Real Life Radio

Jack Hibbs: It's amazing how human nature never changes. Lie about the truth, suppress the truth, do anything but believe the truth. It's human nature. It happened today; it happened then. That doesn't stop God.

David J: Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibbs. I'm David J, thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God's word, the Bible.

US strikes, Israel on alert, Iran escalating. Does anyone else feel like today's headlines sound straight out of Bible prophecy? Jesus told us these days would come, not so we'd panic, but so we'd be prepared.

That's why we created the Prophecy Pack, understanding God's plan for the future. A practical guide to help you live ready. Don't just watch the news; understand it through God's word. Get your Prophecy Pack now for a gift of any amount at jackhibbs.com.

On today's special Easter Passion week edition of Real Life Radio, Pastor Jack now with his message called "Jesus is the King." We're glad you could join us today. This Passion week of Easter has so many emotions tied to it, doesn't it?

The death and resurrection of Jesus takes us from grief to joy over the fact that he rose again from that grave as the King of Israel and the Savior of the world. So today, Pastor Jack teaches that Passion week is a week filled with real events, but a divided crowd of witnesses.

Israel was under Roman occupation, but the 400 years of silence from God was about to end and a hope in Christ was about to spring forth. Now with his Passion week message called "Jesus is the King," here's pastor and Bible teacher, Jack Hibbs.

Jack Hibbs: Well, listen, this is Pastor Jack and I'm excited to be speaking to our weekday audience. You are a different group of people from our weekend listeners, but I'm going to attempt by God's grace to bring you all together at this very special season.

Our Passion week 2026 begins this series, "Live." It's all about the Passion week of the Lord Jesus Christ, our very Messiah. We're going to be talking about his triumphant entry into Jerusalem as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, and of course, his sacrificial death upon the cross and his glorious resurrection from the dead.

It's going to be a great time together. We are going to kick it off. Here's the fun part about it. You are our weekday listeners, but we want to pull you on over to be with our weekend listeners as well. So our series started yesterday on our weekend program that you can listen to at jackhibbs.com.

Now, don't go anywhere because if you missed that, don't worry, today's program stands on its own. The exciting part is that we actually have some weekend listeners listening today with us as well. So let's welcome them and let's get into it.

David J: Pastor Jack, I gotta tell you, I'm excited to be here as we're going into this Easter season. Palm Sunday is one of the most dramatic moments in the life of Jesus. The crowds are shouting and the city is buzzing, and something historic is happening. In this message, you talk about how Palm Sunday wasn't just a celebration, it was actually the announcement that the promised Messiah had arrived. So tell us what was really happening the day that Jesus entered Jerusalem.

Jack Hibbs: That question is one of the most profound questions that every single human being must consider. I beg of you to consider because it's actually down to a science. I mean that sincerely. The book of Daniel tells us that Israel's Messiah would ride into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey that's never been ridden before. That's Zechariah 9.

Daniel tells you down to the day of the Messiah's first arrival to the nation as the sacrificial King. What's amazing about that is Daniel chapter nine, the timeline he gives us can literally be studied as a science. In fact, the great Sir Isaac Newton did that very thing. He studied Daniel's prophecies, especially Daniel chapter nine, and broke that down and would show you that Israel should have known the very day.

Well, guess what? Jesus says, "Israel, if you had only known this is your day." They didn't know, at least many of them didn't know, because of neglect. I gotta tell you, Davey, far too many of us miss so much of what God wants to do because we neglect his word.

David J: What I love is that you mentioned that if the crowd had stayed silent, which they didn't of course, Jesus said that the stones themselves would cry out. What does that say about who Jesus really is?

Jack Hibbs: That's absolutely awesome to think. Jesus is hinting that if you guys don't want to get with the program, you should know that all of creation is already with the program. To the point that these rocks, I don't know what was going to happen if what he's saying would have happened, rocks of all shapes and sizes would have started somehow praising the Lord.

Is that an earthquake? Are those little voices and big voices? What was that? Would they rumble together? I don't know, but God cannot exaggerate. So I almost wish Jesus would have said, "Shh, everybody. Everybody be quiet for a moment. Let's hear this rock concert."

David J: What's really interesting is that some people in the crowd are praising him of course, while others are already opposed to him. And that divided reaction still exists today.

Jack Hibbs: I think it's always going to exist. In fact, Jesus said concerning the last days, "Don't be surprised if people hate you because they hated me first." Isn't that amazing? Look around right now at this time of the year, at this season.

