I love this time of year. Easter season is such a joyous season of the year and it's

privileged to be sharing the word with you this morning. Today we're celebrating the day

called Palm Sunday which is the day of Jesus triumphal entry into Jerusalem during the week

of his crucifixion and death and in case some of you are wondering why we call this Palm Sunday

it's because the crowds who came out to meet Jesus from Jerusalem did so carrying palm branches

which they either waved in the air or laid in his path as he came into the city. We're going to be

looking at this event in some considerable historical detail this morning. So I want to invite

you to put on your thinking caps so that you'll be able to follow along as we look at this event.

We have in the New Testament two independent accounts of Jesus triumphal entry into Jerusalem,

one in the gospel of Mark and the other in the gospel of John. Now historians realize that this

is very important. If you have two independent records of an event then that is highly likely

that that event is actually historical. Marcus Borg who is a prominent New Testament scholar explains

it this way. He says the logic is straightforward. If a tradition or story appears in an early source

and in another independent source then not only is it early but it is also unlikely to have been

made up. Now of course as Christians we believe that the New Testament is inspired by God and therefore

we know wholly apart from historical evidence that it's not made up. Still it's nice to know I think

that when you consider the gospels even as ordinary historical records they pass the tests

of reliability which even secular historians use and this can strengthen our confidence in their

truth and it also gives us a way of demonstrating their truth to our non-Christian friends.

Now in the case of the triumphal entry this event is as I said related in one of our earliest

sources in the New Testament namely the gospel of Mark and then also independently in John's gospel.

Moreover although Matthew and Luke's accounts of the triumphal entry are to a good degree dependent

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