"As Samuel poured oil on the head of Saul and anointed him to be captain over the Lord's inheritance........as he also poured oil on David and anointed him in the midst of his brethren.....and as Zadok took an horn of oil and anointed Solomon........so Mary of Bethany poured costly spikenard from her alabaster box upon the head of Jesus, and also anointed his feet, so that the next day, the ten thousands of Israel might acclaim him King and shout Hosanna to his name" (Bruce R. McConkie, Mortal Messiah Book 3, p 327)
As Jesus left his beloved village of Bethany and approached Jerusalem, He stood on the Mount of Olives, overlooking the splendor of the city and wept. As he wept, he lamented, "If thou hadst known...the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes" (Luke 19:42) for the people were 'divided into conflicting and contending sects, each professing more holiness and righteousness than the other and all closing their eyes to the truth' (The Life and Teachings of Jesus and His Apostles, p. 140). After all that He had done, all that was left to Him was to weep for the city which was too late to save.
Jesus entered Jerusalem riding 'lowly, upon an ass', not a symbol of humility but the symbol of Jewish royalty (McConkie Mortal Messiah Book 3, p 338), for it was His right to do so as the descendant of King David to whom the throne truly belonged. As His disciples, 'the children of the kingdom' (JST Matt. 21:13) shouted hosannas to His name and proclaimed Him king for the first and only time of His mortal ministry, Jesus entered the Herodian splendor of the city. Not even the accolades which they heaped upon Him would have comforted Him as He contemplated their impending doom. What a strange Messianic triumph that was. On one hand they hailed Him as the one who could save but on the other they refused the salvation. With hope of deliverance from Roman rule pulsating in the heart of the glittering, golden Jerusalem, with its' imperial mantle of proud towers, a city regarded as a wonder of the world, who could have foreseen its' destruction? Just one, the one who sat upon 'the colt of an ass'.
Following His triumphal entry into Jerusalem, Jesus once again cleansed the temple of the 'den of thieves', the chief priests who saw themselves as the guardians not only of the temple but of 'the whole structure of Jewish religion. They glutted themselves on the profits from temple business, and so the temple was not just the source of their favoured social position (which they coveted so jelously) but also the source of their incomes - more, their fortunes' (The Life and Teachings of Jesus and His Apostles, p. 143). . During the first cleansing of the temple, Jesus referred to it as 'my Father's house' (John 2:16). This time, upholding his kingly welcome into the city, Jesus referred to it as 'my house' (Matt 21:13). One can only imagine the seething in the vengeful hearts of those who plotted His death upon hearing such words for Jesus' declaration of His messiahship was pure blasphemy to their ears. When the purging was over, those who accepted His declaration and believed Him to be the promised Messiah gathered around Him to receive the fruits of His ministry. There, in His house, surrounded by those who believed in Him Jesus once again healed the blind and the lame, an exquisite symbol of the spiritually blind and lame He came to save.
Jerusalem paid dearly for rejecting and crucifying their God. As they left Jerusalem, Jesus gave the Olivet Discourse to His disciples where He predicted the sacking of Jerusalem by saying that not 'one stone will be left upon another' (21:6) and that the desolation of which Daniel spoke (Daniel 9:27) would be fulfilled. Jesus also told them that this destruction would come in their day and warned that the righteous should flee when they see the signs of its' coming. Less than 40 years after His death Titus descended on Jerusalem with his Roman legions and leveled the city to the ground but not before Jerusalem had endured unimaginable suffering through oppression and famine which saw women eating their own children as prophesied by Moses (Deut 28) and witnessed by Josephus (The New Complete Works of Josephus, The Jewish War, p 893). The destruction was so brutal that 'hunger exceeded human endurance; blood flowed in the streets, destruction made desolate the temple; 1,100,000 Jews were slaughtered; Jerusalem was ploughed as a field; and a remnant of a once mighty nation was scattered to the ends of the earth. The Jewish nation died, impaled on Roman spears, at the hands of Gentile overlords' (McConkie, DNTC, 1:644-45). Only the righteous were spared, the saints who dwelt in Jerusalem at the time had heeded Jesus' warning and had fled, guided by revelation, to Pella in Perea.
Why is it important for us to know about the destruction of Jerusalem? Because the destruction which will befall the wicked at the time of His Second Coming will be akin to what the Jewish nation endured in 70 AD. History will repeat itself because the world is still rejecting the Saviour, stoning the prophets and disregarding the word of God. During His Olivet Discourse Jesus spoke of the last days and the signs of His coming: "All the desolation and waste which attended the former destruction of Jerusalem is but prelude to the coming siege......In the coming re-enactment of this 'abomination of desolation', the whole world will be at war, Jerusalem will be the center of the conflict, every modern weapon will be used, and in the midst of the siege the Son of Man shall come, setting his foot upon the mount of Olives and fighting the battle of his saints (Zech. 12:1-9). Speaking of these final battles which shall accompany His return, the Lord says: 'I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city'. However, the final end of the conflict shall be different this time than it was anciently. 'Then shall the Lord go forth', the prophetic record says, 'and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle. And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives....and the Lord shall be king over all the earth' (Zech. 14). (McConkie, DNTC, 1:659-60)
Jesus wept when He reflected on the destruction of Jerusalem. Will He lament over us as He did over Jerusalem before he unveils His face? Will He weep over His saints who had abandoned their covenants and gone after the pleasures of the world? Will He sorrow over the lost sheep that have not been found? Will His heart break over those who profess to know Him but are found with empty oil lamps and regrets they are too late to rectify? When the comfort zone is ended it will be too late to put up the necessary defenses and watchtowers against the evils of the world. The day of preparation will be past and some of us will be found wanting. We live in the day preceding His return, the day of wars and rumors of wars, famines, pestilences and earthquakes, the day when iniquity is abounding causing the love of men to wax cold. These are all Saviour's predictions found in the scriptures. He has described His Second Coming as 'the great and dreadful day of the Lord' (D&C 110:16), dreadful for those who are in the clutches of iniquity but great for those who are seeking after righteousness and who are waiting with anticipation for the day of the Lord when all His promises shall be fulfilled. The question begs to be asked, are you scared or are you excited?
When He comes again, He will come as the Lord of Lords and King of Kings and He will seek out His own that He might dry the tears from their eyes and embrace them in the arms of His love. A God of power, a God of majesty, a God of glory, but most of all, a God of love.
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