The world is doing everything it can to try to mask and hide the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In fact, there's television channels right now. I won't name them because I don't want to get sued by some of these PBS-type channels and stuff, but here's what really happened at the tomb. Jesus didn't really die. All these things, rather than believing God's word for what it says, they're fighting against it. It's never going to end. It's always going to be that way. Let's get into it.

Jesus Christ was the promised King throughout all of scripture. Where is Jesus promised to be our King, the King in scripture? Genesis 3:15. The Bible says, and this church knows it well, God's first prophetic promise is that of salvation. God speaks to Lucifer, to Satan, and says, "I will put enmity between you and the woman," that is Eve and her offspring, "between your seed," that is Satan's offspring, "and her offspring, her seed."

And that word "seed" in Hebrew speaks of a divine coming. "He will bruise your head or crush your head, and you will crush or bruise his heel." That's a fascinating statement. My Jewish friends, listen up. According to Moses, Genesis 3:15, the Messiah of the world, the King of kings and the Savior of all mankind, would somehow figure it out.

Verse 15, Genesis 3, he would somehow come into this world in such a way that he had to be born. Sound familiar? I know it's not Christmas. We'll get to that months from now. Whoever this is, he's got to come into the world. He's got to come from the seed of woman through a human.

Oh, and by the way, what does he accomplish? He crushes Satan's head. He bruises Satan's head. Who could that possibly be? Think of it. I'm being sarcastic now, just getting started with the sarcastic stuff. But Satan will crush his heel, meaning Satan will inflict pain upon him. One is a survivable wound; the other is not survivable. And when Christ came into the world, his crucifixion and his glorious resurrection crushed the head of Satan's power.

And you think about that for a moment. No longer can Satan grab you as it were by the face and lead you into destruction. By Christ, you have now the power to reject or to refuse or to fight off the wicked one. The only way that you could wind up in hell today is if you refuse the love of God through Christ Jesus.

That's pretty amazing. Scripture says in Ephesians chapter one, verse four, it says, "Just as he, that is God, chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy without blame before him in love." Watch this. "Having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ himself, according to the good pleasure of his will." Wow.

Verse nine: "Having made known to us the mystery of his will." That means you can know what God wants. It's no secret. "According to his good pleasure which he purposed in himself." Verse 10: "That in the dispensation of the fullness of times, he might gather together in one all things in Christ." That's a deep statement. That's awesome.

Point is, God had his salvation predetermined before man was ever brought into this world. God knew. And that great deliverance comes through the coming of the great King. And that's what this day is all about. You read a moment ago where the crowd shouted and the hosannas and they brought their palm branches, and we'll read more of that as we go on.

The Bible tells us in Matthew chapter 21, verse four, "All this was done." This is great. Are you guys listening? All this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet. So now we're talking about Bible prophecy. This is important. This is Matthew, eyewitness account, folks. If you choose to believe this or not, that's on you. But you are reading an actual document that's been preserved for 2,000 years by an eyewitness.

If you won't believe him, then why will you believe any post that you read this morning on the internet? And we are so dumb. We say, "Did you see that?" By the way, I just found out there's a guy—I'm telling you this every week—but every week we're getting more and more information. There's some guy that's me out there. He's got a huge ministry going on online and it's me.

But it's not me. I didn't do it. He's assumed my identity completely. And he's saying things—it's not me—and people are saying, "Jack, why are you saying that?" I never said it. And then they go, "Oh, yeah, sure, now you're lying to me." An imposter. Listen, think of this. This is eyewitness account. We as a culture are so quick to believe something that somebody posted, that somebody posted, that somebody posted.

And here's an eyewitness account. The question is, will you believe the eyewitness account? And by the way, there's other eyewitnesses that watched the same event; they wrote the same things down. And so it says, "All this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet saying," verse five, "Tell the daughter of Zion." Where is Zion? Jerusalem, Israel. "Behold, your King is coming to you, lowly and sitting on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey." That's a strange prophecy, don't you think? What a thing to say.

Hey Israel, you want to recognize your King that's coming, the one that was promised in Genesis 3:15? Sure do. Well, here he comes. He'll be riding on a donkey that nobody's ever ridden on before. You say, "Well, is that it?" No, that's one of the hundreds of prophecies, friends. What is Matthew referring to? According to Matthew, this is what Matthew believed. Matthew believed Zechariah chapter nine, verse nine. The question is, will you believe it?

"Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, your King is coming to you. He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey." What detail. This was written over 600 years before Jesus was born. Every synagogue had this verse in the Bible. Am I yelling?

Lisa no, Lisa's so good. Lisa goes, "You need to calm down. You yell at people. There's people here in the splash zone." No, I get so excited about this. I just, you know what? I want you to be a believer. I want you to follow Jesus. I want you to follow Jesus. Man, he is so good.

