03/28/2026
Walking with Purpose for Your Weekend: “The King They Didn’t Expect” - Tierney Keogler
What "pocket idols" do you turn to when God feels distant or slow to act? Which character in the Passion narrative do you most identify with? How might God be inviting you to surrender more fully to Him this week?
Dear Jesus, draw me close to You as we approach Your Passion. Reveal the obstacles in our hearts that keep us from fully embracing Your love. Help us to die to ourselves so we can rise with You in freedom and joy. Amen.
The fulfillment of our longings….. is on the other side of the cross. Read Matthew 21:1–11
Imagine you are walking through a crowded parking lot when you spot a stranger calmly sliding into the driver’s seat of your brand-new car. Naturally, you confront him, demanding to know what on earth he thinks he’s doing. Without a hint of panic, he simply looks at you and says, “The master has need of it.” Chances are, you aren't handing over your keys—you're calling the police! This is essentially what Jesus instructed two of His disciples to do at the beginning of this Palm Sunday gospel.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT:
We read in the Gospel of Matthew that Jesus and His disciples approached Jerusalem leading up to the feast of the Passover. It was Jewish custom to make a pilgrimage to the holy city to offer God a ritual sacrifice in commemoration of the exodus out of Egypt by Moses and their ancestors. Consequently, this drew a vast multitude journeying in the same direction on foot, as was their tradition.
"The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God" (1 Corinthians 1:18). And yet, this power looks nothing like the world expects. The world pursues status and prestige, but Jesus shows us another way. He enters Jerusalem on a humble donkey. The night before His Passion, He washes His disciples’ feet, the lowest act for even a slave to do. Then He chooses to die for an ungrateful world that has abandoned Him in His greatest act of mercy.
Remember, the cross isn’t the end of the story. Each moment, we are given the opportunity to decide who we want to be in the greatest story ever told. Because it is still being told. We are a part of the great adventure that is salvation history. During this holiest of weeks, we can recommit ourselves to claiming the victory the Lord so lovingly bought for us with His blood. And if you find your circumstances look more like Good Friday than Easter Sunday, remember that God sees what you cannot yet see and is working a good you cannot yet imagine.
Let’s stay close to our Lord this Holy Week as we accompany Him to Calvary, so that we don’t miss a single word He wants to speak to us. Let’s journey with Him to the cross and put to death all sin and disorder in our hearts. Let’s wait with Him in the tomb in trust and hope. And let’s see what Jesus can resurrect in our hearts in a few short days.
With you at the cross,
