For those of you who are commemorating Palm Sunday (in Western Christianity, April 5, and in Eastern Christianity, April 12), this is the day where Christians remember the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem a few days before his arrest and crucifixion.

The Gospel of Matthew (Matthew chapter 21) depicts Jesus as riding into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey. But Matthew’s account also mentions the presence of a second animal: a colt. The colt (foal) was probably the child of the donkey. As best as we can tell, Jesus was probably riding on the donkey with the colt walking along side of both of them.

Matthew’s story tells us that the disciples of Jesus placed garments on both animals. Yet Jesus, like most of us, would find it difficult if not impossible to ride two different animals at the same time. One possibility is that Jesus switched from riding the donkey to riding the colt at some point in his procession into Jerusalem. Another possibility presents how the young colt was prepared with garments, as was its mother; yet the younger animal was probably not ridden by Jesus or by anyone else on that first Palm Sunday. I would tend to agree with this second interpretation of the story. And with this interpretation comes a possible symbolism.

The two animals, the donkey and her colt, I would contend, are symbols of two generations. The donkey that Jesus was riding on represents what God is doing now. Yet the work of what God is doing now usually find its true fulfillment in the next generation. This is where God works “trans-generationally”: From spiritual fathers to spiritual sons, who in turn become spiritual fathers for a new generation of spiritual children.

What God is doing now (the donkey) will be completed in the next generation (the colt). Something to think about on this Palm Sunday.