The first question is what are you doing here tonight? Like why are you here? Honestly. Think about that. For some of you that have gone to church for a long time, you may have not asked that question in a good season. Why are you here? Why do you come? What is your motive? What is it you’re seeking? What is it you desire? What do you want? And why do you go to all of this inconvenience. The second question is what did you bring? What did you bring? “Oh, my gosh. He’s gonna take our money.” Yes, he is (Laughter). Yes, he is. Yes. With that in mind, think through those questions. Why do you come? And what do you bring when you come? And then it’ll all make sense. I’ll tie it in together at the end.
We’re in John Chapter 2, picking up in Verse 12, just continuing through the book. After this, what had happened previously, as you know, Jesus had turned a number of ceremonial washing basins into good wine. It was his first miracle at a wedding banquet. Up to 180 gallons of wine. Okay? So you see this picture where Jesus is making wine at a wedding, and now we see this stark contrast in his response to what’s happening around him. So after this he went down to Capernaum with his mother and brothers and disciples. One excursion I’ll take real quick. How many of you were raised Catholic? Anybody like me, raised Catholic? We were told, were we not, that Mary was always a virgin (Laughter)? And they would say, “Oh, wonderful Mary, Mother Mary. She was always a virgin. Isn’t that wonderful, kids?” I was like “Not for Joseph (Laughter). Not for Joseph. No, not for Joseph at all. If that’s true, that’s bad. I don’t see where that’s good and righteous. Joseph’s walking around saying, ‘Thank you, Lord. It’s good. I didn’t mind getting married to a virgin, but being married to a virgin has become cumbersome, burdensome, painful, difficult.’”
I always wondered like how did Joseph – where did Joseph actually go with this? Like “Oh, yeah, sure. No problem. I’ll get married to my wife and never touch her. That’s not a problem.” Here we see that Jesus has brothers. And so you just fill in the gaps. For those of you in public school, it may take you a little time (Laughter). We’ve all had help. We know how that happens. So Mary was not a virgin forever.
“After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother and his brothers and his disciples,” his students. “There they stayed for a few days. When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem.” Big deal here. Passover is the largest celebration of the Jewish people. It is the day where all that are capable come into Jerusalem to the temple.
It is a celebration. As we look through the book of Exodus, God delivered his people from bondage and slavery and death and oppression, gave them freedom so that they could go into the desert and they could worship him. So Passover was that celebration where God’s wrath passed over them, gave them life instead of death, and gave them freedom instead of bondage. Right? He gave them hope instead of despair. And they are celebrating that at the Passover according to the ways that God had established that they celebrate this great feast and this great festival. And so thousands of years later here we come. They’re still celebrating this as a people.
And the way it was is they would all come into Jerusalem and the would come to the temple, and they would come together as a nation to celebrate what God had done. And the reason that Jesus went I think is multiple, but one of them is that if you are a male, able-bodied, over the age of 19 and Jewish that lives within a 15-mile radius of the temple, you are obligated to go to the Passover celebration of the temple. You must go. It is required of you. It’s almost like Muslims making their pilgrimage to Mecca. Even those that lived in faraway lands had a dream and a desire as often as possible, at least once in their lifetime, to make their pilgrimage into Jerusalem at the Passover for the celebration of their redemption and of God’s delivering them from atrocity and from genocide and from injustice.
And so it’s that season. Jesus ultimately celebrates three Passovers, according to John’s Gospel. This is the first. The last would be the Last Supper that we’ll celebrate when we take communion tonight. And so here they go. He’s going down into Jerusalem to celebrate the Jewish Passover. One other thing I will say with this too. What they would do in their homes before they would head to the temple is they would cleanse their home of leaven, of yeast, of agents that caused to rise. And throughout scripture, yeast and leavening agents are always symbolic and typified of sin. Sin causes us to be arrogant and proud and puff us up. And so they would cleanse their home of things that would cause leaven and cause things to rise and to puff up. And so their goal was to get all of the sin out of their home and all of the sin out of their lives and then come as pure worshippers to the temple to offer sacrifices for the forgiveness of their sins, all typifying and showing what ultimately Jesus would do.
