Saturday, December 9, 2006
Zechariah 9:9 Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your King comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
DON'T JUDGE YOUR KING BY HIS LOWLY APPEARANCE
Jesus is a king, indeed, but a poor and wretched king, who doesn't even look like a king if you judge Him by such outward signs as might and splendor, things which the kings and princes of the world usually employ to show off.
He leaves to other kings such fancy signs as pomp, castles, palaces, gold and great wealth. He prefers to let them eat and drink, dress and build more elaborately than other people. But the heart that Christ the beggar-King knows, they do not even know at all. He provides relief not only for one sin, but for all my sin; and not for my sin only, but for the sins of the whole world. He comes to remove not only sickness, but also death; and not my death only, but the death of the the whole world. This is what the prophet means when he says: "Tell the daughter of Zion not to be offended at His lowly advent; but shut your eyes and open your ears and see, not that He rides so lowly, but listen to what is said and preached about this poor King. His poverty and lowly condition are plain to see, for He comes riding on a donkey like a beggar who owns neither saddle nor spurs. But the fact that He will take away from us our sin, will strangle death, will give us eternal holiness, eternal bliss, and eternal life, this is not plain to see. Consequently, you must hear and believe."
-- Martin Luther
