John 2 (2) Cleansing the Temple
To the left of my house, after you walk around a 20 foot trailer loaded with a tractor and implements, and after you climb over piles of drip edge, and roof vents and shingles, you will see a 14 x 20 blue building that looks like a shed. I special ordered that building and brought it with me when Gladys, Drew and I moved back here from Mississippi. When we moved, 19 years ago, Drew was just 18 months old. At the time, I told Gladys I needed an office, a place to work and study where young Drew would not be climbing on me and wanting me to play with him throughout there day, so shortly after we moved here we constructed my office.
I used it as my office, as my study for a number of years. During the week I would go in there and work, surrounded by many reference tools and a lot of books. I met with Tom and an accountability group there. It was a place of prayer, and study.
A number of years ago I had a leak in the roof. It got the carpet wet; so after reproofing the building, we had to go in, pull out all of the books and book cases, to get the mildewing carpet out. The books were boxed up and moved for a while. I finally got the book shelves back in and started returning the books to their homes, but never completely finished the job. Our internet no longer reaches out there, so most of the time, I do most of my studying on our dining room table, which anyone who has been in our house can testify to, as that table and all surrounding flat surfaces are covered with books, and pads, and papers.
I usually go into my office now, a couple times a week, sometimes just to turn on the air conditioning to keep down the humidity. I went in it again this week, as I was looking for a specific commentary I wanted to look at as I worked on this message.
As you step in the door, you will notice that there is no carpet there now, it’s just the rough concrete floor I poured 19 years ago. 20% of the books are no longer on shelves. They are on various piles on the floor, or my desk or other flat surfaces, where they were placed when I moved them from the house.
In boxes, and totes mixed among the books there are tools, and caulking, and a mixture of other items which suggest that maybe a roofer had to quickly empty the back seat of his truck before making a trip with his family and that not all of the stuff found its way home.
It’s not what I intended for that space. It’s not what I wanted. It was to be a place of study and prayer and meeting. Now it’s primarily a place of storage. It didn’t happen over night. It didn’t happen on purpose. It didn’t happen because of malice. It just happened. Life interrupted and I did not do enough to watch and guard, so that’s where I am today.
It is easy to let things slip in, and derail our best intended plans. We find an example of that in John chapter 2. Please open your Bibles and turn with me this morning to the book of John . . .
- Read John 2:13-25
1. This was a holy place -
Jesus had been here before. Jesus had been to the temple before. We know He had been here about 20 years earlier when He was a 12-year-old boy. Luke tells us that. Remember? Jesus’ parents got irritated with Him because when they headed home they thought He was with family, but then they couldn't find Him. They had to go back to Jerusalem and finally found Him 3 days later, conversing with the priests in the temple. Back then the temple was a place of prayer, and worship, and teaching. It was a place of holiness. It was a place where you could learn and converse with God.
Now, we know that God is everywhere. We know that there is no place you can go where you will not encounter God. David tells us:
> Psalm 139:7-12 Where can I go to escape Your Spirit?
Where can I flee from Your presence? If I go up to heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, You are there. If I live at the eastern horizon or settle at the western limits, even there Your hand will lead me; Your right hand will hold on to me. If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me, and the light around me will be night”— even the darkness is not dark to You. The night shines like the day; darkness and light are alike to You.
There is no place you can go where you will not find God, but there are places where you will find Him especially close and those places are not to be violated, or soiled. The Temple was such a place.
This temple had marble floors, and stone columns, and divisions where the gentiles, and women and men could go and worship. The priests had to bathe in prescribed ways in order to serve here. It was a holy place.
2. This was a sacred time.
Now, was also a sacred time. It was a special time. It was the time of the Passover. It was a time when Jewish folks across the nation would think back to how the Lord had them place the blood of lambs on their door posts and lintels when they were slaves in Egypt. On that night, they ate the sacrificial lambs, and placed the blood of those lambs on their doorposts and headboards, and the death angel passed over every house with that blood; but it killed the firstborn male in every home and family in Egypt where that blood was shot found.
They would be thinking back to how the Lord had led them out of Egypt and led them to their own homeland.
It was a holy place. It was a sacred time.
Jesus, His disciples, his mother & brothers had been to the wedding feast. They had been to Capernaum where they had rested a few days, and now they had come to Jerusalem, to this holy place as this sacred time.
They would have looked forward to seeing the beautiful magnificent temple, as it loomed in the distance. Their hearts probably would have quickened a bit as they saw the magnificent white marble, gold cover building rising in the distance. They would have been surrounded by throngs of people, as Jerusalem swelled to 4 or 5 times its normal population during passover, with people camping in the hills all around the city. The streets were so packed with folks it would be difficult to walk around. It was a festive time.