And Jesus, in the spirit of Passover, realizes that it is not just the sin in their homes and the sin in their lives that needs to be cleansed. It is the sin in their religion. It is the sin in their spirituality. It is their sin in their false worship that also needs a serious cleansing. And so Jesus comes to cleanse God’s house, the temple. And so in Verse 14 “In the temple courts he found men selling cattle, sheep and doves and others sitting at tables exchanging money.” Seems simple enough. This is a tremendous problem. Jesus walks into the temple and it is like an out of control livestock market. There are animals bleeding, you know, making noise. There are people exchanging money. There is negotiations going back and forth like a flea market. The reason is this: A lot of people have looked at this section and said, “Yeah, it’s always bad when religion becomes corrupted and goes after money.” That is true, but it’s not quite that simple. The problem here is lazy worshippers. That is the real problem in this story.
In the Book of Deuteronomy they were told that they were supposed to bring their sacrifices to God for their celebration. The animals here are the animals that God had designated to be offered as sacrifices. But according to scripture, people were supposed to raise their own sacrifice and supposed to transport their own sacrifice. And in failing to do that, in their laziness, they have caused a need to arise for a business to do what they were supposed to do. Okay? And so you think about it. The ways it’s supposed to work, you’re supposed to raise an animal, it’s supposed to be an unblemished animal. That means that it is the best of your livestock. And that means that it has tremendous value to you. And in some ways you may even love that animal. It may become for you like a pet. You have a small lamb that you love, and you see it born and you feed it and nurse it and care for it, and the kids play with it. And it’s your responsibility to carry it all the way to the temple so that it can be slaughtered and its blood can flow. Don’t you love that (Laughter)? Why does everyone look like I just shot their pet (Laughter)?
See, the issue was if you were going to offer a sacrifice, it was supposed to cost you something. It was supposed to be a grievous moment. You were supposed to have some sort of connection and commitment to this animal. It was supposed to be one for you that was like a pet, that it was beautiful, it was the best that you had, it was worth money, and it was a personal sacrifice and came at a great cost. Not only that, you were supposed to transport it yourself because that is inconvenient. It is not convenient to take an animal and travel on foot for 30 or 40 or 50 miles to go to a religious celebration. And so the people decided “Well, that’s complicated. That’s difficult. That’s burdensome, cumbersome. We can find a better way to do this. What we will do, we will just show up there with money in our pockets, and then we know that there’ll be someone around there that will sell us what we need. And then we can go in and have the great high priest sacrifice the animal. And then the blood can be shed to show what needs to happen for our sins to be forgiven, ultimately what the Messiah, what Jesus will do.”
And so what happens then is lazy worshippers who aren’t doing their responsibility of raising their sacrifices, transporting them and obeying what God has said are still trying to worship through a shortcut. They want to pay someone else to do what they were supposed to do. It’s the same problem that the church has today where people believe that whomever is paid and called pastor is responsible for everything that is to be done. “Well, I pay somebody to do my worship.” No. No. That’s what they had done. And that’s what drives this whole commerce out of control because not only – you have three problems really with this system. The first is people were supposed to bring their own sacrifice. And they had become lazy, and they wanted to worship God without working. They wanted convenience. Okay? This is the hallmark of the modern age.
The biggest thing in church right now is 45-minute services. Forty-five minutes. And there are churches that are competing against each other to see who can have the shortest service and guarantee that we’ll get you in and out with as little inconvenience, as minimal cost so that you can have convenient worship. That is fine for Burger King, Wendy’s and McDonald’s, but not for Jesus Christ. God does not give us convenience. God gives us inconvenience and sacrifice so that we know what it’s like to be part of the kingdom of God. And so part of it is these people want worship without sacrifice, and they want worship that is simple and convenient.
The second problem is, as a result of that, business has now come in to meet a need that worshippers were supposed to do. And as businessmen, not as worshippers, the rates become exorbitant. Leon Barclay, one of the commentators, says that the “Cost of a dove on the temple grounds was as much as 20 times its actual value.” Do you believe that?
Yeah. You guys ever been to Disneyland (Laughter)? This is what they do. They get you in, and then they jack you. That is what they do. They do this. I took my daughter to Disney World. “Daddy, can I have a coke?” “No. That’s $1,500.00 (Laughter). And that’s the small one. The big one’s four grand. We can’t afford that (Laughter).” But they get you in, and you’re jacked and you’re stuck, and you know that you’re just going to lose because commerce has taken over. That is exactly what is happening. That is the second problem because that robs the poor and the oppressed and the marginalized of an opportunity to really worship God. If you’re poor, you can’t afford it. You can’t afford to come in and pay 20 times value for something for worship.
