Well, once again, good morning.
The passage for our sermon this morning comes from John's Gospel the second chapter be reading from verse 12 to the end of the chapter, and as you're hearing this, we remind you that this is the very Word of God, and so please give it your full and undivided attention. John, chapter two, beginning with verse 12. And after this, he went down to Capernaum with his mother and brothers and his disciples, and they stayed there for a few days. The Passover the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem in the temple, he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons and the money changers sitting there and making a whip of cords. He drove them all out of the temple with the sheep and the oxen, and he poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, take these things away. Do not make my father's house a house of trade.
And his disciples remembered that it was written, zeal for your house will consume me. So the Jews said to him, What sign do you show us for doing these things? Jesus answered them, Destroy this temple, and in three days, I will raise it up.
The Jews then said, it has taken 46 years to build this temple.
Will you raise it up in three days? But he was speaking about the Temple of his body when, therefore, he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken. Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing, but Jesus, on his part, did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man.
Thus far the reading of God's Holy Word, let us pray, Oh God, we thank you for John's record of this event at the Passover feast, and we ask now that you would add to our understanding of it as we examine it for these few minutes. We ask that you would help us to apply it to our own lives and to inform our own better worship of you. We ask these things in Jesus name, amen, please be seated throughout our lives, when we enter new situations, we face the new we face anew. The question of who is actually in charge? Sometimes, like when we start a new job, the answer is straightforward, it's our boss or our direct report, who is in charge? Other times, like in school, the answer can be more elusive. The answer time reveals who in the crowd is in charge, at least socially and even in the church, sometimes the stated leadership is not the actual leadership, as it may be a large donor who is in fact running the show. Our passage this morning is ultimately about authority.
Specifically, it is about who defines the right worship of God, and the confrontation between Jesus and the authorities at the temple. Those authorities seem to have and retain control of the situation in spite of Jesus's protest, but ultimately, it is Jesus who has the authority to define right worship of God, and it is he who will ultimately completely redefine it. And so this morning, let's take a look at this cleansing of the temple at Passover, and then examine the question of authority. And finally, we will take a look at the resulting believers after this incident, but first, the cleansing of the temple at Passover. Well, the disciples and Jesus have been in Cana of Galilee, that is where Jesus famously changed water into wine at a wedding where they had run out of wine. And we're told that after this time, they go down to Capernaum. Now Capernaum. The reason they went down is Capernaum is by the Sea of Galilee. You descend to get there from Cana, which is above.
And they Capernaum would have been something of a reasonable waypoint. Uh, for Jesus and his disciples along the way to Jerusalem, and from there, Jesus and presumably His disciples went up to Jerusalem. Now they would have actually headed south. And the convention at that time was no different than it is today, where you look at a map and you say you go down, we would go down to the keys from here, but we would go up to Atlanta, if you're going north, and they would actually go south. But it's instead that said that they'd go up to Jerusalem. And that's because you always from whatever direction you came from, went up to Jerusalem for two reasons.
One, Jerusalem was on a mound, and so you had to ascend to Jerusalem to get there. But even more importantly, Jesus, Jerusalem was the center of worship and the place of God's presence in the temple. And so it held a center point in in the life of the Jews. So you went up there. And when Jesus arrives at that temple, he finds those selling oxen, sheep and pigeons, along with money changers, we're told. Now, absent any further context, these things might strike us as strange to find in a place of worship. But the reason they were there was essentially to make worship more convenient. During Passover, pilgrims like Jesus would make their way back to Jerusalem to worship, and they would have an obligation once they got there, to offer a sacrifice and to pay the temple tax, obviously, it would be burdensome to bring an ox or a sheep along for what could be a very long journey of several days. And so there grew a cottage industry which provided the animals for sacrifice in Jerusalem at the Passover. There's evidence that those providing those animals were originally located outside the city across the Kidron Valley. However, by Jesus's day, the vendors had moved into the city, and not just into the city, but into the temple itself. Now almost certainly these vendors would have been located in the court of the Gentiles, outside of where the services were actually being conducted. But considering the size of the animals, ox and sheep, and the quantities necessary for the pilgrims who would have come there, could not help but be a significant amount of noise and commotion associated with these sales. The money changers were also there because the currency of the Roman Empire was not accepted for the purchase of any of these sacrificial animals. Instead, they would have to exchange that currency for a special temple currency, which was the only thing which would be accepted for the purchase of sacrificial animals. And for those of you who have traveled abroad, you know this to be true. Like currency exchanges, everywhere in the world, there's money lost in the exchange. It's likely that the temple received revenue from this profit that was made in the exchange. It's also possible that they exacted a concession fee from those who were selling the animals. Now, in this passage, John such a practice is not called corrupt per se. However, in each of the other gospels, in Matthew 21 mark 11 and Luke 19, there is an account of Jesus, at least, similarly cleansing the temple where he says it is written, My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers, a quote from Isaiah 56, seven, that indicated that these practices were indeed abusive. And we'll get back to these other accounts shortly.
