Now we've finished eight weeks of conference. Our last speaker was very interesting but very long. I'm going to finish at twelve o'clock promptly this morning. And I want to talk about what happened on Palm Sunday. Let me read another account very much like the one that we read in Mark and then we'll turn back to Mark's account in that eleventh chapter. Now I'm going to read now from Matthew, but you don't have to turn to it. I promise you I'll read it just as it's written in my King James Version. See if you can pick out just listening the differences between the two accounts. And when they drew nigh unto Jerusalem and were come to Beth Phage, unto the mount of olives, then sent Jesus, two of his disciples, saying unto them, Go into the village over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied and a colt with her. Loose them and bring them unto me. And if any man say ought unto you, ye shall say, The Lord hath need of them. The Lord hath need of them. And straightway he will send them. All this was done that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the prophet, saying, Tell ye the daughter of Zion, Behold thy king, cometh unto thee meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt, the foal of an ass. And the disciples went and did as Jesus commanded them, and brought the ass and the coat, and put on them their clothes, and set him thereon. And a very great multitude spread their garments in the way. Others cut down branches from the trees, and strawed them in the way. And the multitude that went before, and that followed, cried, saying, Hosanna to the Son of David. Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. And when he was coming to Jerusalem, all the city was moved, saying, Who is this? And the multitude said, This is Jesus, the prophet of Nazareth of Galilee. Now turn to Mark eleven, to that account. And that's where we want to spend these twenty-five or less minutes, because this morning I want to have a closing hymn. I want you to imagine that you're standing with me on the terraced patio at the Intercontinental Hotel on the summit of the Mount of Olives. We're looking out over the low parapet that ends the patio at the city of Jerusalem spread out in front of us. As we look over the parapet, we can see that the hundreds of graves of those who were sure and so wanted to be buried in this spot that this was where the resurrection was going to begin. As we look at the city, we are looking across the valley of Jehoshaphat. Along the valley at the base of the mountain, and it's really not a mountain, it's just a very large hill, there's a road. we can see as it turns the corner past the pillar of Absalom, past Zechariah's tomb, on until it disappears in the little village of Ilri Pute called Silwan. There's a road that also goes around the summit of the hill, and that's the road that leads to our hotel. We leave the patio and we move into the hotel courtyard. There are probably three Arabs there with their camels and they're going to try to persuade us to take a ride on the camel because they want back sheesh. But we're going to ignore them. We're going instead to drop down to the road and we're going to move to our right and several hundred feet down the road we're going to stop. And we're going to look down the hill into the city toward the golden gate. Now the road over which the Lord Jesus traversed the Mount of Olives is still there today. Of course now it's Tarmac Abdomed and it may be that it moves a little here or there in the course of its winding journey down the hill. But you never go to see Jerusalem but you stand and look down the Palm Sunday Road. That was the path the Lord Jesus travelled on the coat. The story is a very interesting story, a lot of detail in the story. Seems to me that I can learn lessons from the coat, I can learn lessons from the crowd, and I can learn lessons from the Christ. I'm not going to cover all that ground this morning because I intend to continue to cover it tonight. And by the way, if you have any plans other than being at the service tonight, you'd better cancel them and be here because the choir is going to sing for fifteen minutes the first part of a cantata that they've learned especially for tonight. and that in eight weeks of conference. Two weeks, one my wife was ill, no choir practice. One, I was ill, no choir practice. Another one, the Wheaton Glee Club came along on a Monday, and again there was no practice. But the choir has done wonders. So you have to be here for our mini cantata tonight, because it has to do with Palm Sunday. And in whatever time they leave me, we'll continue with our story. The cult. I don't know whether you've ever thought about this. I know the story is very, very familiar to you. I know you've heard before about these two disciples that the Lord Jesus sent to get the animals. It's all very familiar to you. But Mark says some rather interesting things. about this cult. Take a look at your open Bible there on your knee. Jesus said to them, verse two, go your