The third problem was the animals had to be tested and approved by people that work for the priest to make sure that they were unblemished and met the specifications. The problem was over time those guys had become corrupt and were likely being hired by the guys who were selling the animals. So you carry your lamb 20 miles, you get there, it’s unblemished, you lay it down, and the guy inspects it and says, “No, that one won’t do, but we have some nice ones for sale over here.” Right? It’s the first used car dealer is what it is. “No. That one won’t do, but we have one over here we’ll sell you. It’s just like yours. The only difference is it’s already been inspected and tagged, and it’s already preapproved. And it’ll just streamline the process. We’ll even carry it up there for you. Nice and convenient.” This is all about commerce, business, you being served because the customer’s always?
Response: Right.
Wicked. That’s right (Laughter). The customer’s always wicked. And so that’s the problem with the sacrificial system here. So Jesus walks in and he sees this. In addition, the scriptures tell us there that he seems moneychangers exchanging money. Now, this is – if you are a businessman, I’m not saying that there’s a problem in making a profit, but I am saying there’s a problem in extorting money from God’s people. Okay? And that’s exactly what is happening there. And if you went to a foreign nation and walked in to exchange American dollars for something else, you’re jacked. They will jack you every time. I went to India. I call it the white guy tax (Laughter). There is a really high – I didn’t know there was a – it’s not on the books and official, but there is a very high white guy tax. I walk in with this East Indian kid, Bobby, nice kid. We walk in to look at shoes. I said, “How much are those?” “A hundred and twenty dollars.” Bobby says, “You go stand out in the back.” “Go stand in the back? Why?” “Go stand out around the back where they can’t see you, and give me your money, and I’ll buy them.” I said, “Well, how much can you get ‘em for?” He said, “Seventeen dollars (Laughter).” “Seventeen dollars? That’s a crime.” He’s like “That’s business.”
That’s exactly what it is happening here because to go into the temple to offer your sacrifice, you had to pay a temple tax. If you were a male 19 years or older, you had to pay a temple tax to get in. Why is that? How many of you are men over the age of 19? According to God, everything is your responsibility. Okay? So just when you leave here, make sure that everything is taken care of. I’m talking the whole world. It is yours (Laughter). Seriously. The men here they were supposed to bring the temple tax to pay for the work of the priest and the sacrificial system so that the single moms, the widows, the orphans, the non-Jewish people, the gentiles from other nations, the poor so that they could still come and worship God. If you are a male 19 years of age or older, it is all of your responsibility. It is yours. And the men were not doing their job.
And so business came in to do what Godly men were supposed to do, and that’s pay the bills for ministry because ministry costs money. And if God’s people don’t come with generous and cheerful hearts, then what happens is you start to find ways to cajole God’s people. Do you guys know how the average church funds a building campaign to purchase a structure like we’re meeting in? We have a marketing firm. And they take the church database and they give it to people, telemarketers and people who send direct mail pieces to your home, and they continually press you to make a pledge. It’s business. It’s all business. And so when God’s people don’t worship with maturity and consistency and when men over the age of 19 don’t do their job, then businessmen come in and try and make up the difference. And the way they did this here, part of it was this temple tax. You would have to pay, as a Jew, between 27 and 29% of your income just to ministry. Mandatory. Fresh fruits, tithes, offerings, feasts, special Sabbaths and those sort of issues.
But now if you want to go into Jerusalem into the temple and you want to worship God on the holiest day of the year, it will cost you about two- or three-days’ salary. That’s your admission cost just to get in. But to pay that you are not allowed to use the coinage from other nations that you had come from because the coinage that you would bring from other nations had the picture of your king, and your king from that nation was worshipped as a deity. And there’s no way you could pay your entrance fee into God’s temple with the image of another God. And so you had to get special temple money. Have you been to Chuck-E-Cheese (Laughter)? This is what this is. This is special Chuck-E-Cheese money. This isn’t American money. This is Chuck-E-Cheese money.
You go into the moneychanger and you say, “Well, I need to pay my entrance fee to get into worship.” It’s mandatory that I go as an adult male. Therefore, I need to give two- or three-days’ wages, whatever it was equivalent to. Now, I need to exchange that for temple money. And then they would jack you with the temple money and give you a terrible exchange rate, so you’re actually spending four- or five- or six-days’ wages just to get in. Plus you were paying for your sacrifice. Plus 27 to 29% of your income. Imagine that.