Jesus and His disciples head to the temple and instead of teaching, and holiness, and worship; they hear the mooing of cows. In the temple itself, they hear the cooing of doves. They smell the overwhelming stench of feces and urine from the livestock in the temple, and Jesus gets ticked. He gets angry. He gets so angry, so riled and upset that He goes out and makes a whip and comes back and cleans house.
Can you just picture Him, with one hand He’s opening livestock pens and turning over the tables of the money changers. With the other hand he’s swinging a whip, driving out animals, and running the venders out of the place.
It amazes me, how people paint Jesus as some kind of whimpy, nearly effeminate man, who goes around telling everybody to turn the other cheek. “Ya’ll be good. Turn over a new leaf.” Oh my word. That’s not Jesus at all. He was a man’s man. He was a carpenter before they had power tools and before Lowes made deliveries.
When people ask, “What would Jesus do”, they need to remember that swinging a whip and turning over tables is a distinct possibility.
Jesus was ticked. He cleaned house! What brought things to that point?
1. They let a good thing go bad - I imagine at first the priests started providing animals near by, so people didn’t have to lead or carry animals to sacrifice, all the way from their homes. Some of those folks would have traveled ling distances and for extended periods of time to get to the temple and it would not be easy to carry a sacrifice, so the priests began selling some nearby.
And the money changers? There was a temple tax, folks were expected to pay yearly, to help support the temple. Remember when they charged Jesus the tax, and He sent Peter to go catch a fish and to take the money for the tax out of the fish’s mouth? That was a tax to help support the temple.
Well, most of the coins in those days either had the picture of the emperor or one of their gods on it. The Jews didn’t want any graven images in the temple, so they had a special temple coin they would use. They would let you exchange whatever coin you brought for one of those. It was a good thing.
But somewhere along the way, those good things got distorted. The animals moved into the temple, and priests began charging extreme prices for them. Then they began charging robbery rates for the temple coins.
What started as good things went bad.
2. They did not guard against the encroachment.
Second, they did not guard against the encroachment. They did not check to see if what they were doing was still in alignment with their original intentions and with what God intended when He told them to build the temple in the first place.
They failed to stop and check and see if what they were doing was still meeting the originals objectives.
We can do that . . .
Begin to read your Bible every day so you can learn the scriptures and walk closer to the Lord . . . becomes just a box you check off saying, “I’ve done that.”
Y'all remember the donation envelopes some folks use, and we used to ?
I know a lady who told me she used to read her Bible everyday just so she could mark that box on her envelope. Perhaps not a bad thing when we are children trying to develop the disciplines of disciples, but certainly not appropriate for Passionate pursuers of Christ.
We do in with Sunday school . . .
We do it with VBS . . .
We can do it with Christmas in the Country . . . Bonnie told me she had better be the 3rd person to know when the Lord tells me it’s time to quit this.
3. They mistook who was the authority.
- Read John 2:18-20
Show us you have the authority to do this. Who is the authority here? Who has the authority to determine what’s right and wrong?
We have people doing that today. When God’s Word clearly teaches something is wrong and folks believe they have the right, the authority to say otherwise.
II. THE CORRECT RESPONSE
- Read John 2:17
Zeal for Your House will consume me. Do you have that zeal?
1. Do you look forward to spending time in God’s house with God’s people?
> Hebrews 10:23-25 Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. 24 And let us be concerned about one another in order to promote love and good works, 25 not staying away from our worship meetings, as some habitually do, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day drawing near.
Growing up, attending Sunday morning, Sunday evening . . . Now attending in the morning 2 times a month is considered a regular attender.
> Revelation 2:4-5 But I have this against you: You have abandoned your first love. 5Therefore, keep in mind how far you have fallen. Repent and perform the deeds you did at first.
2. Never settle for good enough
> Matthew 5:48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
3. Examine yourself
> 2 Corinthians 13:5 Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith. Examine yourselves. Or do you yourselves not recognize that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless you fail the test.
4. Get rid of the corrupt
> Galatians 5:16-25 I say then, walk by the Spirit and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. 17 For the flesh desires what is against the Spirit, and the Spirit desires what is against the flesh; these are opposed to each other, so that you don’t do what you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are obvious:[b][c] sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, 21 envy,[d] drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar. I tell you about these things in advance—as I told you before—that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith,[e] 23 gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, we must also follow the Spirit.
Prayer