way into the village over against you, and as soon as ye be entered into it, ye shall find a cult tied. Now you'll notice that Mark doesn't mention the ass. He only mentions the cult. He focuses his attention on the younger of these beasts. And then he says, upon that cult, never man sat. The cult was an untamed cult. Loose him, says the Lord Jesus, and bring him. If any man say unto you, why are you doing this, say the Lord have need of him. I'm glad Mark emphasizes that, along with Matthew, the Lord hath need of him. Now we were singing, for thou hast created, hast all things created, for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are created, for thou hast created all things. And yet it says here, the Lord hath need of him. There's somebody here this morning and as the Lord Jesus looks at your life a great big longing settles down upon his heart. In one Bible story it is said of the Lord Jesus that a young man who was challenged with regard to giving up what he had in order to follow the Lord Jesus he went away sad and when he did another sad heart followed him That was the Lord Jesus from whom he had turned away. It said of the Lord Jesus, and he beholding him loved him. The Lord Jesus had a longing after that young man, but the young man loved this world and his possessions too much and said, I cannot pay the price. And he left. But the Lord had need of him. But he went away. There's not a man sitting in a pew this morning here. There's not a woman sitting here. Not an older person or a younger person. But the Lord, the Creator of the universes, needs you. And he wants you. I don't know why you're sitting in our service this morning. There may be any one of a dozen reasons, but you're here. and I want you to realize it's not an accident. I want you to recognize the fact that God intended that to meet you here, he has need of you. There's something about your life that he wants. There's something about your personality that he covets. There's something about you, the real you, that God wants to make fit in with his purpose. so that he can bless you and use you and triumph through you and mark you. If you, like the young man, turn and go away, you miss the very point for which you were born and the very point in living. Not until you find the Lord Jesus, not until you find the will of God, not until you fit into the will of God, Will you find what it is to really live at all? If somebody says to you, are you saved, does that offend you? If somebody says to you, are you born again, does that disturb you? If they say to you, have you ever been converted, do you find yourself a little riled inside as though they were interfering with you? It's because they love you. It's because they want to share with you the joy they have and it's because they want you, like they have, to meet the Lord Jesus and to begin to live. A London businessman, a friend of mine, wrote a book about the Christian life which he called Life with a capital L. His name was Lindsay Glegg, well known in Britain. He's in the glory now. Somebody said to him one day, Lindsay, That's a very good book. I've enjoyed reading it, but the title doesn't suit the book. Why not Gleg Wanted a No? Well, the Christian life is not just life with a capital L. It's life with a capital L and a capital I and a capital F and a capital E because it's a capital life altogether. But you'll never know that. until you come to the giver of that life, the Lord Jesus, that we've been extolling and exalting without any apology because indeed he is God the Son. The Lord hath need of him. Does he do anything to you to know that the Lord of heaven wants you? And in order to carry out his plan he needs you. and this morning make no mistake at all about it he is going to make his approach to you and knock upon your heart's door and say forget everybody else what about you there were four things concerning the cult that the Lord Jesus needed that appealed to me as I read this story it says when the disciples came to the place They went their way and found the coat tied. That was the first thing that struck me about the coat. He didn't have his freedom. My wife and I were driving not very far from here the other day, and we saw a coat. I suppose it was probably only two or three days old, and already it was frisking around. That's the nature of the coat. but this cult was tied. I said to myself, how much like I was by nature before I was saved that cult is. I had no freedom. I was tied. I was bound. I didn't realize it, but it was so true of me. And you know, there are lots and lots of people who are bound and don't realize it. They've gotten used to their tied condition. The Word of God says, if the Son of God shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. If you're bound, if you're tied, and you can know whether you are, when you look into your heart and find out if you're discontented, if you're disturbed, if your life seems to be out of kilter and off center. It's an evidence that your... Separate it from God and you're