But here Jesus drives out the large animals with a whip that he fashioned. He pours out the coins of the money changers, and he overturns their tables, and he says to those who are selling pigeons, take these things away.
Do not make my father's house, a house of trade. The stated problem Jesus has here is that commerce is being conducted on the grounds of the temple, the place of God's presence, and then where he has appointed to receive. Worship.
Now, from a practical standpoint, the sale of these animals could take place within the city, but not right on the temple grounds that there's pushback against Jesus's protest does imply that this is ultimately about enriching the temple over and against faith, faithful worship within it, before we move forward with the questioning of the Jews, I want to address these other accounts of Jesus cleansing the temple and the other three gospels.
Now, in each of those other cases, the account places the cleansing during the final Passover which precedes Jesus's crucifixion. Obviously, John is placing his account at the outset of Jesus's earthly ministry, while neglecting any mention of a cleansing at the end of his ministry. So how do we reconcile these accounts?
Well, in both cases, there is a question of authority posed to Jesus by the Jewish authorities, but there are some differences, one of which we've already addressed. Are they the same event simply placed at different points in Jesus' ministry by the respective writers, or are they different events? Each of the gospel writers we know, would organize their accounts at points in a thematic rather than a chronological fashion. So it's certainly not impossible that all these accounts were of the same event. However, I think it's more likely that these are indeed separate events. John and his gospel will record three and possibly four different passovers during the course of Jesus's ministry, so there would be temporal separation between the first and last one of these of at least two years. If he did this cleansing early in His ministry, as seems to be indicated here, he would have returned later to see that nothing had changed, and then would have performed one final cleansing to emphasize his authority and the change in sacrifice which was to come. And it is that authority that we will get to next. In each of the other accounts of Jesus cleansing the temple, there is a subsequent direct question posed to Jesus by the Jewish leadership, by what authority do you do these things?
Essentially, they're questioning, what makes Jesus think that he can just come in and overturn, both literally and figuratively, the established order of worship in the temple.
In our question, in our passage, the question is more nuanced in verse 18, but still centered on Jesus's authority, or his right to do the things that he's doing in the temple. By what authority do you by? What sign do you show us for doing these things.
Jesus's response is puzzling to everyone who hears it, Destroy this temple, and I will, and in three days, I will raise it up, given that they are in the literal Temple in Jerusalem, the natural assumption is that Jesus is referring to the structure around them. Beyond that, it's odd that Jesus would propose destroying it. The Jews respond, according to that assumption, it has taken 46 years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days ever helpful. John clarifies that Jesus was speaking about the Temple of his body and the fact that it would be resurrected three days after his death. Now the disciples at this point have no greater clue what Jesus is talking about than the Jewish leadership does, but John assures us that they come to understand it after he was, in fact, resurrected, and so they believed as a result. So Jesus's authority is ultimately confirmed, but we need to examine what authority it actually is Jesus is concerned in driving out the animals and overturning the money changers tables is the proper worship of God his Father, and He is asserting authority over that worship. And what the Jews have done has two motivations, both of them working. Against proper worship. The first is more obvious. The commerce that is taking place in the temple is financially beneficial to them.
The commerce, this commerce within a sacred space, is what Jesus directly objects to. The second is less apparent. Selling the sacrificial animals in the immediate proximity of where they'll be sacrificed is a great convenience to those having to make the sacrifice. In other words, this is more convenient worship, and there's obvious, there's obviously a demand for this convenience over and against having to bring the animals from at least across the Kidron Valley, where they once were. In other words, the people want to worship God in the most convenient way possible, on their own terms, if you will, as opposed to how God has ordained it, and the Jewish leadership seems all too happy to accommodate them. Jesus is asserting his authority over the worship in the temple and correcting these disobedient practices. If this is a separate incident, as I've indicated, he will come back in two years and find that nothing is actually changed and will make his point again. Jesus has that authority because He is God in the flesh.
