Palm Sunday Teaches Us to Trust

Fears surround us daily. What’s scaring you these days?

Technologically, the advance of powerful AI technology holds promise but also peril (such as the technology “tak[ing] over,” as AI’s founder worries). Politically, there are doubts as to how much longer a democracy can be sustained, a concern heightened in an election year. Looking abroad, conflicts on multiple fronts lead us to wonder whether we’re teetering on the edge of the next world war. There’s also the ongoing pinch of sin we experience in our communities and lives.

Trust is key for weathering our fears. It acts as a trellis in the tumult. The problem, though, is that we don’t have much trust left. Ironically, the path toward distrust is motivated by self-protection. Trust, so the thinking goes, will hurt us in the end. So we build a buffer of skepticism toward others, especially toward institutions and those in power.

As we tread further down distrust’s path, what began as self-protection ends up hurting us and our communities. The hedge of skepticism that was supposed to protect becomes a prison. We’re left isolated and afraid in a world that appears to be careening toward doom.

Jesus’s triumphal entry on Palm Sunday teaches us that no matter how unstable and dangerous the world feels, we can trust him.

Jesus’s triumphal entry on Palm Sunday teaches us that no matter how unstable and dangerous the world feels, we can trust him.

Such trust requires two ingredients: command and care. You trust a good plumber because he has a command of the trade and cares for you. If he has no command of plumbing, you probably shouldn’t trust him, no matter how much he cares. But if he doesn’t care, then no matter his command, he isn’t looking out for your best interests and will probably try to take advantage of you.

Command and care are both essential for trust. Take one or the other away and healthy skepticism makes sense; after all, Jesus instructs his disciples to be “shrewd as serpents” (Matt. 10:16, CSB).

Jesus’s Command

For Jesus’s disciples, the lead-up to Palm Sunday was marked by trepidation. They dreaded the return to Jerusalem, for Jesus narrowly escaped stoning the last time they were there (John 11:8). Tensions were high and the world felt unstable. On top of all that, Jerusalem was buzzing with activity as pilgrims flooded the city to celebrate Passover.

Still, Jesus has command of the situation. He instructs his disciples,

Go into the village in front of you, and immediately as you enter it you will find a colt tied, on which no one has ever sat. Untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, “Why are you doing this?” say, “The Lord has need of it and will send it back here immediately.” (Mark 11:2–3)

Jesus’s prediction and its fulfillment remind his disciples he’s in command of the situation. As Holy Week unfolds, the intensity will only heighten as his power and authority clash with the rulers and authorities in Jerusalem. When he’s arrested, his followers will abandon and deny him, fearing they may be next.

Nonetheless, these instructions remind his disciples of something important: when it feels like everything is spiraling out of control, Jesus is still in charge and his commanding kingship rules over the smallest detail.

When it feels like everything is spiraling out of control, Jesus is still in charge and his commanding kingship rules over the smallest detail.

Jesus’s ministry had already demonstrated his command over sickness, storms, demonic forces, and death. As he enters a chaotic and hostile Jerusalem under a canopy of waving palm branches, he essentially says, “I’ve got this. I am in control.” Commentator James Edwards puts it like this: “[Jesus] does not enter Jerusalem as an unknowing victim, but with . . . foreknowledge and sovereignty”—or we might say, competency and command.

Jesus’s Care

Perhaps we don’t doubt Jesus’s command but question his care. After all, if he’s in charge, why is the world (or my life) filled with such pain? Palm Sunday shows us Jesus also has the second ingredient necessary for trust: care.

Zechariah 9 tells of a righteous king, humble and mounted on a donkey, who’ll bring salvation to Jerusalem. This king’s peace will extend to the ends of the earth. Lest Jesus’s three years of ministry leave any doubt he was bringing forth the “year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:19), his entry on a beast of burden speaks loudly of his salvation and care.

Luke’s account gives an additional detail that points to Jesus’s care at his triumphal entry: his tears (19:41). Jesus weeps over Jerusalem’s rejection of him and his kingdom. He is not in a huff; he is brokenhearted. Not long before weeping for Jerusalem, he wept over the death of Lazarus (John 11:35). In both instances, Dane Ortlund observes, it is sorrow for others that draws out Jesus’s tears, for he is the King who cares.

But do Jesus’s command and care hold up against the threats we face—nuclear war, a volatile market, another pandemic, AI, a precarious democracy, a school bully, an overbearing boss, a difficult spouse, besetting sin? Consider a diver plunging into shark-infested waters. How does a person do such a thing? He has a cage of protection that can fend off any attack.

Jesus’s triumphal entry teaches us that his command and care, like the shark cage, outweigh and overpower every threat we face. He can be trusted, and so our governing posture in a chaotic world can be galvanizing trust. While the world, flesh, and Devil bang and bite against our lives, our refuge is in the mighty King on the donkey.

Is there enough evidence for us to believe the Gospels?

In an age of faith deconstruction and skepticism about the Bible’s authority, it’s common to hear claims that the Gospels are unreliable propaganda. And if the Gospels are shown to be historically unreliable, the whole foundation of Christianity begins to crumble.