Imagine if I told you “Thirty percent of your money belongs to God. I’m your pastor. It belongs to me. Now, if you want to come here on Christmas, that’ll cost you 500 bucks in the door. But you’re gonna have to exchange that for Mars Hill money (Laughter), and Mars Hill money is like Monopoly money. The denominations sort of vary a little bit. And then when you come in, well, then if you’d like to sing a song, well, those are ten bucks each for you. And if you’d like to hear a sermon, you know, I’m good, so that’s 15 bucks a minute (Laughter). And I’m long-winded (Laughter). And so, you know, bring your pockets full. And if you’re a single mom or you’re poor or you’re broke or you’re not a Christian, well, that’s just really tough because these other people haven’t done a very good job paying the bills. And so as soon as they pay the bills, then we’ll tell ya about Jesus.” Don’t you love that? That would make my life so much easier (Laughter). But then Jesus would come with a whip (Laughter), and that would make my life so much more complicated.
But you see what happens, they need money to run the temple, to construct the temple, to run the priesthood, to offer the sacrifices, take care of widows and orphans, to do all the ministry. And the men are not doing their job. And so businessmen come in and say, “Well, there is a plan B. There is a way to get money out of God’s people without just having them love God and give out of a cheerful heart. We can extort them. We can squeeze them.” But Scripture says, “Well, what does that do to poor people? What does that do to single moms? What does that do to little kids?” “Well, it means they’re gonna get jacked. That means they’re gonna get completely taken advantage of in an unjust system.” And so that’s what Jesus sees.
So in Verse 15 here is his response: So he, Jesus, God incarnate gets totally bent and goes fight club. He makes a whip out of cords and drove all from the temple area, both sheep and cattle, and he scattered the coins of the moneychangers and overturned their tables. And to those who sold doves, he said, “Get these out of here. How dare you turn my father’s house into a market.” Jesus is pissed. Anger is justified at certain points. This sort of docile, neutered portrait of Jesus Christ as Mr. Rogers walking around the earth (Laughter) is just completely inaccurate. Jesus is a man. Here he looks like Braveheart William Wallace. This is my favorite picture in the whole Bible. I like the picture of Jesus bent with a whip and another hand flipping tables, declaring war and taking on the whole religious establishment.
I love the fact that the other young men were not doing their job, but Jesus shows up and declares war on the whole religious system of the Jewish people. The entirety of the temple, the priesthood, the sacrifices, the whole thing. Jesus will not put up with it. I love that. All the other cowardly men just walk up and “Well, just whatever. We’ll get ripped off. I mean, it’s convenient. At least I didn’t have to work.” Jesus is not like that at all. Jesus is willing to go through the inconvenience of declaring war. So in one hand there’s a whip to scatter all the animals and send them to freedom. With another all the moneychangers’ tables are being thrown into the air, and money is scattered everywhere. I love that. I love that Jesus cares enough about God’s glory, his Father’s glory to actually get angry.
Paul tells us in Ephesians “In your anger, do not sin.” So you can’t just run around being angry and sinning, but there is a time when anger is justified. There is a time when poor people, marginalized people, single moms are being scammed and ripped off by religious hucksters under the guys of business and commerce and profitability. There is a point where that is justified. So his disciples remember some scripture here. They knew the word of God. His disciples remembered that it is written, Verse 17, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” It’s a Messianic chapter, Chapter 69 of the Book of Psalms. That’s Verse 9. It’s the same Chapter in Verse 21 where it’s predicted that Jesus will be given vinegar at his crucifixion.
Do you guys see what’s happened here? Do you guys know what the difference is between a consumer and a worshipper? This is exactly what the difference is: A consumer is someone who believes that the entire world exists to service their needs, and that they have a certain amount of money that they are now going to place in some particular business. Therefore, all the businesses should compete for their dollar. And then whoever wins, right – I’ll just show it to you. This is how it works: Here’s my buck. I’m a consumer. Now, I want some things. Now, what I’m trying to figure out is who will give me the most for my dollar. And so I start to look at competitors, and then people rise up against each other to compete for this. And then what I try to find out is where can I place this and get the maximum return with the least amount of inconvenience? Who will do for me the most and charge me the least? That is a consumer.