bound. I think of many young people today who are having a terrible struggle in a world that is so threatening and a world that so sadly affects them, affected by their peers and challenged by peer pressure. You know, that's why we find a lot of drunkenness among young people. That's why we find a lot of drugs among young people. Did you read that letter, that account of a message delivered to a young man who had gotten mixed up with drugs by a judge after he sentenced him to one year in prison and four years probation? Listen to what he said. Judge Cephe spoke directly to the youth and said, Do you know who's going to serve that year? Not you. Your mother and father will serve that year. That's what's wrong. They get sentenced. They get sentenced for a lifetime. You serve a year. Your body is in the stockade for a year. But their souls are tormented for a lifetime. Why? Because you were a selfish person. Spoiled boy, that's why. There is no punishment in the world that I could inflict upon you that could in any way compensate for what you are doing to your mother and father. I have not spent five cents raising you. I don't know you from Adam, but your mother and father have put their lives, their hearts, their sweat, their money, and everything else they have into bringing you up. And now they have to sit in this courtroom and listen to a total stranger who had nothing to do with your upbringing, scold you, and put you in jail. This is at a time when phony kids your age are yelling, you adults have your alcohol, we want our drugs. You have polluted our water and air. You have polluted this and that and all the rest of the garbage that comes out of your mouth. Meanwhile you put yourselves above everybody else, I feel sorry for you. I want you to think of this for one year and the reason why I say it. If you are sick, a doctor will treat you and he won't be on drugs. The lawyer who represented you, he's not I, on drugs. The people into whose custody you'll be put, they won't be on drugs. Your astronauts are not on drugs. Your president is not. Your legislators are not. Your engineers who build the bridges that you drive across. And the tunnels you drive through, they're not on drugs. Those who build the planes you fly in. And the cars that you drive are not. Neither are those who build the bathrooms that you stink up with your lousy rotten drugs. None of them have been on drugs. And this is because of people like your mother. and father. But in the world of the future, Sepi went on, the same may not be true. Teachers, doctors, lawyers, legislators, products of the new drug-oriented generation may well be as high as kites. You won't know to whom to send your child or whom to trust your life to. Sepi sighed and closed the case files. Let's see what kind of world you leave to your children, he said, before you talk about the world we left to ours. When men are tied, their lives are blasted and broken. When men are bound, their hearts are broken too. You take a wild bird, a wild songbird and you put it in a cage, its song flees. Are you bound? The cult was tied. But you notice the account here says, they went their way and found the cult tied by the door. I think that's a very interesting location. I used when I was a boy, about a hundred and five years ago, to sing a chorus, one door and only one, and yet its sides are two, inside and outside, on which side are you. One door and only one, and yet its sides are two. I'm on the inside, on which side are you. Now a door is an entranceway. I know that this cold had no choice as to whether he would go through the door or not, because he was bound. Now if you're not saved, if you're unconverted, if you do not know the Lord Jesus as your Savior, tied though you are, your rope is long enough that you can, if you will, investigate the doors. Now the door could be closed, in which case it would be no help to you. But the door I'm thinking of, beside which that the bound sinner is tied is an open door. Jesus said, I am the door. By me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved. I'm glad that Satan is such a defeated foe that although he ties up the cults, although he binds up the sinners, He can't shorten the lead that prevents them from reaching the door. But in the final analysis, those bound people are going to make a choice. I see the door. I note the door is open. I am going to go through the door. Or I'm not going to go through the door. The choice is yours. The cold had no choice. He was tied by the door, but the door only mocked him. Sometimes that cult would hear the voices stealing out of the house, perhaps, and if it's anything like my dog, he's very social. Maybe the cult had learned to like people, I don't know, but he couldn't get to them. His tether wasn't long enough, but yours is. There's no reason in the world why you shouldn't approach the door and enter through the door. Jesus said, as I reminded you a moment ago, I am the door. By me, if any men enter in, he shall be saved. This door speaks to me of choice. For