Later in John's gospel, in chapter nine, he will accept worship and not correct those offering it, showing that authority, however, the way he defends it here points to something even greater by appealing to His resurrection, Jesus is forecasting that he has come not just to assert authority over the present form of worship at the time, but to render it obsolete. All of the sacrificial system that the sale of these animals represents is only a shadow of what Jesus will ultimately do sacrifice himself for his people as the Lamb of God, the complexity and repetition of the old covenant is going to vanish, replaced by the simplicity and finality of the new covenant, which Jesus will inaugurate, as the writer of Hebrews says in chapter nine.
But when Christ appeared as the high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent, not made with hands, that is not of this creation, he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves, but by means of His own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.
And that result leaves us with just one thing in our passage to be dealt with, and that is the resulting believers. We're told that the result of these actions, and of numerous other signs Jesus performed, is that the disciples believed in him, and that many believed in him, in particular the faith of these disciples, which is at this point, likely the five disciples who are mentioned in chapter one, including likely the author himself of the gospel. It's bolstered and clarified. We're told in verse 17 that they remembered that it was written, zeal for your house will consume me in Psalm 69 nine a prophecy that's a prophecy about the Messiah to come and like the miracle at the wedding of Cana before it, this expands their concept of who it is they've attached themselves to and deepens their faith, while in this they have what appears to be a present benefit to their faith. They are just as they're just as confused as everyone else by Jesus saying, Destroy this temple and I will rebuild it in three days. But John adds that they will remember the saying and realize he was speaking about his body and the resurrection after he is raised from the dead, and that bolsters their faith during the trauma of Jesus's death.
Thus. So once again, it's the disciples who are the Jesus's primary audience to all that he is doing here, which is a continuation of replacing the old with the new, which began at Cana, where he took water out of stone pots, which was set aside for ceremonial washing and replaced it with wine, which represents his blood, which will ultimately and completely wash away sins the old way to the new way, alongside the disciples, we're told that there are many others who believe on account of the numerous other signs which Jesus was performing, to which the disciples, of course, were also witnesses. But unlike the disciples, Jesus does not entrust himself to these followers, because we're told Jesus knew what was in man.
Jesus' suspicion of those outside the circle of the disciples is going to prove to be well founded. Throughout the rest of John's gospel, in chapter five, he will go back to Galilee, and many of this same crowd will be there and be happy to see him, and he rebukes them, saying, unless you see signs, you simply will not believe. In chapter six, he feeds 5000 men and who knows how many other women and children from a meager amount of bread and fish, and the next day, after having eaten it, that same crowd comes to him and demands a sign. And when Jesus's teaching becomes too much for them to understand, they abandoned him just as quickly as they embraced him, leaving Jesus with only his disciples, and He'll then ask them if they want to go away as well. And Peter, who would be one of the disciples, who sees this what is happening in our passage today, replies, Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed and come to know that you are the Holy One of God. So the disciples are gaining clarity about who Jesus is, even when the others around them do not and that brings us to you. How about you? Have you gained clearly about Jesus? Do you see his teachings and those of his apostles to be the words of eternal life. Do you see his sacrifice on behalf of his people, the final and only sacrifice which will satisfy the holiness of God and provide a way to heaven? Do you want to worship him as he is prescribed, these are questions of ultimate importance Jesus and Jesus alone provides a way to heaven, and we should ask and we we access it by faith, like his disciples, as we read of their experiences with him, that faith should be bolstered and our assurance should grow. So may God bless His Word in your life, that your faith may grow and that you might be assured that one day you will see this same Jesus face to face in heaven. Let us pray Lord God, we thank you for having sent Christ be our sacrifice and to instruct us, even as he is instructing his disciples about everything that his being the son of God entails and all that he brings as Messiah, we ask that you would clarify and strengthen our faith in Him, build our understanding of him, and help us to worship Him all the more rightly as he would desire. We ask these things in His name. Amen.