Though unmoved by the cunning effort of the Pharisees to get Him over from Herod’s jurisdiction into Judea, despite their threatening attitude, the winter Feast of Dedication finds Him again in Jerusalem walking in one of the temple areas.  Instantly He is surrounded by a group of these Jerusalem Jews who, with an air of apparent earnest inquiry, keep prodding Him with the request to be told plainly if He is really the Christ.  His patient reply brings a storm of stones—­almost.  Held in check for a while by an invisible power, or by the power of His presence shown under such circumstances so often, again they attempt to seize His person, and again He seems invisibly to hold their hands back, as He quietly passes on His way out of their midst.

Then comes the stupendous raising of Lazarus, which brings faith in Him to great numbers, and results in the formal official decision of the national council to secure His death.  He is declared a fugitive with a price set upon His head.  Anybody knowing of His whereabouts must report the fact to the authorities.  This decides Him not to show Himself openly among them.  In a few weeks the pilgrims are crowding Jerusalem for the Passover.  Jesus’ name is on every tongue.  The rumor that He was over the hills in Bethany takes a crowd over there, not simply to see Him, but to see the resurrected Lazarus.  Then it was determined to kill Lazarus off, too.

That tremendous last week now begins.  Jesus is seen to be the one masterly figure in the week’s events.  In comparison with His calm steady movements, these leaders run scurrying around, here and there, like headless hens.  The week begins with the most public, formal presentation of Himself in a kingly fashion to the nation.  It is their last chance.  How wondrously patient and considerate is this Jesus!  And how sublimely heroic!  Into the midst of those men ravenous for His blood He comes.  Seated with fine, unconscious majesty on a kingly beast, surrounded by ever-increasing multitudes loudly singing and speaking praises to God, over paths bestrewed with garments and branches of living green, slowly He mounts the hill road toward the city.  At a turn in the road all of a sudden the city lies spread out before Him.  “He saw the city and wept over it.”

    “He sat upon the ass’s colt and rode
    Toward Jerusalem.  Beside Him walked
    Closely and silently the faithful twelve,
    And on before Him went a multitude
    Shouting hosannas, and with eager hands
    Strewing their garments thickly in the way. 
    Th’ unbroken foal beneath Him gently stepped,
    Tame as its patient dam; and as the song
    Of ‘Welcome to the Son of David’ burst
    Forth from a thousand children, and the leaves
    Of the waving branches touched its silken ears,
    It turned its wild eye for a moment back,
    And then, subdued by an invisible hand,
    Meekly trod onward with its slender feet.