Jesus driving the money changers from the Temple, by Jacob Jordaens, 1650, oil on canvas at the Louvre, in Paris.

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Restoring True Worship

George Laigle led us through our Lenten readings today with the story of Jesus cleansing the temple. In addition to the account in John that we read today, that takes place at the beginning of Jesus ministry, this story is retold in the other Synoptic (from the Greek, syn "together" and opsis "view", referring to the gospel of Matthew, Mark and Luke) gospels. In these the event takes place in the final week of Jesus ministry.

Matthew 21:12-17

¹² Then Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who were selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold doves. ¹³He said to them, ‘It is written,
“My house shall be called a house of prayer”;
but you are making it a den of robbers.’

¹⁴ The blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he cured them. ¹⁵But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the amazing things that he did, and heard the children crying out in the temple, ‘Hosanna to the Son of David’, they became angry ¹⁶and said to him, ‘Do you hear what these are saying?’ Jesus said to them, ‘Yes; have you never read,
“Out of the mouths of infants and nursing babies
you have prepared praise for yourself”?’
¹⁷He left them, went out of the city to Bethany, and spent the night there.

Mark 11:15-19

¹⁵ Then they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling and those who were buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold doves; ¹⁶and he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. ¹⁷He was teaching and saying, ‘Is it not written,
“My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations”?
But you have made it a den of robbers.’
¹⁸And when the chief priests and the scribes heard it, they kept looking for a way to kill him; for they were afraid of him, because the whole crowd was spellbound by his teaching. ¹⁹And when evening came, Jesus and his disciples went out of the city.

Luke 19:45-48

⁴⁵ Then he entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling things there; ⁴⁶and he said, ‘It is written,
“My house shall be a house of prayer”;
but you have made it a den of robbers.’

⁴⁷ Every day he was teaching in the temple. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people kept looking for a way to kill him; ⁴⁸but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were spellbound by what they heard.

Class speculated what this scene must have been like, both then and if it happened today. As Rev. Zimmerman said in his sermon this morning, "Don't try it in the Narthex, the ushers will take you down!" The temple in Jesus time had gradually turned into a common meeting place, a market with all the hustle and braying animals that this implied. Someone chasing people away with a whip (John 2:15) and overturning tables must have been a disturbing sight. Who wants their familiar places to be upset? Alice Camille from our class notes spells it out:

(Alice Camille is an author, religious educator and parish retreat leader. She wrote in U. S. Catholic (March 2000):)

“John presents Jesus from the first moment of his story as the cosmic Christ, the Word of God living with God from the beginning, and—make no mistake—‘the Word was God.’ Jesus is the bigger, stronger Someone who comes and saves, from the
first verse forward, spelling it out in the most definite and public act any person of his time and culture could perform. You’re either with him or against him, from there on out. You can’t pick and choose, liking his teachings maybe but not his style.”
In Jesus, what is seen as the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom; and what is seen as God’s weakness or failure is stronger than human strength.

Murray gave a short prayer to conclude class.

Lectionary readings

The Readings for Sunday, March 18th are from Lectionary Year Two, Lent 4-B, "God's Saving Love": Numbers 21:4-9; Psalm 107:1-3, 17-22; Ephesians 2:1-10 and John 3:14-21. The text this week is from the New Revised Standard Version.

Numbers 21:4-9

⁴ From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; but the people became impatient on the way. ⁵The people spoke against God and against Moses, ‘Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.’ ⁶Then the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. ⁷The people came to Moses and said, ‘We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord to take away the serpents from us.’ So Moses prayed for the people. ⁸And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.’ ⁹So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.

Psalm 107:1-3, 17-22

¹ O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;
for his steadfast love endures for ever.
² Let the redeemed of the Lord say so,
those he redeemed from trouble
³ and gathered in from the lands,
from the east and from the west,
from the north and from the south.

¹⁷ Some were sick through their sinful ways,
and because of their iniquities endured affliction;
¹⁸ they loathed any kind of food,
and they drew near to the gates of death.
¹⁹ Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
and he saved them from their distress;
²⁰ he sent out his word and healed them,
and delivered them from destruction.
²¹ Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love,
for his wonderful works to humankind.
²² And let them offer thanksgiving sacrifices,
and tell of his deeds with songs of joy.

Ephesians 2:1-10

¹You were dead through the trespasses and sins ²in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient. ³All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else. ⁴But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us ⁵even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— ⁶and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, ⁷so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. ⁸For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— ⁹not the result of works, so that no one may boast. ¹⁰For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.

John 3:14-21

¹⁴And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

¹⁶ ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

¹⁷ ‘Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. ¹⁸Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. ¹⁹And this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. ²⁰For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. ²¹But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.’

NRSV