Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” (Zechariah 9:9 ESV)
Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on a donkey’s colt amid the acclamations of many was an open declaration that He was the Messiah. According to Zechariah, this is exactly how the Messiah would appear. Many among the Jews that day knew this prophecy and knew exactly what Jesus was saying. Their King came lowly, riding on a donkey. Perhaps to us this may seem comical. We would expect a King or ruler to be a powerful man riding a white horse, a drawn sword in his upraised right arm at the head of a mighty army.
But to the Jews there was nothing comical about what Jesus did, because they were expecting the Messiah to come just in this way. Yet their concept of the Messiah was not a man of humility as the prophecy tells us, but a man who would deliver them through military conquest and throw off the yoke of oppression by slaughtering his enemies.
When Jesus entered in triumph on that Palm Sunday, he came as the King of Peace, to bring peace between God and man. He gives us this peace through his own self, through His sacrificial death on the cross. Through Jesus we who are of different nations and ethnic groups are united as one family. We are first and foremost citizens of the Kingdom of God, not of any earthly one. Our loyalty, our allegiance is to Jesus above all else.