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It was Palm Sunday. Our Lord was riding in to the City of David, Jerusalem the Golden. He rode into the heart of God's Old Covenant people physically, visibly, on the back of an ass. He came as the Incarnate One to forgive, strengthen, and love. He came to do some final teaching and preaching before He would go to Calvary to die.

It is the 10th Sunday after Trinity. Our Lord rides into this small chapel, Faith Village. He rides into the heart of God's New Testament people, physically, invisibly, on the "back" of lowly creatures as well: water, wine, wafer, word of absolution. He comes here this morning for you and He is still Incarnate, still the God/Man with flesh and blood. He comes to you today to forgive, strengthen, and love. He's here to do some preaching and teaching, to distribute the benefits of His suffering and dying.

"And when He approached. He saw the city and wept over it ... " He wasn't crying over the extensive stone walls and towers; He wasn't crying over the cities' fabled history and past glory; He wasn't even crying over the re-built Temple-- his Home before the Incarnation by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary. He was crying over the people not their stuff. He was crying over His brothers and sisters not over their possessions and their mammon. The word St. Luke uses to describe our Lord's reaction is a bit different than the word St. John uses do describe the Bible's "shortest verse:" "Jesus wept." The verb John used stresses Jesus' flow of tears. Here the word St. Luke employs emphasizes the Lord's voice; the noise He made with His mourning and crying out audibly on behalf of those He was sent to seek and save. Jesus was not privately sobbing overcome by emotion, He was vocally lamenting the sin of His people; He was orally chastising them for their hard hearts and unbelief. He was preaching Law to them even as their own echoes of "Hosanna in the highest, blessed is He that cometh in the Name of the Lord" faded away.

That the Second Person of the Trinity can show righteous and perfect wrath over blasphemy and sin, demonstrated in His subsequent "cleansing of the Temple outer court" shows that this Man from Galilee is true Man... man enough to be beaten bloody, man enough to be affixed with spikes on a tree. That this traveling Rabbi can accurately predict what will occur 40 years later shows that this Man from Galilee is true God. Jesus predicts the fall of Jerusalem to Rome in the year 70 A.D.: "For the days shall come upon you when your enemies will throw up a bank before you, and surround you...and will level you to the ground...." But as bad as that will be, Jesus also once said fear not he that can but kill you, rather fear he that can hand you over to hell. Jesus is not crying out over the devastation that will be inflicted upon earthly Jerusalem, rather He is mourning what will happen to its inhabitants. The Lord is consternated over the stiff-necked Jews rejection of Messiah. His concern is over their spiritual well-being, their eternal dwelling place: "If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace..." Jesus, Jesus, only Jesus goes the hymn, and Paul says he is resolved to preach nothing save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Only the Bodily God/Man makes for peace. Caiphas thought peace could be maintained by playing the Romans the right way diplomatically and politically. He was wrong. The militant zealots thought peace could be achieved only by armed resistance to the Legions. They were wrong. The Pharisees thought peace could be earned by outward shows of compliance to the Laws of Moses, without real regard to the inner sins of the heart. Wrong too.

Our day and age is no different Our people, our brothers and sisters, our fellow creatures do not know the things which make for peace. Numbers do not make for peace, nor do man-made political organizations, the right elected leaders, or advocacy groups and their newsletters. Peace is not the result of large bank accounts, multi-staff "ministries," liturgical accoutrements or teeming Sunday school "programs." Peace is the Incarnate Jesus serving you in Word and in Supper. Peace only comes when you are in His presence drawn by the Spirit, and ministered to with His loving gifts. Jesus is pure and undefiled. His teachings and doctrine remain total truth. The same way that the Lord cannot be co-mingled with false baals, so too his teachings cannot be intermixed with false doctrine, and so too his people cannot remain in fellowship with those who deny Christ's teachings, whether in action or in words, or in lack of action where it is warranted.

Does one, or does one not: "recognize the time of your visitation?" The specially designated church holy-day: the Visitation, celebrates the Virgin Mary carrying in (in utero) the living God/Man to be in the presence of Elisabeth. With the bodily presence of God, within her, Mary gospels Elisabeth with the beautiful "Magnificat" Elisabeth had Peace at that moment, the Peace which is Jesus, the Peace which passed all understanding.

You are being "visited" again this morning by the Lord's living Word of Power. It has had the power to crush you down in shame and trembling because you know what you've done, and what you've failed to do; you know that you do not do His will as you should. Christ's Word now has the power to stem you fears and tears, for it tells you, it gives you, Peace, Love, complete forgiveness and restoration. You are being "visited" today by the Bodily Jesus; not Jesus veiled in Mary's womb, but Jesus veiled in Bread and Wine. Eat and drink His Body and Blood. Have that Peace within you, that peace between you and the Heavenly Father, and you will know, you will be guided into all truth as to what you should do, and refrain from doing with all the un-peaceable men who tell you that their maneuverings and posturings and gatherings make for peace. You will know by Christ where to go for real peace, real food, and real family.

"For all the people were hanging upon His words." Yes, for He was hanged upon a cross for all the people.