I guess I was quite young, but I do know that on this day, on the church calendar, I always went swelling home with a single strand of a palm frond very skillfully woven into the shape of a cross. How many of you had that experience when you went to Sunday school? Yes, a number of us. And that's how I learned to appreciate Palm Sunday. Now it seems to me that I must have stood here at least eight Palm Sundays in the last twelve years that I've lived here. And Easter Sundays too. I counted a privilege. and I'm glad to be once again bringing the Palm Sunday story to you. I've taken you down that narrow winding road that runs from the top of the Mount of Olives down into the city, across into the temple area. We've looked at the disciples on this particular day we've talked about the Lord Jesus and his experience on Palm Sunday and what followed it I think the last time I spoke on Palm Sunday I talked about the cult I don't know whether you remember but there were four things that I mentioned about him and they are found in our reading which is in Mark eleven. I'm just going to make reference to them again and then we're going to go on. Mark chapter eleven, we could have read this story from Matthew or from Luke, but today we're reading from Mark. And when they came nigh to Jerusalem, unto Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, He sendeth forth two of his disciples, and saith unto them, Go your way into the village over against you, and as soon as ye be entered into it, ye shall find a cult tied, whereon never man sat, loose him, and bring him. And if any man say unto you, Why do ye this? say ye that the Lord hath need of him, and straightway he will send him hither. And they went to their way and found the colt, tied by the door, without, in a place where two ways met, and they loosed him. Now that was my message. I think the last Palm Sunday. when we talked about the cult on the outside and how like the sinner he is, who's on the outside looking in and in no way able to appreciate what it really means to be born again and to be on the inside instead looking out. But here he is, outside and he's tied. So much again, like the sinner, bound by his own sin, not free to do as he pleases. What he looks upon as liberty and makes out of it license is not freedom at all. He is tied by his sin. The Bible says a man shall be bound, hold him, by the cause of his own sins. And then we noticed that he was at a place where two ways meet. So much like the sinner who has a choice to make, especially when he's brought face to face with the issue that the Lord Jesus is. He will either receive him Or he will reject him. And I would remind anybody here this morning who's not saved. That you too stand at a place where two ways meet. And which way you will go will determine whether you land in heaven or find yourself eternally lost in hell. And the solemn thing is that the choice is yours. So here is a quote, outside and tied at a place where two ways met. But it says very significantly that he was tied by the door. The Lord Jesus said, I am the door. By me if any man enter in, he shall be saved. Or there are lots of lessons to learn. from the cult. The verse ends with this, And they loosed him. I'd love to think that somebody here this morning who's not saved might be loosed from the bondage into which their sin has brought them by trusting the Lord Jesus who so willingly died upon the cross and shed his blood to wash away their sin. Now we're going to go back again to the cult this morning. But instead of reading about him, we are going to put words into his mouth. Now it's not the first time that words have been put into a donkey's mouth. Do you remember when Balaam, the prophet, in his stupidity, thought to go some other way than God intended him to go, and the donkey crushed his leg against the wall, and when Balaam smote him, the donkey opened his mouth and talked to Balaam. It's an amazement to me that the prophet didn't fall off his back. But that man also learned words of wisdom from a donkey. Now, my wife and I recently had grandchildren staying with us. Two granddaughters for one week, and one grandson for a little over a week. And if you never know it earlier, you find out that on Saturday morning, on television, there are cartoons. I noticed that one of the... You have to think about these things. Don't let your grandchildren sit and watch all these cartoons that are on television. Some of them, I think, are devastating. Some of them, I think, are very violent and they need to be monitored. But I noticed one of the cartoons was entitled Rabbit, the Tale of the of tails. T-A-L-E, T-I-T-I-L-S, the tail of tails. Now in the past when I was young and foolish and went to parties, many of the time I've tried to pin a tail on a donkey blindfolded. Oh, I can see you've had that experience too. I wonder were you ever successful? putting it in the right place. I never managed to do it. I suppose that I'm intrinsically dumb, but I never could put the tail where it belonged. Now, I'm going to put a tail at the other end of the donkey, but I'm going to spell it the other way. C-A-L-E. I think this donkey has a tail to tell. I really do. We are going to look for him years after these things have taken place. And of course, when we find him he's hoary and he's obviously quite old, but not like some of us, old enough to have forgotten everything he ever learned. I'm going to talk to this donkey and find out what his impressions were of Sunday I think the very first thing he might say to me is this it was the most interesting moment in my life I met the carpenter the Bible says they brought him to Jesus Now what should be, what would be, so very striking about meeting a carpenter? When you meet a