done there, and great glory to God resulted from it, they were angry. Such is man's fallen nature. Of course the thing that provoked them was others calling Jesus the Son of David – the Messiah of Israel. They did not want to accept this or hear it.⚜
16 📚and said to him, “Do you hear what they are saying?” And Jesus said to them, “Yes. Have you never read 📖, Out of the mouth of little children and nursing infants you have provided praise?”
The King curses the barren fig tree
17 📚And he left them and went out of the city to Bethany, and spent the night there.
21:17 Bethany was a small town over the crest of the Mount of Olives to the east, about 3 kilometers from Jerusalem.⚜
18 📚Now in the morning as he returned to the city, he was hungry.
21:18 See Matt 4:2. Jesus had both a human nature and divine nature.⚜
19 📚And when he saw a fig tree along the way, he went to it, and found nothing on it except leaves, and said to it, “May no more fruit grow on you forever”. And immediately the fig tree withered away.
21:19 It was the nature of fig trees that fruit appeared with full leaf, and sometimes before full leaf. If it had leaves it should have had fruit, even though it was early in the year for fig trees to have either leaves or fruit (Mark 11:13). The time was April, the full leaf and fruit bearing season was June. This tree was deceiving. It promised what it did not have. In some ways it was a picture of the nation of Israel or of the city of Jerusalem. Compare Luke 13:6-9. It is also a picture of any person, any church which professes much but produces little or nothing. What is the use of great foliage if there is no fruit?
Sometimes in the Bible trees symbolize nations or individuals (Matt 3:10; 7:16-20; Ps 1:3; 37:35; 52:8; 92:12; Jer 11:16-17; Ezek 17:22-24). It is not stated here in Matthew that this fig tree represents Israel, but it may be so. Israel certainly had plenty of “leaves” but little or no “fruit”. Compare v 43; Isa 5:1-4.⚜
20 📚And when the disciples saw this, they were amazed and said, “How quickly the fig tree withered away!”
21 📚Jesus answered and said to them, “Truly I say to you, if you have faith, and do not doubt, you will do not only what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be moved, and thrown into the sea’, it will be done. 22 📚And everything that you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive”.
21:21-22 Observe that the lesson Jesus taught His disciples from this incident of the fig tree was not a lesson about judgment on Israel, but of the power of faith. Prayer without faith may lack power, but believing prayer will accomplish wonders – Matt 17:20; Mark 11:23-24; Luke 17:6; Jam 1:6; 5:16.⚜
The King meets with further opposition from leaders
23 📚And when he came into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him while he was teaching, and said, “By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you this authority?”
21:23 They meant that Jesus' activities were not authorized by the religious leaders of the nation and that therefore He had no right to do as He was doing.⚜
24 📚And Jesus answered and said to them, “I will also ask you one thing. If you tell me this, I will also tell you by what authority I do these things. 25 📚The baptism of John, from where was it? From heaven or from men?” And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven’, he will say to us, ‘Then why did you not believe him?’ 26 📚But if we say, ‘From men’, we are afraid of the people, for everyone holds John to be a prophet”. 27 📚And they answered Jesus and said, “We cannot tell”. And he said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.
21:24-27 Jesus knew these men were cowardly and dishonest. They did not want the truth, but were determined to oppose and defeat Him. So He put them on the horns of a dilemma. And He had nothing more to say to them when they revealed their character by their answer.⚜
The King gives the parable of the two sons and the parable of the vineyard
28 📚But what do you think? A certain man had two sons, and he came to the first and said, ‘Son, go work today in my vineyard.’ 29 📚He answered and said, ‘I will not’, but afterwards he repented and went. 30 📚And he came to the second son and said the same thing. And he answered and said, ‘I will go, sir’, but he did not go. 31 📚Which of these two did the will of his father?” They said to him, “The first”. Jesus said to them, “Truly I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God before you. 32 📚For John came to you with the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him. But the tax collectors and prostitutes believed him. And when you saw this, you did not repent afterwards, so that you might believe him.
21:28-32 This little parable was spoken to the Jewish religious leaders and its meaning is clear. It also is a help in understanding the incident of the fig tree in vs 18,19. The first son signifies the “tax collectors and prostitutes” of v 32. They made no pretense of being God's servants, but openly disobeyed Him and did as they pleased, but later they repented and did God's will. The second son signifies the religious leaders. They made great claims of obedience to God, but actually were not obedient, and did not repent of their inner disobedience and hypocrisy.⚜
33 📚“Hear another parable: There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard, and put a hedge around it, dug a place for a winepress in it, built a tower, rented it out to vine growers, and went to a far country. 📖 34 📚And when fruit season drew near, he sent his servants to the vine growers to get his share of the fruit. 35 📚And the vine growers took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another.
36 📚“Again, he sent other servants, more than the first time. And they did the same thing to them.
37 📚“But last of all he sent to them his son, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’
38 📚“But when the vine growers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let's kill him, and take over his inheritance.’ 39 📚And they caught him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
21:2-3 Here is an example of Christ's knowledge of what was going on in another place (see also John 1:47-50).⚜
40 📚“Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine growers?”
21:33-40 This parable was also addressed to the Jewish religious leaders, and is very clear in meaning. Jesus was speaking of God's kingdom (v 43). The landowner (v 33) signifies God. The vineyard is the nation of Israel. See Ps 80:8-11; Isa 5:1-4; Jer 12:10. “Hedge” suggests separation from other nations (see Ex 19:4-6; Lev 20:24; 1 Kings 8:53). “Tower” (or “watchtower”) suggests the earnest desire to protect the nation against enemies. “Winepress” signifies the intention to have a crop. “Vine growers” means the leaders of the nation.⚜
41 📚They said to him, “He will bring those evil men to a bad end, and will rent out his vineyard to other vine growers who will give him the fruit in its season”.
21:41 Little did they know they were foretelling their own punishment.⚜
42 📚Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes? 43 📚Therefore I tell you, The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing its fruit. 44 📚And whoever falls on this stone will be broken, but the one on whom it falls, it will grind him to powder”.
21:42-44 The Lord Jesus here brings out the spiritual application of the parable. He is the rejected “stone” of Ps 118:22-23. God would remove His vineyard (the kingdom of God) from the control of the Jewish nation which rejected His son (John 1:11), and give it to others. These were peoples of other nations who would receive Christ. They soon became the vast majority of all those in the churches (which is, of course, true to this day). Verse 44 reveals the doom of those who will not receive the Lord Jesus as Messiah and Lord and Saviour. Compare Acts 4:11; Rom 9:32-33; 1 Pet 2:6-8. “Scriptures” (v 42) – the Old Testament (John 2:22; 10:35; 2 Tim 3:16).⚜
45 📚And when the chief priests and Pharisees heard his parables, they saw that he spoke about them. 46 📚But when they looked for a way to seize him, they were afraid of the crowd, because they took him for a prophet.
21:46 They did not look for a way to repent and be saved from the threatened punishment revealed in this parable. They looked only for a way to silence the one who revealed their sin and unbelief. Learn from this what the fallen heart of man is like, and beware of falling into the same error.⚜