In Jesus Holy Name Lent III March 7, 2021
Text: John 2:19-20 Redeemer
“Jesus, The Replacement for the Temple”
Sometimes we need to read the words of the Bible more closely than we do. I noticed something new as I was reading John chapter 2 this week. . “After the wedding in Cana”, John tells us an interesting bit if information. Jesus returned to “Capernaum with his mother and brothers where they stayed a few days.” Maybe in the home of Peter. We do not know for sure… but I found it interesting that Jesus is with His mother and brothers. Did the family of Jesus move to Capernaum? We do not know. John then writes: “Jesus went to Jerusalem for the Passover.” Did His mother and brothers also go to Jerusalem? I’m sure they did.
These are questions my curiosity would like answered. John isn’t concerned with my questions. He is only concerned with one question: “Is Jesus going to replace the temple, and the temple sacrifices for the forgiveness of sins with Himself? The answer is “yes”. Jesus is the replacement.
Some theologians have tried to understand, and then explain why the Gospel of John is different. Matthew, Mark and Luke all seem to follow a logical progression from the birth of Jesus to His baptism. His temptation. His miracles and parables. Followed by His arrest, trial, crucifixion, and resurrection.
John is different. The first miracle John records is the Wedding at Cana. It is not in the other gospels. In Chapter 3 John records this nice interview with Nicodemus. Again, only in John. After the wedding at Cana, and the family’s return to Capernaum, John tells of this event in Jerusalem when Jesus “clears the temple of money changers”. With a whip he drives out the animals, turns over the tables. Coins clatter on the stone floor. Jesus makes two bold statements:
“How dare you turn my Father’s hours into a market!” “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” John places this historical moment in the life of Jesus not during Holy Week, as in Matthew, Mark and Luke. Why? Why does John have this event at the beginning of the ministry of Jesus? I suggest that John is making a theological point that Jesus has come to fulfill all the O.T. laws. He has come to replace, “the place”, where forgiveness of sins is offered, with a new place, a cross on Calvary’s hill.
The point? Jesus is boldly proclaiming that He Himself is God’s touchstone on earth, no longer the stones of the temple, nor the stone altar of sacrifice. Jesus is replacing the “holy of holies”. He is replacing the Jerusalem temple. The stone altar in the temple, a place for the sacrifice of lambs for the forgiveness of sins is being replaced by God’s perfect sacrifice, the holy Lamb of God, on the cross. The author to the book of Hebrews reflects correctly on this replacement idea.
“Sacrifices, offerings, sin offerings” were required in the Old Testament, but now God Himself has come in Christ to offer his perfect body on the cross. “So Jesus was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people and He will appear a 2nd time not to bear sin…(which happened at the cross) but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for His return. _ (Heb. 10:5; 9:27)
When Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ became a megahit movie in 2004, the question: “Why did Jesus die?” hit the headlines. For a brief moment in time, Jesus became fashionable again. Reporters discussed the movie and then talked about what the death of Christ meant. In response to the movie, John Piper wrote a short book called 50 Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die. In his book he stated that the most important question of the 21st century is: Why did Jesus Christ come to die? (p. 11)
Not many people would, I suppose, pick “Why Did Jesus Die?” as the most important question of the 21st century. “Why is there so much suffering in the world?” or “Will there ever be world peace?” or even “How can I know God?” as the central questions of our age. But if you dig deeper, you can see what John Piper is getting at. All the other “great questions” of our time lead us back to ultimate questions about God and his purposes in the world.
We will never understand God until we understand the cross on which Jesus died.
Thoughtful people have pondered that question “Why did Jesus die?” for 2000 years. When we read the gospels, the record looks something like this:
Jesus was a good man, a very good man who went about doing good.
Even his enemies testified to his integrity.
He couldn’t be bribed or pressured or threatened or intimidated.
He healed the sick, raised the dead, caused the blind to see, made the lame to walk, and he preached the Good News to the poor.
The common people heard him gladly.