carpenter in Alice in Wonderland, he's a rather stupid individual. But the reason why the donkey would find this extremely interesting was because of what he as a donkey had heard and heard and heard. I remember visiting a Greek island called Mikanos, and there many of the streets were actually stepped streets, and no traffic could travel them. They were very narrow, and all the vending, all the selling, all the tradesmen's wares were carried by donkey. And more than once we stood. and photographed a donkey, standing there very still, very quiet, very patient, while after the sale is over the conversation goes on and on and on. I think Mikanov taught me that the donkey is a very patient animal. Now I think that this particular donkey had heard the people talking, and different people talking, and different people often talking about the same individual. He was just a carpenter from Nazareth. But the people would talk about him because their eyes would open wide and they would say, This is the carpenter that went into the temple and drove out the people that were selling there. I can see the donkey's ears twitch because who would dare to do this in the temple? This is the carpenter who outside the temple, there in the city, only two miles away, saw a man who was crippled at this beautiful gate. And although he was lame from his mother's womb, Jesus spoke a word and raised him. My vats are carpenter worth talking about. Why, in this very village? The donkey would have heard, perhaps, the people talking about the death of Lazarus in Bethany and how sorrow came upon the household. In fact, the donkey may even in those days have heard the wailing of the mourners at the passing of this man. But when the carpenter comes on the scene, so the donkey hears. He calls to the dead, and the dead comes forth out of the tomb. Oh yes, this was the most interesting moment of my life because I met the carpenter. I never thought I'd ever see him. I never thought that I would ever be brought to him. I never thought that I would see the man who did all of these wonderful things. Indeed, it was the most interesting moment of my life. But as we continue to converse, I think the donkey is going to tell me it was the most exciting hour of my life. I met the carpenter, but then I also saw the crowds. And my what crowds? Mark says that there were many. Matthew tells us that there were great multitudes. And here is a coach. And he's surrounded by a mass of people. And a mass of very excited people. And it's not surprising if indeed it was the most exciting hour of his life. Many people. A very great multitude. That's not all that I saw, he would say. In seeing the crowds, I saw them make their clothes his saddle. I saw them make his garments a carpet. I saw them make the branches of their trees, their banners, to wave them as they moved along in this vast throng. why their very actions were a parade, and I never had an experience like that since. And now I'm a very old donkey. The most exciting hour of my life, I saw the crowds. I can almost see the donkey shaking his head sadly and saying, I little thought when I saw those crowds that I would hear afterwards of the same crowds making their way to a nearby hill and going there to see his death, his demise, and raise no hand to prevent it. is the donkey to me. It was not only the most interesting moment of my life when I met the carpenter and the most exciting hour of my life when I saw the crowds. But it was the most startling time in my life because I heard the cries. These people, and I don't know who started it, but somebody started it and the word... came into every throat, and they began to call out, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. Now these people were in front of them. The Bible account says that the crowd, the great multitude in Matthew, was before. And part of the multitude was behind. And the whole multitude was surrounding the donkey. They were ahead crying. And they were behind crying. And they were around crying. Blessed is he that cometh. said Vedanti, I can hear the voices of the children. I can hear the echoes from the mountain. I can hear the sound of the people as one voice. Blessed is he that comes. You know, this was the acclaim of that multitude for the Lord Jesus. He's sitting on an ass's coat. His saddle is a close. He's surrounded by the multitude. And here they are acclaiming him. But what is actually the gist of what they are saying? It says here, this is what they said. Hosanna! Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. Blessed be the kingdom of our Father David, that cometh in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest. And Luke tells us, they spoke of the mighty works that they had seen. What they were doing here was hailing the Lord Jesus as a king, as the doer of mighty works, and they were singing Hosanna to him, and if that were not sufficient, they were singing Hosanna in the highest, the very loftiest of praise, the most adoring of phrases. Says the donkey, it was the most startling time of my life. I heard the cross. But again I can see him sadly shake his head and say, I never dreamed that within a week they would be climbing at his and they would be surrounding him again. But this time on a gibbet, and they would be crying instead of Hosanna in the highest, away with him, crucify him, we will not have this man to reign over us. It's a very sad tale. The donkey tail. Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the kingdom of our Father David that cometh in the name of the Lord. And so they elevate the Lord Jesus until at last they cry, O Zana, in the very highest. But says the donkey, This was not only the most interesting moment of my life because I met the carpenter. It was not only the most exciting hour of my life because I saw the crowds. It was not only the most startling time of my life because I heard those cries. It was the most wonderful day of my life. because I carried the crisis. I carried the crisis. This is a cult on which man never before sat, totally unchained and unbroken. And yet the Lord Jesus climbs aboard the donkey and he's perfectly calm. There's not another being that could have sat on the back of that cult without being bucked up. But the Lord Jesus quietly climbed aboard and the donkey was perfectly calm, untamed though he was. He was young. He was just a coat. And yet he was willingly cooperative. That's not really a trait of the young, be they beast or human. But here is a very cooperative donkey. And although no man had ever ridden him before, as Jesus rides him, He is perfectly controlled. There are lessons to be learned here. I don't know whether your life is running away with you. We know the horrible fears that are gripping humanity in these days. We know how that disease is making men and women deftly afraid. We know how the drugs are destroying families, ruining marriages, causing children to starve, and taking men and women, many of them young men and young women, to their deaths. Next day, next time that I stand and listen to a drug addict screaming in pain in the prose of withdrawal, will not be the first, nor the second, nor the third. In the mission in New York City, we used to have a little room. We had a mattress that completely fitted the floor. It was actually a little landing to which the elevator could come. And it would. You would step out into that little room and then out of that little room into the dormitory. It was to that little room that we used to bring drug addicts who wanted to kick the habit. Young men who realized that they were caught in death. Young men who recognized that the time had come for them to be men about this business and break this wretched, deadly habit once and for all. We had no doctor living in the building. And in consequence, could administer no drugs during withdrawal. It was always what they used to call cold turkey. I have wished many times that I had had a tape recorder placed within reach of that little room so that those who were foolish enough to begin the habit might hear how it ends up but I didn't do it. If your life is beginning to run away with you, it may not be drugs. It may not be drinking. It may be just a total selfishness that has laid upon you and you want what you want when you want it. Like the cult, you're untamed. Right in the back of your mind you know that the signs are not good for you or for your future and that somewhere along the line you're going to be called to pay the price. Now the donkey is an example of one who lets the Lord Jesus climb aboard. If you're not saved that's why your life is mixed up. If you're not saved, that's the reason why your life seems to be purposeless. That's the reason why, young though you may be, there are times when you ask, why in the world was I born? The Lord Jesus can climb aboard of your life. And, oh, what a difference that will make. Instead of bucking and kicking and struggling and rebelling, you'll find a beautiful calm come into your heart and into your life and you will find that when the Lord Jesus is brought into control of your life that at last you begin to get somewhere what you need is Christ if you're not saved you need to be born again you need to have him not only aboard but in control of your life. Somebody has very aptly said that in every Christian Christ is resident, but only in some Christians is Christ president. Perhaps you are not unfaithed. Perhaps you have been born again, but there is still that in your life which demands to hold the reins and to send your life where you choose that it should go. By how much you need the Lord Jesus, just to take hold of those ways and to begin to control that life. There is no life to be compared to that which is totally and absolutely surrendered to the Lord Jesus. Maybe there's someone here, and you know, although you may never have admitted it to any loved one or friend, that your life is actually a backslidden life, that much is being done from force of habit or to put on a front. You can't deceive the Lord Jesus, you know. God knows all about it. And the one who can save and then can control is the one who can restore and then take over the reins. The donkey said, I carried the Christ. You'll never be called upon to carry him. You'd never be able to do it. But what you need is for him to carry you. Let's bow in prayer shall we. Our Father, our hearts are puzzled as we think about these things. How people could one week cry out in the terms of highest praise and the next call for the murder of the Lord Jesus. And yet we know that this is human nature. And our hearts by nature are no different from theirs. We need a change of heart. We need a control of the Master's hand. We ask that this morning these words of the donkey that we put into his mouth might speak to us. especially the last. It was the most wonderful day in my life. Oh, that this day might be just such a day for someone who sits in this congregation, not yet born again. Dismishes with thy blessing. Grant that thy word that this old, old story might linger with us. and that thy Holy Spirit shall be able to challenge our hearts and to bless our hearts. So many of us, Lord, have known thee for a long, long time. And yet sometimes there is a question about cooperation with thee. Sometimes there is a question about control by thee. Lord Jesus, we ask that we might search our hearts whatever age we be and make sure that our lives in their entirety are in thy hand. We ask, seeking thy glory, Lord Jesus,