Now, a worshipper is just the opposite. A worshipper looks at this and says, “Where can I give this so that the most number of people are benefiting? Where can I give this so that I don’t get anything from this, but that someone else gets God’s love, grace, mercy extended to them in some tangible way?” A worshipper looks at it and says, “It is not about me. It is about God and those people that don’t yet know God.” A consumer looks at it and says, “It’s all about me. I’m the customer. The customer’s always right. The customer is king. Whatever the customer wants.” We live in a world that is governed and dominated by consumerism. And when consumerism creeps into our spirituality, what happens then we look at church and brothers and sisters in Christ and God and the work of the Gospel as something that is to compete for our interest. “What will it take for me to get as much as I can and give as little as I can? How can I have some sort of transacting relationship in which I win?” That’s exactly what is happening. “How can I get the biggest bang for my buck?”
And a consumer views church and view God and views religion as the place where they can get all of their needs met without making any sacrifices, without being inconvenienced, without having to carry any responsibility for anyone else. The worst of it is when men don’t look at it and say, “Well, gosh, what can I do for women, children, single moms, widows, orphans, the poor, the handicapped, the neglected, those in need?” If I am an able-bodied male, that means “How can I take what I have and invest that so that they are blessed and that they are loved and that they have an opportunity to worship
God as well? How can I pay the bills for them so that they can come to know God?” That’s an attitude of a worshipper, but a consumer it is not.
A consumer takes every single dollar and hour and interest and invest them – invest that in themselves. And what that is, is it’s idolatry. It’s self-worship. It is giving what belongs to God to myself. It’s self-glorification. We also call that things like self-esteem or self-actualization. We got a whole language for pride. Jesus is confronting the heart of this kind of worship. The disciples look at it and they say, “You know, he has zeal for his father’s house.” What always happens then is the religious professionals that are making a good income off of this sort of transaction they get angry because they’re losing market share. They’re losing income. And if people believe what Jesus has to say, then the whole thing is going to come undone. And so in Verse 18 they challenge the authority of Jesus Christ. “Then the Jews demanded of him, ‘What miraculous sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?’”, they ask Jesus “Who the heck are you? We’re religious professionals. This is the temple. Who are you? What right do you have to speak about these things, to declare war on us?” And they ask for a miracle, a sign.
Paul says in First Corinthians 1:22 that “Jews always ask for a sign.” And Paul says, “I never give them a sign. I just preach Christ crucified. You want a sign? Here’s what you get. Jesus died and rose from the dead. That’s all you get. You get one. Everybody gets one sign. God doesn’t want to run around doing private miracles for everybody because they’ve asked for them. He’s already given the big one. That’s all you get (Laughter).” And they ask Jesus for a miracle. “Well, what can you do? Prove it. Who are you?” I love Jesus’ answer. Jesus answered them “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” The word here for temple in the Greek text is not just the physical building. It’s the presence of God dwelling. “Destroy the place where the presence of God dwells, and I will rebuild it in three days.” He’s not talking about the physical temple. He’s talking about his own body. He’s talking about his own death and his own resurrection from the dead. And that’s exactly what it goes on to say.
The Jews replied “It has taken 46 years to build this temple. Herod had been working on this temple for 46 years. He still had 20 years to go. And you’re going to raise it in three days?” If the temple he had spoken of was his body, after he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said, and they believed the scriptures and the word that Jesus had spoken. He says, “You want to see a miracle? Destroy the place where God dwells.” And they said, “Well, this big building we’ve been working on this thing for 46 years. Millions of dollars. Thousands of people. All kinds of craftsmen, artisans, bricklayers. Everyone’s been working. If we destroy that, you’re gonna raise it up in three days?” Jesus is not talking about the temple. Jesus is talking about his body, which was the temple. “Kill me. I’ll raise up in three days. You want to see a miracle? Kill me. I’ll show you a miracle. I’ll show you what authority I have to speak for God.”
You know, guys, that’s the only place that we have any authority to speak for God is in Jesus’ death and resurrection. That’s where our authority comes from. He demonstrated and proved that he was God through his death and through his resurrection. And for us to request anything else of him miraculous is unbelief. He’s already proven himself. And the issue is here what Jesus is doing, Jesus is essentially saying, “That temple that you have built, those sacrifices that you have offered, those priests that you have, all of that money that you have given, all of the blood that has been shed, all of that is worthless, pointless, completed, done, unnecessary.” He is not just attacking corrupt Judaism. He is, in some ways, tearing down the entirety of Judaism and replacing with himself as the fulfillment of everything that they are doing.