So how did he end up dying on a Roman cross? What crime had he committed that would allow this seeming miscarriage of justice? This question is not theoretical. (from a sermon by Keep Believing Ministry, April 2, 2014)
From our perspective, we may say that Jesus was betrayed, tried, beaten, mocked, humiliated, crowned with thorns, convicted in a kangaroo court, falsely accused, beaten until his skin was shredded, forced to carry his own cross, and then publicly crucified, the most brutal form of execution in his day. If we focus on those events, we may come to the conclusion that Jesus shouldn’t have died, that it was all a big mistake, that somehow the powers of darkness finally triumphed over the light.
But that is not the end of the story. He did not die because he could not help it; He did not suffer because He could not escape. All the soldiers of Pilate’s army could not have taken Him, if He had not been willing to be taken. They could not have hurt a hair of His head, if He had not given them permission. An unnamed soldier took branches, bearing thorns, nimble enough to bend and wove them into a crown of thorns. The same voice that stilled the raging storm. The same voice that cleansed the temple…and summoned the dead back to life could have stopped it all with a word. The blood begins to drip…Why didn’t Jesus resist?
Remember the garden of Eden? After Adam and Eve broke the one commandment God have given God put a curse on the land. “The ground will now produce thorns and weeds for you.” Rebellion results in thorns and punishment. On His head Jesus bore the weight of our broken commandments, the thorns caused holy blood to drip down His holy face. We did that to Him.
On March 5, 1942, an old, four stack destroyer, the USS Pope on its third engagement at the battle of the Java Sea, was badly damaged and eventually sunk. The crew was rescued and captured by the Japanese. They were placed in a POW camp. It was not an easy existence. If you read the book Unbroken, the story of Louis Zamperini then you know torture was common, capricious, and lethal. Hope among the captives often disappeared.
There was a day in April when one of the Americans, a lieutenant, didn’t bow deeply enough to his guard. The guard reacted. Using his swagger stick, he rained down blows upon the American’s back until he lay face down in the dirt, semi-conscious and unable to raise a hand to protect himself. There would be no mercy.
In the center of the camp, the prisoner was strung up to receive 50 lashes with a hawser, a heavy rope. The lieutenant already bruised and battered from his beating showed little reaction as the first lash of the hawser ripped his back. The first blow followed by another. The guard was in his rhythm. By the 15th stoke the Lieutenant was unconscious.
There was no question, without a miracle, the captive would not survive. The miracle came. That miracle came in the person of lieutenant Richard Antrim of the USS Pope. From his position he called out one word. “Enough”. A silence fell over the entire camp. “Enough”, I’ll take the rest. Antrim added. The Japanese stopped. They were shocked, stunned. They had not expected such an unselfish, loving act. Thinking he might have been misunderstood, Antrim rephrased and amplified what he had said. “Enough, if there are to be 50 lashes, I will take the rest of them for him.”
Everyone understood. Slowly the Japanese began to understand the moment when someone was willing to suffer, and maybe even die for another. Antrim’s actions changed things. The punishment ended. (sermon Rev Klaus February 25, 2018)
Our humanity, our lives have been captured by an evil adversity. We live in the POW camp controlled by Satan, beaten down by the painful thorns of life. The stress of work. The uncontrolled anger that brings destruction to property and death. We are captive to the illnesses that degrade our bodies, but can not tarnish our soul. We know the pain of the thorns that accompany disgrace and shame over our foolish dips into drugs, or pornography. The results of sin are catastrophic. They are irreversible by our own power.
Adam and Eve felt shame and the inability to reverse their mistake, so they hid.
The dark shadow of death lurks in our future. Once the Wolf and Lamb had lain down together. Now a new lamb must be found. Their God when searching but He could not pretend that their disobedience had never happened. A good judge never sets aside a law because He loves someone who broke the law.
The eternal judge of the universe did what only He could do. He left His throne and came to our POW camp and offered Himself as our Substitute. The innocent would die for the guilty, the perfect sinless, man Jesus for the imperfect.
Just as He promised to those standing near overturned tables, and scatter coins on the stone floor, there would come a day when He would give His life and He would rise from the dead.
It is we who now sing… “O death where is your sting, O grave where is your victory?” We have been set free by Your nailed pierced hands and thorn pierced brow. Like Lieutenant Antrim, Jesus Christ, God’s holy and perfect Son would say, “Enough. If death is to be their punishment, I will die for them.
The crown of thorns, the cross, the empty grave are the gifts of God for you and me.
