Shalom Dear Partner and Friend of Israel,

Everyone knows the Last Supper as a Christian moment BUT almost no one recognizes it as a PASSOVER moment… Yeshua (Jesus) did NOT invent a new ritual that night – He redefined and Ancient one! The bread, the cup, the Covenant language — this was a Passover table and when he held up that unleavened bread and said, "this is my body," He was doing something that would have been immediately understood by everyone in that room.

Yeshua (Jesus) was the lamb… and NOT a replacement for Passover – He was the fulfilment of everything Passover had always been pointing toward; "Liberation from Pharaoh" that was the shadow …and Liberation from everything that enslaves the soul that was the reality! The original Passover freed bodies from Egypt BUT our Lord Yeshua (Jesus) came to free identities from a deeper bondage. "Do this in remembrance of me" wasn't just about a meal – it was about who we are now not just as a tradition — but as someone being set free?

The Day the Lamb Is Chosen... Palm Branches; a Donkey and the Passover that NO one understood 2,000 years ago… Four days before Passover, something deeply intentional happens in Israel, and most of it takes place quietly, inside homes where NO crowds gather and NO one is applauding. It is not dramatic - it is not public …but it is commanded, and that makes it weighty. "Tell all the congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of this month every man shall take a lamb… Your lamb shall be without blemish…" - Exodus 12:3–5. The LAMB is chosen on the 10^th-Day of Nissan (Abib/Aviv). NOT "sacrificed" yet and NOT rushed. It is brought in, kept close, and carefully observed. For 4-Days, it lives among the people, visible and known, so that what is about to be offered is NOT distant or abstract but fully seen. The lamb MUST be proven before it is given!

Centuries later, on that exact day, the City of Jerusalem is anything but quiet... Pilgrims have filled the streets for the Feast of Passover and anticipation is thick in the air …and rumours are moving faster than people can verify them. Something is happening, and the crowd senses it before they understand it. “Now when they drew near to Jerusalem ...they brought the donkey ...and they set Him on it.” - Matthew 21:1–7. Yeshua does NOT slip into the city unnoticed and enters in a way that forces a response. People begin laying down their cloaks on the road, a gesture of submission, of honour, of recognition that someone greater is present. Others cut branches and spread them in front of Him, creating a path that looks less like a street and more like a procession. “Most of the crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road.” - Matthew 21:8. Those branches matter. Palm branches were NOT decoration …they were “declaration.” They were the language of victory, of national hope, of deliverance! They had been used before when enemies were defeated and when freedom was tasted again. By waving them now, the people are saying something very specific without needing to explain it; They believed their king has come; “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” - Matthew 21:9.

As the crowd cries out, there is another layer unfolding that most people miss, because these words were not invented in the moment. They were remembered; “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” - Matthew 21:9. In Hebrew, this verse is: Baruch Haba b’shem Adonai. (Psalm 118:26). This line comes straight out of (the Hallel) - the Psalms sung during Passover. Every pilgrim in that city would have known it. Every Jewish family would have rehearsed it. These were NOT spontaneous words rising from emotion …these were “Covenant” words, liturgical words, words tied to deliverance! And just one verse before it, the Psalm says: “Save now, I pray, O Lord…” - Psalm 118:25. Hosanna.

But the Psalm does not begin there. Just a breath earlier, it says something else - something they are standing in the middle of without realizing it… “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” - Psalm 118:22. The same Psalm they are quoting over the Lord is the same Psalm that already told them what would happen next; Rejected - Not by Rome but by the builders - by the leaders - by the ones responsible for recognizing what YHWH God was doing. Yeshua Himself will later point directly back to this moment and this Psalm: “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone’?” - Matthew 21:42. They are singing the right song, about the right Person, at the right time - and still missing what it means. How? Because the cornerstone does NOT get “crowned” first. It gets “rejected” first …and that rejection is NOT a side note in the story. It is part of the plan! And then the Psalm continues: “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord…” - Psalm 118:26.

So, what they are doing in that moment is reciting Passover Scripture over Him... They are declaring, with their own mouths, that He is the One who comes in the Name of YHWH – Yahweh God …the One bringing Salvation …the One to be blessed as He enters the city. And yet, even as they say it, they are filling those words with their own expectations instead of Yahweh – God’s meaning. The language is right. The theology is Ancient. The moment is real …but understanding has NOT caught up to what they are proclaiming! And those words are NOT finished yet, because Yeshua (Jesus) ties this exact phrase to what has NOT yet happened and the End- times: “You will not see Me again UNTIL you say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord.’” - Matthew 23:39. Baruch haba b’shem Adonai. The same words shouted on the road with “palm branches.” The same Psalm! The same declaration! But this time, NOT from a crowd caught up in expectation …BUT from a people who finally understand! Not a cry for political rescue - but a recognition of “the King” they once rejected! The end does not come because the world gets darker …it comes when the “rejection” is reversed. When Jerusalem - the leadership, the heart of Israel - NO longer echoes the builders who “rejected the stone” - but instead welcomes “the Cornerstone” fully, knowingly and without misunderstanding, then He will return.  And so, we wait for Jerusalem “to cry out” to Him again as they did that first Passover. 