What is the temple? It is the place where God dwells. That is Jesus. What is the temple? It is the place where sin is atoned for. That is in Jesus. What is the temple? It is the place where people come to worship God. That is in Jesus. What is the temple? That is the place where the priest intercedes for people before God. That is in Jesus who is our great high priest and our intercessor and our advocate. All of this happens in Jesus. And Jesus essentially says, “You have wasted your time thinking that the temple will do for you what I can only accomplish. And so if you want to see a miracle, kill me, and I will raise from the dead. And this simple, 30-year-old, human flesh temple that is where God is present on this planet will demonstrate my authority.” It’s awesome. It’s incredible.
Verse 23. “Now, while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, many people saw the miraculous signs that he was doing, and they believed in his name.” That’s the point, according to John’s Gospel, for the miracles. That’s what he says in Chapter 20, Verses 30 and 31. He says, “And Jesus performed a great number of miracles, but these ones are written down so that you may believe that Jesus is God and that you can have life in his name.” The purpose of miracles in the Bible is always to serve as a sign, to point you to God in Christ, to show you Jesus so that you believe in Jesus. Miracles are not for our entertainment. They are not always even for our service. They are for our salvation. And so people see what he is doing, they see what he is saying, and they put their faith in him. They come to believe in Jesus.
It says, “But Jesus would not entrust himself to them for he knew all men, and he did not need man’s testimony about men for he knew it was in a man.” Okay? A lot of people wanted to be his students and wanted to follow him and wanted to be with him. Jesus didn’t trust them. Jesus knows how fickle our hearts are, how in one moment we can be so committed and then in another we can become so cold. And so Jesus didn’t need to entrust himself to them. He knew that the human heart is not all that trustworthy. If that weren’t bad enough, I’ll close with this. It’ll take me a few minutes to explain this to you. The place that this happened in the temple – I know why Jesus is angry, I fully understand why Jesus is angry. As if all of this corruption wasn’t bad enough, the location of this corruption was the most painful thing, I think, for Christ to see. In Mark 11:17 what it tells us is that all of this transpired in the court of the gentiles. This is very important.
The way the temple was established, there’s the holy of holies, the presence of God, and then there is the place where the priests can come and hear the presence of God. And then Jewish males, and then Jewish women, and then the court of the gentiles. The people that were the furthest away from the presence of God were in the court of the gentiles. The court of the gentiles was where – for those of you like me who are not Jewish in your descent, that is the only place that we could go in the temple. Jewish women could be a little closer, Jewish men a little closer, priests and leaders a little closer. The high priest would go right into the presence of God once a year. But the closest that a non-Jewish person could come, the court of the gentiles was the place where they were supposed to hear about love.
If you were a gentile person that is not an Atheist, if you’re just a regular person that’s non-Jewish and you believe that there’s a God, you’re not sure who God is or what God said or what God has done and you want to know God, you would come to the court of the gentiles. That was your place. That was your place in the temple that was supposed to be paid for by the men over the age of 19. The men were supposed to pay the bills, be mature, be consistent, be responsible so that there was a place that what we would say essentially non-Christians, people that don’t know God that they could go and find God. And you were supposed to pay for that. And so they came. And the court, the gentile court would have been filled with people who didn’t know God. Or maybe some of them wanted to worship God or wanted to know God. And that from all nations of the earth, all races, cultures, tribes, languages, colors, backgrounds, this promise that was given to Abraham that all nations of the earth would be blessed through these people was supposed to come true at the court of the gentiles.
And you know what they did to the court of the gentiles? They turned it into business. That’s where they had all the animals and the moneychangers and the negotiations and the bartering and the noise and the chaos. All of the business had been shoved not into the holy of holies. Into the presence of God. Not into where the religious professionals were, not into where the men and women who knew God were, but out on the fringes, out to the place, the only place where the people who didn’t know Gold could come. That’s what you have is you have thousands of people who don’t know God that are coming saying, “Well, I would like to know God. And so I’m going to go to the temple, and I’m going to go to that place that they designated where I can pray. And maybe someone will talk to me, and maybe someone will answer my questions, and maybe someone will pray with me. I will go there at the holiest day of the year, and I will learn who God is.” And you get there, and it is a flea market, and no one gives a damn about you because they’re all trying to get a bang for their buck and trying to be lazy worshippers and consumers. And they don’t care about you. They’re just trying to get in and out as quickly, as simply, as efficiently, as painlessly, as economically as possible.