John chapter 12, verse 15, John 12:15 says, "Don't be afraid, people of Jerusalem. Look, your King is coming, riding on a donkey's colt." His disciples didn't understand at the time that this was a fulfillment of prophecy. But after Jesus entered into his glory—that is resurrected—they remembered what had happened and realized that these things had been written about him.

So listen, if they got it back then, and if they understood it back then, why don't we doubly get it now? Doubly meaning this: if Zechariah said it, and then John said it, and Matthew said it, and Luke said it, and Mark said it, and the Roman government said it—the Arco Volume. You ought to look it up. A-R-C-O, Arco Volume. Totally secular.

All about Jesus. And the scandal of the Roman Empire and how they dealt with Jesus's crucifixion and resurrection, because it was totally legal. It was totally legal. They were never supposed to have conducted a crucifixion based on the evidence of the scribes and Pharisees. In other words, it was the kangaroo court of all time. That said, we now have more reason to believe than those who back then, and yet they got it. We must get it.

Also this, church family, is number two to this, and that is that it was the prerogative of God. Prerogative meaning it was the place of God. It was the practice of God. It was God's sovereign place to reveal these things to us. For example, the Bible says, "I will save you," says the Lord. God says that. That's his prerogative. The prerogative of God is when he says, "I will."

So when you say something where you announce, "I will do this" or "I will do that," you are, assuming you can do it, talking about your own prerogative. This is in my scope. So listen, it's like when parents say to the kid, "Put that down. We're not getting it." And the kid goes, "Why?" You could say to them, "That's not your prerogative; it's mine."

But I want it. But I don't want you to have it. And you're not going to get it. And that's their first step of learning how to live in California. The government says, right? Prerogative. You have the sole custody of whatever is being decided. And this is the prerogative of God. Think about his nature. This is his prerogative. The nature of Christ.

Psalm 68, verse four. This is God's prerogative: "Sing to God," why? Because he's God. "Sing praises to his name." Why should I? "Because he is the Lord. Extol him who rides on the clouds." Okay, riding on clouds is awesome enough, but it's because of who he is. It's not that he rides on clouds. That's awesome. But you praise him for who he is. You don't praise him because he's a cloud rider. You praise him because he's God and he makes the clouds his chariots, the scripture says. Love that.

David J: You're listening to Real Life with Pastor Jack Hibbs. To learn more about this ministry or to catch up on some previous episodes, go to jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. And now, let's get back to today's message. Once again, here's Pastor Jack.

Jack Hibbs: By his name, Yah. Everybody mark it. That is the Hebrew name of the God of the Bible. Yah. That name means salvation. And rejoice before him. He's the only one in all of the universe, in all of time and space, that we are to rejoice before him because he alone is God. That's his prerogative. And it's beautiful.

So when God says, "I will be with you," the Bible tells us in Isaiah chapter 43, verse two—listen to this—"When you pass through the waters, I will be with you." Friends, listen, are you going through the waters right now in life? In fact, I want to meet some of you who are not; we're all going to go home with you. "And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you."

You say, "Well, that's ridiculous. There's been believers that have had to suffer floods and water and fire and all this stuff." Yes, yes, yes, of course. You're thinking about the physical stuff. He's talking about the stuff that matters in life, and in real life, and for forever life. God says, "I'm going to be with you. You're going to make it. You will make it."

Are you thinking today you're not going to make it? Are you thinking that God has brought you this far and he's going to leave you? He's not going to leave you. Do you feel like he's going to leave you? Do you feel like he's left you? Listen, he hasn't left you. In fact, the people whom God is not involved in their life would never even think a thought like that.

Are you right now concerned that maybe Jesus has left you? How about this? Let's push it hard. What if you're sitting here today and you're thinking, "I think Jesus has left me"? Does that concern you? Well, listen, cheer up, because that would mean he's turning to you right now and saying, "Listen, I didn't leave you." Yeah, you got it. "You left me." Who's he saying that to? Only his kids.

Listen, when a parent calls up another family down the street and says, "Send Johnny home." God might be picking up the phone right now and saying to whatever world you've been wandering in, "Send Johnny home now." Believer, listen, it's time for you to come back home quick. Unbeliever, it's time for you to stop believing and find out that there's someone on the other end of the line.

His name is Almighty God. He's revealed himself in the Son of God, Jesus Christ, and he is the King. And he's awesome. He'll never leave you. Would you like to live life, no matter what's coming, knowing God will never leave me? Whatever's coming. Life or death, suffering or freedom, pain or joy, God says, "I'll never leave you." Where are you going to find a better thing than that? You cannot, because he alone lives. He's the King.

