You shouldn’t have pressed him so hard on who was to sit nearest him when he becomes king said the other, then we might not have had to eat humble-pie by doing this menial job.

Ah well, we’re here now so let’s take a look for this little colt – why does he want to ride a donkey anyway? Well, there was some further shouting and bargaining but then it all seemed to be resolved.
That was intriguing – I wondered who ‘he’ was and what he was doing. So we followed them when they left.

There were a lot of people around, even in our small village of Bethpage. It was the preparation for the Passover and the place was filling up with people from many distant places all going up to Jerusalem. Some were trying to find lodgings in our little village - but most homes had already taken all the travellers they could and moved their own families into the byres and stalls to make more room. Merchants were coming with their camels bringing aromas from the wide-world. It really was an exciting time and quite nose-tickling with smells not quite like those we were used to here in our little home.

The smell changed as we walked through the olive groves towards Bethany – I caught the two men talking again. They seemed quite oblivious of me so I got closer.
He’s going to ride into Jerusalem as a king today – at last we are to see him deliver his people said one, but why on a donkey! He ought to be on a horse.

Ah, well here I had the advantage over them – because, being around donkeys all my short life, I knew a thing or two about donkey-lore. It was said by our grey-beards that an old prophet had proclaimed the arrival of the deliverer with the words : Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. (Zech 9:9)
Had these guys found the king who was to come and release Israel from the oppression of Rome as they seemed to be saying?

I had been listening so intently that I hadn’t realized we had arrived at the place where the king was. I almost walked into the men but stopped hastily and looked up. And when I saw him, and his eyes met mine I wanted to do anything I could for him.

So we set off for Jerusalem. Back down through the olive groves and across the Kedron valley. I had never been here before and it was a little disconcerting. All those people who had seemingly been just milling about were now all at once lining our way. But not just the merchants and those who had come for the Passover. The weird thing was that there were so many who were lame, sick, poor and outcast. This didn’t seem like the people who would be of any use in a battle for a kingdom. What did they see in this man – was it some different sort of deliverance?

We walked on palm-branches and everyone was shouting Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the LORD!'Peace in heaven and glory in the highest! It sounded like angels singing at times.

All these nobodies in the crowd seemed to understand that they were no longer invisible and voiceless, and all at once this entry into Jerusalem did seem to be of a king riding on a white horse, coming to deliver people from their oppressors.

Wow. What a day to remember. And when Jesus eventually got down off my back I really felt that I had been a white stallion taking my king to be crowned. Well, even donkeys can dream – can’t they?

Easter 2010