And there you stand. And your first impression of God is “All he cares about is my money. And God’s crooked, and God’s corrupt, and God is not just. And his people are not very impressive. And their ignoring me is very unjust. And the way they approach God is so disrespectful.” And see, I was a guy for the first 19 years of my life I lived in the court of the gentiles. I didn’t know God. I knew there was a God. I didn’t know anything about him. And I know what it’s like to be that guy sitting in the court of the gentiles saying, “Well, if you all could just take a break and maybe answer a few questions. I don’t hate God. I just don’t know him. You’re all supposed to. The things you’ve forgotten are things I haven’t even yet learned.” And the problem was they thought worship was about themselves.
I’ll tell you guys what. I’ll tell ya the most important thing of this evening. Jesus Christ, Christianity, Mars Hill, the Bible is not about you. It is not. It is not about you. It is about God and God getting his glory and God being loved and God being thanked and God being adored. It’s not about you. You say, “Gosh, that’s so mean.” No. that’s the nicest thing I’ve ever told you. The whole world is wrong. The kingdom of God is a completely different world that turns this world upside down. It says, “You know what? If you lose your life, you’ll find it.” It’s not about you. It’s about God and people that don’t know God. That’s what it’s about. And if you’re a man over the age of 19, every time you think it’s about you, think about Jesus Christ with a whip in his hand. It is not about you. It is about God. See, we don’t believe that.
I asked you “Why did you come? And what did you bring?” My answer, some of you maybe not, most of us come for me and don’t bring a damn thing because there’s no tax at the door, there’s no mandatory requirement. You don’t have to pay three days’ wages to get here. There’s no business. It’s just if you love God, you get to participate in his work. You say, “Well, what do I get for my dollar?” Nothing. You don’t get anything. Someone else gets it. Somebody who doesn’t know God. “Well, that’s not a good investment.” It is if you’re investing in the kingdom of God. Now, if you’re investing in yourself, that’s a bad transaction. But it’s not about you. It’s about God. Do you see where this runs antithetical and counter to everything you’ve ever been told? I’m sure people are looking at Jesus like “Well, what is the big deal? We bring money, we get something. That’s fair.” No. We bring money, someone else gets something. That’s grace. That’s the kingdom of God.
I loved it when I was a non-Christian and someone brought me to church. Someone else paid for the rent at that church. Someone else paid the pastor’s salary. Someone else paid for everything, and I heard about God. And it was beautiful. I would have never paid for that, but someone else did. And I got to hear about God. And I got to hear the Bible. And I got to learn about Jesus. And then I came to an understanding of that where all of a sudden it was like “Yeah, I believe that I am a child of God now. What Jesus has done is also done for me.” And I remember sitting in church one day and the plate was going by. And I was a 19-year-old male, which is kind of curious to me. And I remember the plate went by and held it, and I hand it over, and I thought “Well, I’m a man now. This is my responsibility. For thousands of years someone has been doing this so that it could get to me. And now it’s my job to put something in here to make sure that it goes to someone else. That’s good. I can’t wait to get to heaven and realize that because people gave, other people came to know, and I was part of that process. That’s a beautiful thing.”
And so worship is not about you. It’s about God. It’s amazing, isn’t it? People come to the temple on the holiest day of the year, to the presence of almighty God and they think it’s about them. Is that unbelievable? I mean, the one day and the one place that you would assume that people would recognize it’s about God, but they forgot. They forgot it was about God, and they forgot it was about those people that didn’t yet know God. If you were here tonight, don’t give us any money if you are not a Christian. You know why? It is our job, our responsibility as worshippers, not just consumers, to pick up the tab for you. God loves you. Your salvation has nothing to do for your money. You don’t earn or pay for God’s love. It’s given to you. God already loves us, and all of our money belongs to him. We’ll pay the bills, and you just come along and enjoy the ride.