And then thirdly, under this, the coming of the King, is that it was the place of Jesus Christ. It was the place of Jesus Christ to be the King. And we saw there in Luke and we read it a moment ago in chapter 19, verse 35. Let's just refresh it: "Then they brought him to Jesus," the little donkey, and they threw their clothes on the colt.

So imagine this little sweet, cute little donkey and there's now beauty, because people would have dressed up for these festive events that are at the temple. This poor little donkey is just being now covered with beautiful tapestries and quilt-type of things. "And as he went, they spread their clothes on the road. And when he was now drawing near to the descent of the Mount of Olives," if you've been on the Mount of Olives as many of us have, you can see perfectly looking down on the Temple Mount.

You can look across the Kidron Valley and there's the temple. "The whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works or miracles they had seen saying, 'Blessed is the King.'" Friends, go back in time 2,000 years ago in the crowd. The crowd says, "Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest."

Folks, that's what they said. That's what they—they knew the Bible, they saw what was going on, and they said, "This is it. Get your garments out. Get the palm branches out. Get the leafy branches from trees. Throw them down on the roadway." Remember, if you read all four of those gospels, you get the full picture.

This is what was transpiring. You'll hear it a few times before we end. They lay down their clothes, they lay down the branches, they're all shouting, "Hosanna, Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord." They're also shouting, "Save now, Son of David! Deliver us, Son of David!" And the Pharisees were going nuts over this because everything they feared had come to pass. He is the King. We can't let that happen.

Isn't it amazing how human nature never changes? Lie about the truth, suppress the truth, do anything but believe the truth. It's human nature. It happened today; it happened then. That doesn't stop God. I love that. In Second Peter, chapter one, verse 16, the Bible says, "For we did not follow cunningly devised fables."

I can't believe the Bible's a bunch of stories. Well, you and National Geographic ought to—only problem is, friend, you're trying to hide behind a story. You'll even use the word "story" as some sort of justification for you to not believe. I just want you to know that your whole unbelief is based upon a very, very sad story. The reason why you don't believe him is because you've made up a story.

God's salvation, God's Bible, God's message is not a story. If it was a story, when Peter is arrested in Rome and he's sentenced to death because of the preaching of the gospel, and they're going to crucify Peter upside down, which they did in Rome, don't you think Peter would have said, "Excuse me! All right, I'll be honest. It was all a story." I'm telling you right now.

Somebody may deny Christ out of fear. Remember Peter did that? Peter denied Jesus. But did he believe it? When Peter said about Jesus, "I've never known him. I don't know who you're talking about," did Peter believe that? No, he was lying to save his own skin. But in time, and how has time been working on you? That it's time to confess the truth.

David J: Pastor and Bible teacher, Jack Hibbs, here on Real Life Radio with his special Easter Passion week message called "Jesus is the King." Thanks for being with us today and Happy Easter to you. Our prayer is that in celebrating Passion week, you'll come to realize the urgency to come to Christ knowing that he is the only way to eternal life. And we'll continue on the next edition of Real Life Radio.

Ever felt like something's missing in your life? Maybe you've been searching for answers, for peace, or a sense of purpose. You know the truth is those longings are there because you were created to know God. At jackhibbs.com, there's a tab called "Know God." It's designed to help you discover what it truly means to have a relationship with God.

This isn't about religion; it's about understanding who God is and why he loves you and how you can find hope and forgiveness through Jesus Christ. The page breaks it down in a simple, clear way, answering common questions and guiding you through the steps of faith. It's a great place to explore and reflect, whether you're just curious or you're ready to make that next step.

So don't miss out on the most important relationship you'll ever have. Visit that tab called "Know God" at jackhibbs.com and start your journey today. That's jackhibbs.com, because knowing God changes everything in your life for the better. Take that next step. Explore and reflect at the "Know God" section at jackhibbs.com.

Hey, thank you again so much for listening. And if you'd like to hear or see more of what we do here, you can always go to jackhibbs.com for all the latest on what's going on with this ministry. And please, if you're ever in the Southern California area, come see us at Calvary Chapel Chino Hills. We'd love to see you there in person.

It has been so good to be with you today, and I pray you find yourself in the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ. See you on the next episode. This program is made possible by the generous contributions of you, our listeners. Visit us at jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com. Until next time, Pastor Jack Hibbs and all of us here at Real Life Radio wish for you solid and steady growth in Christ and in his word. We'll see you next time here on Real Life Radio.