Matthew 21:5
“See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”
I woke up this morning full. It kind of felt like while I was asleep someone had force-fed me, and when I saw the headlines at FoxNews.com I realized what it was: while I slept, someone had shoved more Obama down my throat. In case you missed it, he won the Nobel Peace prize. Wow.
Now, I could say quite a bit of stuff about that from a political slant, but that really isn’t the purpose of Evotions. I can tell you, though, why this passage of Scripture immediately came to my mind when I saw the news about President Obama’s win.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see a great contrast between President Obama’s rise to fame and Jesus’ arrival on the scene. One has all the publicists and media coverage money can buy proclaiming how great he is, and the other sent two disciples to get a donkey for Him to ride on as He entered Jerusalem. Not just any donkey, either. This one was borrowed. That’s right. The King of kings could have said “Poof!” and had a mighty steed appear, but instead sent some of his guys down to Rent-a-Center to get a donkey for a day.
In that day, mighty warriors and great men rode horses. I’m guessing that President Obama would have ridden one, too. But not Jesus. He was content to simply ride a rental, and a very slow rental at that. It was no accident that Jesus rode a donkey. It wasn’t because they’d already rented out all the great rides or because He hadn’t gone to freecreditreport.com and now had to ride the worst of the lot. Nope, He rode the donkey so that He would be even more approachable for the people He was coming to save. A prancing horse would have scared people away. A fast horse would have been hard to keep up with. But this slow ride allowed the hurting and the oppressed to be near Him. His lowly appearance made Him real, and look at the response.
People came to throw down coats along the path He was riding. They actually went and cut branches down and threw them in His path to honor Him. Their response was unrehearsed and heartfelt. They weren’t forced, manipulated, or told they better cheer or else their health insurance would be taken away. Jesus came to serve, and because of that the people rallied to Him. They couldn’t help it; they just wanted to be as close to this King as they possibly could, and He wanted that, too.
“Press the flesh” is a pretty big phrase in politics. It means “shake hands and mingle with people, especially when running for public office.” Typically it is done after a speech, or at a school surrounded by cute children watching the candidate read a book while sitting in a chair so small that his knees touch his ears. “Pressing the flesh” is what you do when you’re trying to force-feed yourself – or your agenda – down the throats of your people. But not Jesus. He knew that when you lead people by serving their needs first, inevitably the “flesh will press” you.
So serve people where they are. Walk slowly enough that even the most hurting among them can still be near you, and you will find no lack of people with whom to share the grace of a King who rides rentals.
