Palm Sunday, The Golden Gate and Prophecy

Below is a Re-Post from Last Year 

for Palm Sunday:

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Today is Palm Sunday, the day Jesus rode into Jerusalem through the East Gate on the back of a young colt / donkey.  You are probably familiar with the story, if not, see my post:  A Prophecy Fullfilled

I have recently been reading about the history of this particular gate.  I never would have thought there could be such history, and even prophecy related to a gate of stone!

 The Golden gate is located on the east walls of the old city of Jerusalem, leading to the temple mount. It is regarded as a Holy site for all faiths - Jewish (arrival of the Messiah) and Christian (entrance of Jesus on Palm Sunday) and Muslim (site of future resurrection). 

It is known by many names other than the Golden Gate. It has also been called the Gate of Mercy and the Gate of Eternal Life.

 The gate has two doorways. The southern part is known as the Gate of Mercy, and the north part as the Gate of Repentance. Centuries ago, Jews prayed opposite this gate, facing the Temple. They began praying at the Gate of Repentance before proceeding to the Gate of Mercy to ask God for mercy. 

The Muslims in the Middle Ages named it as the Gate of Eternal Life. They also called this gate the Mercy Gate. According to the Islamic Koran, the just will pass through this gate on the Day of Judgment.

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Prophecy:   God gave Ezekiel a supernatural vision of this gate which Ezekiel reported :

 Ezekiel 43:1 “Afterward he brought me to the gate, the gate that faces toward the east. And behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east“.

 Ezekiel 43:4; “And the glory of the Lord came into the temple by the way of the gate which faces toward the east.“

God revealed this truth to Nehemiah:   

Nehemiah 3:29 "...the gate that looketh toward the east: And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east." 

This was of course, Palm Sunday when the Lord came to the Temple through the East Gate.

Did you know that Daniel predicted exactly when this very day would happen?!

Daniel 9:25

“Know therefore and understand,

That from the going forth of the command

To restore and build Jerusalem

Until Messiah the Prince,

There shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks;

The street shall be built again, and the wall,

Even in troublesome times.

Sixty nine weeks is the Jewish way of saying 483 years. 

According to this prophecy, a decree would be issued that would allow the Jews to rebuild the wall.Several decrees were issued concerning the rebuilding of Jerusalem after the captivity but only one concerned the wall. This decree was issued by Artaxerxes and is one of the best known dates in history.

Sir Robert Anderson and  Dr. Harold Hoehne have meticulously worked out this prophecy and both conclude that it was fulfilled on the very day Jesus entered Jerusalem, through the Eastern Gate, in His Triumphal Entry, 483 years, to the day, after the decree was made!

God further revealed to Ezekiel that after the Messiah came through the Eastern Gate, it would later be sealed shut:

 Ezekiel 44:1-3 “Then He brought me back to the outer gate which faces toward the east, but it was shut. And the Lord said to me, This gate shall be shut; it shall not be opened, and no man shall enter by it, because the Lord God of Israel has entered by it; therefore it shall be shut.

This Eastern Gate is closed when it was walled up by it's Muslim conquerors (the Ottoman Turks) in 1530 A.D.   And it is still closed today.

While this may have been purely for defensive reasons that the Muslims sealed the gate, in Jewish tradition since this is the gate through which the Messiah will enter Jerusalem, it's believed that they sealed off the Golden Gate to prevent the Messiah's entrance.  

The Muslims also built a cemetery in front of the gate, in the belief that the precursor to the Messiah, Elijah, would not be able to pass through the Golden Gate and thus the Messiah would not come because  a Jewish Rabbi is not permitted to enter a cemetery. 

I think it is fascinating that there is not only so much history to this structure---but it also clearly plays a huge roll in our future.....

Read more:

The Eastern Gate and Prophecy

Wikipedia Golden Gate
Before It's News
The Best Reference on the Golden Gate