“Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their clothes on it, and He sat on it. And many spread their clothes on the road, and others cut down leafy branches from the trees and spread them on the road”. Mark 11:7-8 NKJV
I can’t help but to think about the clothes!
Everybody is familiar with the palm branches: how the people waved them and placed them on the road for the Triumphal Entry Jesus made into Jerusalem, but their clothes too? Remember now, there wasn’t Walmart, or Target, Ross, or Macy’s….. their clothes were costly, handmade, and precious to them. They didn’t have closets full, most only had a few. So for them to lay their clothes on a stinky donkey and to lay them down on a dirt or stone road to be trampled on by a King on a donkey is true reverence and worship. I’m sure after everybody passed through and started to pick them back up, that they were dirty and even some damage done to them. But yet, they still laid them down knowing this.
It is so easy to cut a branch out of a tree; but to take off our over-clothes, not dig through our rag piles at home, but to take what we have on and lay them before the King to give Him the red carpet treatment into our lives is true adoration. I know that it was traditional for them to greet a king in that fashion back then, but they did have a choice. Branches or clothes. And I believe the ones that chose clothes said “Hosanna in the highest!” louder than anyone.
Blessings!
Elder Steve Smith