Now, let’s return to Hosanna for a moment...  Did you know that “Hosanna” is NOT a soft word …it is a cry that means “save us now.” It carries urgency, expectation, and assumption all at once. They are NOT asking whether He will save …they are assuming that Yeshua (Jesus) will …and that it will happen the way they have always imagined. The Jews of 2,000 years ago were NOT wrong about who He is …but they are wrong about what He came to do (at least in His first coming). Because while they were shouting about kingship and deliverance from Rome, something far older is unfolding underneath the surface. On the very day “the Passover lambs” were being chosen in homes across Israel, Yahweh God was presenting His Lamb in the open; “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” - John 1:29. But the crowd was NOT thinking about lambs …they are thinking about power, about overthrow, about visible victory. Their expectations were shaped by oppression, and they were looking for relief that looks like strength! And, then there is the detail that should have reframed everything - if they had slowed down long enough to see it.

What about the donkey….? “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your King is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey…’” - Matthew 21:5. This is NOT improvisation - this was prophecy being fulfilled with precision; “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion… ...behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is He, humble and mounted on a donkey…” - Zechariah 9:9. In the Ancient World, kings rode horses when they came to wage war! Horses communicated, strength, force, conquest! However, a donkey communicated something entirely different …it signalled “peace, humility, and intentional restraint.” Yeshua (Jesus) is NOT hiding His identity; He is declaring it in a way that aligns perfectly with Scripture. But the declaration does not match the expectation. And that mismatch is everything. The crowd sees “a king” …but they expect a conqueror. He came as both, but NOT in the order they wanted. 

And then, just like in Exodus, the Lamb remains among the people… For the next several days, He does not retreat. The Lord stays in the city …He teaches openly …He is questioned, challenged …and examined by every group that holds influence. “By what authority are You doing these things?” - Matthew 21:23. The religious leaders probed Him. The Pharisees tested Him. The Sadducees tried to trap Him. Every conversation, every confrontation, every public moment becomes part of a larger process that looks remarkably familiar!

The Lamb was being examined in full view of the people… And at the end of it, even those who wanted Him gone could NOT produce a legitimate charge that holds; “I find no guilt in Him.” - John 19:6. The requirement of Exodus stands. The lamb must be without blemish, and this Lamb was. Not symbolically, but demonstrably. He had been seen, questioned, pressed, and still NO fault stood. Yet something begins to shift in the crowd. The same voices that cried out in expectation began to cool when their expectations were NOT met. The deliverance they wanted did not arrive in the form they demanded, and when that happens, people do not always adjust their understanding …and then sometimes, they turn on what they once celebrated!

The timeline does NOT break, though as it holds with precision. The Lamb was chosen on the 10^th-Day of Nissan (Abib/Aviv). He was present, visible, and examined for four days. And then, at the appointed time, He was given… “He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter…” - Isaiah 53:7. What the crowd thought was “a coronation” was actually a presentation! What looked like the rise of “a king” was the setting apart of a Sacrifice. The palm branches were real, the cries were sincere, but the understanding was incomplete. Passover was NEVER ultimately about Political freedom …it was about “deliverance” from something deeper …something that could NOT be overturned by force or policy. It required substitution - It required blood and it required a Lamb!

And on the very day families across Israel were bringing lambs into their homes to be examined, Yahweh God brought His Lamb – Yeshua (Jesus) into the city to be seen by everyone! Nothing was hidden! Nothing was accidental and every detail was aligned with what had already been spoken! The donkey was NOT a small detail - it was a declaration. The Lamb of God, Yeshua (Jesus) did NOT come first to conquer by force …but to submit to the will of the Father …and He did not come first to take a Throne, but to become the Lamb who makes the Throne accessible. And that is the tension of that day. They were celebrating "a king" while unknowingly selecting a Sacrifice! They were "waving symbols of victory" …while standing in the middle of a process that would lead to the CROSS of Calvary. Because what they thought would be the moment of "Political triumph" was actually the moment the Lamb was chosen. And what they expected to look like POWER had always been pointing to something far more costly… ...and far more complete.

That leaves us with questions we cannot avoid, because it is very easy to stand at a distance from that road, waving branches in hindsight, and say we would have understood… "But they had Scripture. They had the Words. They had the moment. And still… ...they missed Him?" So, the question is NOT what they saw. It is what we see today!  Are we recognizing the Lamb of God – the Messiah Yeshua (Jesus)…or are we also still looking for "a conqueror" - that fits our expectations? Are we welcoming "the King" that He actually is …or the version we have quietly built in our own image? Because Passover is NOT just about remembering deliverance. It is about preparing for it. It is about bringing the Lamb close enough to examine and allowing Him to examine us; "Search me, O YHWH, and know my heart; try me and know my thoughts." - Psalm 139:23. What expectations are we still holding onto that keep us from recognizing Him clearly? What parts of us are still shouting "save us now" …but only on our terms?

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