(Mt 21.12—17; Mk 11.15—19; Lk 19.45—48)
13 The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15 Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” 17 His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” 18 The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20 The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21 But he was speaking of the temple of his body. 22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.
23 When he was in Jerusalem during the Passover festival, many believed in his name because they saw the signs that he was doing. 24 But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people 25 and needed no one to testify about anyone; for he himself knew what was in everyone.
Deleting files
Funeral
Yesterday, I went to a funeral of one of my relatives in New Brunswick. She also was from Burma, but through marriage, she became my cousin-in-law. The poignant part of this funeral, unlike others is that she is the first of my generation to die. She is very rich, very successful as a first generation immigrant from Burma.
The minister revealed in his sermon at the funeral yesterday that her offering to the church was $5,000 a month. Imagine her income. Of course, minister was not crying about the lost, but revealing her faith and commitment that not many people can match.
Her husband cried aloud like a baby. Her mother cried of course. What’s worse than having to burying your own child?! But my thought was occupied by the fact that she is the first, at least one of the first that I am aware of, that died among my generations. It makes me realize that I am no longer young. It makes me sense the mortality of life in a near distance.
When we are young we want to grow. My daughters can’t wait until next birthday. "I will be six next year!" "I am eight years old now!" They are so proud of it. I guess my son look forward to the college age. Or at least the age that he can drive. But now, suddenly at my age, I want to hit the break. Too fast! Oh no, stop!
She was killed by cancer. Each time I heard of cancer, I remember my naive thoughts when I was back in Burma as a young man. When I saw people died of cancer, I thought it should be curable in developed countries like America. After I came to America, I found out that this super power of the world have no power against cancer. Still I thought they would find the cure soon. But, yesterday, I search the Internet about cancer and realize that the medical scientists still have no clue. One of the most popular article about cancer entitle "Cancer: Looking for Simplicity, Finding Complexity."
Cancer cells, or carcinogen, are from originally good cells that grow to fight the problematic cells in the body. It’s part of human immune system, or antibody. But the problem is it doesn’t know when to stop, after it destroy the bad cells it continue to grow and kill the good cells. It is at that point it becomes cancer.
We can see the same problem in the biology of the society. Some of the most destructive forces of the society as we know came out of good intention; for example, Communism. Now when people talks about communism, we mean a bad social system, but do you know that it started out as a good intention? It came out of a social justice movement against the unjust distribution of wealth and prosperity.
But, the problem is that it is unlike the Terminator in the movie that terminates itself when the job is done. Like the cancer cell, it just doesn’t know when to stop and began to destroy the good and healthy elements of the society. As a result the entire society suffers.
The same thing can happen to a church, a religion, or a temple. In today’s scripture reading, we’ve heard that Jesus came into the temple of Jerusalem and he saw a cancer in the temple. He was furious, the scripture says, "In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15 Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!”
See these merchants in the temple court started out with good intention. Each Jewish man was required to attend three annual feasts at the Holy City: Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles (Deut. 16:16). Three times a year all your males shall appear before the Lord your God at the place that he will choose: at the festival of unleavened bread, at the festival of weeks, and at the festival of booths.c They shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed; 17 all shall give as they are able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God that he has given you.
On these events, people come from allover to Jerusalem to attend the festival. For their convenient, and to save time and effort for the outsiders to buy what they need to come to the temple, they open these shops. If you are rich, you offer a cow, and they have clean, kosher cows for you to buy. If you want to offer a lamb, they have lambs there. If you are poor, you can only afford to offer a dove, they have it there.
They also have money changers because most people outside use the Roman money. Remember when the Pharisees challenged Jesus whether they should pay taxes? Jesus asked someone to give him a coin and it has Caesar’s image on it. That means people legally used Roman money. But that money is regarded as unclean, so when you come to the temple, you have exchange your Roman money with the kosher money so that you can offer it.
But like the carcinogen, this good intention didn’t know when to stop. It became to serve people’s greed rather than their service. These shops are setup in the court of the Gentiles. In the temple, there are different sections for different people. If you are not a Jew, you can only enter up to the court for the Gentiles.
This court is for the Gentiles to come to learn about Judaism and for the Jews to share tell them about the one true God. But now the businesses have eaten up healthy elements of the temple, like a cancer. It started out originally with good intention for the convenience of people, but it became a cancer cell in the temple because it didn’t know that it must stop when the purpose of convenience was reached.
Jesus came to destroy the cancer of the temple. The cancer of the temple at that time was a marketplace within the temple. What is the cancer of this place? What is eating up the good elements, the health of this church? That’s something you need to think about.
Since this is the season of Lent. I like the fact that Lent happens to be around spring time. Like spring cleaning, Lent is a time for cleansing our body, and preparing to meet the resurrected Christ. The Bible says that your body is the temple of God? If Jesus were to come to your body, what kind of garbage will he find? What kind of carcinogens have you accumulated that is in the process of carcinogenesis that is becoming a spiritual cancer?
Jesus wants to wipe out the garbage in your body because your body is his temple, are you going to allow Jesus to do it?
Years ago, when we were living in Flashing, NY, we had to occasionally buy those cockroach baits to kill the cockroaches. I told a young girl from my church that I have cockroaches in my apartment, and she said, it because your apartment is dirty. I was sort of offended, and I said, "No it wasn’t dirty!" But she said cockroaches have proven that it was dirty. She doesn’t know my apartment, but she knows the truth about cockroaches; they grow where there is dirty, where there is garbage. If you have more garbage, the mice will join the cockroaches. That’s the fact! She doesn’t know my apartment, she just knows the facts.
Later I found out that those cockroaches climbed up from the apartment downstairs. So I went back and told her that, you know what, it wasn’t my apartment that was dirty it was the apartment downstairs. The cockroaches are like the cancer cells they come to eat the garbage in our body. Then they start to eat the good staff. I would be glad that they just eat the garbage, so that I don’t have to dumb the garbage but make is a charitable contribution to the cockroaches.
The problem is they go ahead and eat the good things, and spread disease, and spread out to the next apartment, then the next apartment, like the cancer cells, spreading out all over the body, eventually destroying our lives. This spring, Jesus wants to clean your body, his temple, so that the cockroaches won’t creep in your body and make his temple cancerous.
How are you going to clean your body?
You need to invite Jesus Christ into your life. If he doesn’t visit your body, his temple, then how could he drive those garbage out of your life? Verse 17 says, 17 His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” Another version of the Bible translates; the passion for your house will consume me. It is the passion of Jesus Christ to cleanse your life. It was the passion of Jesus Christ that consumed him on the cross.
18 The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20 The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21 But he was speaking of the temple of his body. 22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.
Jesus said, the kingdom of God is like a seed dies in the ground, sprout, grow and become a tree and beat a hundred fold of fruit. Jesus was talking about his life, that he is like a seed that died in the ground and three days later he rose from the death and this resurrected life of Christ bear the fruit of eternity in our life.
Jesus cleansed the temple, but he did just cleanse the temple physically because it was already too dirty. He rebuilt it with his blood on the cross, consumed by the passion because he loves you. In the same way, when you invite Jesus Christ into your life, he not only cleanse you, but also sow a seed of his fruit in you that gives you a new life, that life is eternal life.
Let me show you a practical way of how to invite Jesus into your life daily ... give the Praying the Word bookmark and remind them of the lectionary.