the cult, there was no choice. But for the tethered sinner, there is. Now it says here, they went their way and found the cult tied by the door without it. Now it leaves no doubt about the fact that the cult was on the outside. Remember that little chorus? One door and only one, yet it sides a two, inside and outside on which side are you. Now if you fail to make a choice with regard to the door of salvation, that door which is the Lord Jesus, which stands open and inviting to you today, You'll be on the outside and that's the place you'll be forever. Now mark you. The door of heaven is not entered by a religious affiliation. It is not entered by a moral upbringing. It is not entered by means of living a good life. Jesus said, I am the door by me, if any man enters in, he shall be saved. There is no way of getting to heaven without receiving into one's heart and life the Lord Jesus in a personal, intelligent, and once and for all fashion. The cult was tied by the door without, that is outside. it becomes a very apt picture of a man or woman, the younger or older person outside of Christ, tied beside the door, but on the outside. There's something else said about the cult. And they went their way and found the cult tied by the door without in a place where two ways met. I don't know whether that expression reached you as it was read to you. A place where two ways met. Do you realize that in this place this morning, sitting where you are in our Pound Sunday service, you are actually at a place where two ways meet. The one is the way of life and the other is the way of death. And when you leave and go out through those swinging doors, or the doors are either side, and then out through the central door, you will go out from this service this morning, a young man, a young woman, an older man, an older woman, who has been at the place where two ways met, made a choice, and moved down one or the other. Do you realize this morning which may seem to you to be a very ordinary morning you're standing at a place of great responsibility before God because you're going to say before you leave I will trust the Lord Jesus as my Savior or I will not trust the Lord Jesus as my Savior I will take the road of life as I yield to him or I'll continue to pursue the road of death as I turn my back upon him and reject him. But if you leave this place choosing the wrong road, I wouldn't want to stand in your shoes for all the wealth of the world. My final word is in our closing hymn. Let me read it to you and then we'll sing it. It's number three hundred and fifty one. Behold the Savior at the door. This is not the door beside which the cult was tied. It's not the door of salvation which is the person of the Lord Jesus. This is the door of your heart. Behold the Savior at the door. He gently knocks, has knocked before, has waited long, is waiting still. You use no other friend. So we'll open the door. He'll enter in and stop with you and you with him. We're going to sing these three verses and in a moment we're going to stand to sing them. Number three hundred and fifty one. Shall we rise to sing? Will you please think about the words as you sing them? He holds the Savior at the door. He shan't be gone. Has not been born. Has waited long his way. You use no other friends to yield. Open the door, please enter in. Hands are with you, and you with me. Oh, lovely attitude. He stands with open heart and outstretched hands. Oh, matchless kindness. And he shows his matchless kindness even to his foes. You know, if you really wanted to trust the Lord Jesus this morning, If you really wanted to choose the right road and to enter through the door, you could courageously show us that you have that concern by leaving your seat and coming forward to confess your need of Christ. I'm not pressing you to do that, but it's a wonderful opportunity that you have to say, I'm going to trust Christ and I'm not ashamed who knows it. The second verse. Oh, lovely attitude to be stand with open heart and our own stretch hand. Oh, matchless kindness, and he shows his master's mind. Yes, to his Lord. Oh, and the Lord, he's entering. And come with you, and you will be. God let him air his anger burn, let he depart and bear it burn, and let him pour it out. and hand, where at his door denied you stand, open the door, he shepherding And come with you, and you with me. Thank you, you may be seated for the benediction. Lord Jesus, we call thee to witness. that we've sought to lay before this congregation the way of life and the way of death. We only pray that thy word will stay with them until it accomplishes what thou hast in mind. And if there is some unhappy heart, if there is some struggling person, if, Lord, there is some concerned one, We ask that thy Holy Spirit shall follow such in one, impressing upon them the fact that you need them, and you love them, and you want them. Give to them the wisdom we pray while there is time and opportunity to surrender to you. We pray it in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.