I’ve heard a lot of commentators who have said, “See, Jesus here hates religion that deals with money.” No, he doesn’t. He just hates corruption. That’s what he hates. Last thing. Paul says twice, at least twice, in the New Testament that “We, as the children of God, when we gather together for worship, that we are the temple of God.” When you think about that, that is an amazing statement to me. Where does God’s presence flow? With his people. Where does sin get dealt with? In the church. Where do people come to know God? In the church. Where does worship happen? In the church. Where do we make our sacrifices not just now of blood because that has been done once for all in Christ, but to offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable under God as our spiritual act of worship? That would be in the church. That you and I when we get together in these moments, we are the temple of almighty God. And that coming in will be people who are from the court of the gentiles. They’re not sure who God is. They hear that this is a church, and so they come here to find out.
And I would beg you and implore you if you know God, shake their hand, buy them dinner, love them, extend a hand of friendship. It is not about you. Someone has done that for you. A mom, a dad, a friend, a loved one, a – someone has done that for you. Do that for them. Do that for them. My prayer is that as people come into our church, they would not walk away with that befuddled angst that the people experienced in the court of the gentiles where everybody knew everybody, everybody was talking to everybody, everybody was getting the most for their buck, they were all in and out, convenient, no sacrifice, no giving, it didn’t really cost ‘em anything. “I didn’t know anything, and nobody even stopped to say hi and to answer my questions. I appreciate the fact they picked up the tab, but I just had some things I wanted to learn about God.”
Do you know how many people come through this service alone every year, visitors? It’s well over 1,000. If they all stayed, we couldn’t seat them all in this room. It’s beautiful. What a wonderful opportunity. And so that’s where we’re at tonight. We always come to this place in our service where we respond. I have two questions. Why are you here? From now on remember you’re here for God and people that don’t know God. You say, “Well, I need to grow up and mature and learn and be discipled.” That’s your first lesson. That’s the most important thing. Second, what did you bring? And what will you continue to bring? Bring your sin. That belongs to Jesus. He’ll forgive you. All right? Bring your fears. Those belong to Jesus. He will give you hope and strength. Bring your weakness. He will give you his life in place of your death. Bring your money. Bring your prayer. Bring your song. Bring your friends. Bring those that you know that are living in the court of the gentiles and don’t know God. What do you bring?
And so, God, we come to you tonight thankful for this portrait of Jesus Christ with a whip in his hand, anger in his eyes, tables and money flying. We thank you, God, that Jesus was not just another corrupt religious leader or businessman. God, our world is filled with liars making millions in the name of God. Scam artists, extortionists, people that are guaranteeing things that they can’t make good on, people that are lying about God. People that are telling other people that they are the center of the universe and that they are customers and consumers, and “Just come on in and we’ll give it to ya.” God, thank you that Christ was angry, but he didn’t sin. God, give us the wisdom to know when it’s okay just to be really upset with corruption and injustice, that it ruins your name and causes people who don’t know you to have an inaccurate portrait of who you are and why you have come.
And, God, for the men in our church that are men, those guys that are over the age of 19, God, please just give them the deep conviction tonight to be men. Not to be customers walking around seeing how they can best invest their dollar in their own desires, but how they can give and sacrifice and serve so that women and children and orphans and single moms and poor people and those who are underprivileged and those who don’t know God and Christ and those who are lost would be loved and served and blessed because of their sacrifice. I pray, God, that those men would view that as their greatest honor and a tremendous demonstration of their manhood. And, God, thank you that we actually get to bring something to worship. Hopes and fears and dreams and failures and sins and money and prayers and songs. God, I pray for my friends here. If there’s anybody here, God, that doesn’t know you, I pray, God, that they would know that you did come as Jesus Christ, God incarnate.
That, God, you lived a perfect life in place of their sin, that you were killed, murdered, died in their place as a substitute, but that as Jesus promised, that he rose from the dead to conquer their enemies of sin and death. And that, God, you’ve brought them tonight so they could hear about the love that you have for them, and how your relationship with them can only be transacted through Jesus. I pray, God, they would respond tonight and give you their lives and their hearts and their faith. And for the rest of us, God, I pray we would confess our sin, that we would continue to learn what it is to live for you with a heart for those who don’t know you. And that, God, as we have prepared, we would give our offering, we’d give our song, we would give our life, we would take communion, and we would extend a hand of friendship to those that we don’t know tonight.
And, God, we thank you that you have done that for us in Christ. That Jesus has given us everything, that he has extended a hand of friendship. That he has come to us, and he has laid down his own life to give us grace. He is a wonderful demonstration of how we are to be as the children of God. Amen.
