What Are People Buying And Selling In The Church?

So they came to Jerusalem. Then Jesus went into the temple and began to drive out those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. Mark 11:15

How do we translate this verse in this present generation. The church became a business centre when Jesus entered it. There were many people involved in buying and selling in the church.

What were these people buying? They were trying to buy God’s plans and provisions for their needs with their money

What are these people selling? They were selling the work of the Holy Spirit for money.

It was an outward selling/buying and as well as inward selling/buying

Outward selling or buying - Selling or buying products or propaganda that increase the church's infrastructure and facilities by creating a revenue generation model.

Inward selling or buying -trying sell or buy God’s plans, blessings, provisions and work with money

Jesus did not like the aspect of buying and selling in the church. Our contribution or giving for receiving a miracle from God is also buying. Accepting money for the work of the Holy Spirit( through the Gifts of the Holy Spirit) is also selling. Using Gifts of Holy Spirit to make money is also selling.

There are people who sold doves - These are people who made money by selling doves. Selling doves represent selling the gifts and the work of the Holy Spirit. God is overturning all the tables of people who make money by selling the work and Gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Money changers – These people were changing money into divine provisions, whether blessings or curses. Balaam is an example of money changer. These people take money from people and use the shortcuts from Bible i.e. get hold of some blessing verses and explain them how to receive a blessing from the Bible. Balaam helped King Balak despite the fact that it was against God's will. These people, like Balaam, give people what they want even though it goes against God's will. They just want money, don’t care of God's happiness. For money, they are willing to do things against God's will. Balaam sold the secrets (secrets on how to attract God's wrath) he learned from his relationship with God for money.

The church had people who were selling divine blessings and provisions for money. There were even people buying divine blessings with money. Jesus wanted to cleanse the buying and selling culture in the church by removing all money changers and people who sold doves. People were making money by selling the work and gifts of the Holy Spirit in God's name.

In these days, God is purifying the church of all the buying and selling. God is overturning the tables of the people who are involved in selling the doves and money changers, i.e. those who are selling the work and Gifts of Holy Spirit. Overturning means doing the opposite of what they are expected to do. For example - the people who moved in the Gifts of the Holy Spirit earlier become misfiring, and instead of blessing people, they are causing confusion.

The Gifts of Holy Spirit are given freely by God, and when people generate money or make profit from them, God has the power to overturn their business model and in extreme cases them also.