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Oh, it's awesome. Good morning, good morning. You know, um, I had my first ever church planting assessment this last week. And uh, you know, they they asked me, they said, so like, what do you think qualifies you to go out and plant a church? And what I just said to them is, you know, Holly and I, we've been so privileged that we've gotten a front row seat to, I think, some of the best church planners around in Pastors Clayton and Courtney. And so, can we just honor them really quick? Come on. Um such an honor, privilege to be a part of this family, and it's so incredible what God has done here in this house in such a short period of time. Um, if you would go ahead and turn with me in your Bibles to John chapter 2. That's where we're gonna be today. Uh, and if you are just joining us, or if you are new to this series, we've been in this series called The Jesus Life. And the question we've been asking is this how do I get the good life? How do I get the abundant life? I've titled today's message, The Cleansed Life. We're gonna be walking through the scenes from Jesus' life when he cleansed the temple. And so we're gonna pick it up here in verse 13 through 22. Here we go. When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So he made a whip out of cords and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle. He scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves, he said, Get these out of here. Stop turning my father's house into a market. His disciples remembered that it was written, Zeal for your house will consume me. The Jews then responded to him, What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all of this? Jesus answered them, Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days. They replied, It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you're gonna raise it in three days? But the temple he had spoken of was his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said, then they believed this scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken. Like Clayton just alluded to a few moments ago, and I know I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I grew up in Michigan, okay? And uh I'll never forget my grandparents. They lived in Florida, and during the summer they'd come visit us from time to time. And uh one particular time, I remember my grandpa getting out of the car, unloading his suitcase, bringing everything inside the house. And my brother and I are sitting there as he's unloading his suitcase, and the moment he opens his suitcase, the world's like in my mind, my eight-year-old brain, the world's largest lizard, jumps out of his suitcase and starts running around the house. Now, for me as a boy growing up in Michigan, this is the first encounter I've ever had with a lizard. We don't have those things up north. I'm like, this is a crazy looking snake with like legs and arms slithering around the house, like, what is this thing? Get it out. Now, I'll never forget, I'll never forget what my dad did. Men in the room, you can probably relate a little bit to this, but my dad kind of kicked into another gear. He went full kind of like Navy SEAL mode-ish. Uh, he got his gun, and um and he posted up outside of the house, opened up the back door, and he just was on this weird like stakeout, like just sitting there waiting for the lizard to run outside. Now, most of you in the room, you're like, well, what's the big deal? Just open the door, like let the lizard out. Like, no, like my dad had to take action. And as an eight-year-old boy, I was like, Who is this man? I want to be like that, you know? And it's like, but the thing that I remember so vividly about it is my dad knew that something in the house didn't belong. He knew that there was something in there that was trying to take up residence in our home. I have a question for you this morning. Is there something that's snuck into your life that doesn't belong? And is it trying to take up residence? We've all likely been there. See, maybe it's a relationship. Maybe a slight offense has crept into the relationship. And that offense slowly, over time, turns into bitterness. Maybe you made a choice long ago, seemed small, insigni insignificant, but it led to an addiction. You had a thought, it just kind of crept in years ago. Maybe it was a word or a phrase, somebody spoke over you, and now it's a source of insecurity in your life. See, it usually starts small. I love what C.S. Lewis said. He says this indeed the safest road to hell is the gradual one, the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts. Guys, this is how the enemy works. He doesn't want you to know where you're headed. He doesn't want you to know what you've allowed in. There are no signposts to alert you or how long you've been headed in a particular direction. There are no mile markers, no sudden turns. He knows if there's a sudden turn, it may just jolt you and wake you up to the fact that something wrong is happening around you. The enemy wants to sneak little things into your life without you noticing it. And this, this is exactly what's going on in the temple scene we just read. But before we go any further, I just need you, just for a moment, just nerd out real quick with me. Just like nerd out. This is some temple theology 101, all right? This is some Old Testament history lesson here. We need to know what the temple is. To understand the gravity of what Jesus is doing, we have to know what the temple is. What is the temple? The temple is the place where God's presence dwelt. You see, our God, the Christian God, desires to dwell with his people. God wants to be with you. God wants a relationship with you. The thing that turns the pages of the Bible is that God is pursuing his people. That's the Christian God. We see it literally on page one of the Bible in the Garden of Eden. He creates this beautiful garden, he puts at the center Adam and Eve. And what is he doing? He is dwelling with them, walking with them in the cool of the day. The original design was for that. And then we see later on, after God rescues the Hebrew people out of slavery, out from under the rule of Pharaoh, Moses is given instructions on how to build the tabernacle. Now, the tabernacle is this portable tent that literally houses the presence of God. And in the wilderness, God would, his presence would guide his people through the wilderness, a pillar of fire by night, cloud by day, and they would just follow the leading presence of God. And then when they get into the promised land, King Solomon is given direct instructions on this is my temple, and I want it built this way, and we see the temple. Now, here's the deal. We're like, oh, it's just some old like church building on the street corner, you know, they got a pretty decent worship service, sing a few songs, listen to like a message, and then go get brunch, right? Like, no, like the temple was literally the pinnacle. It was like the thing, it was the heart of all of Judaism. It was the center of worship, music, politics, society. It was the place of national mourning and weeping. And as a Jew, as a Jew, it didn't matter how far you were from the temple, at some point you'd have to come back to the temple. And why? Because the temple was the place you did two things. Two things. And this is key. It was the place of meeting. It was the place of meeting. It was the place of personal encounter with God. If you wanted to meet with God, talk with God, be in his presence, you had to go to the temple. And it was the meeting place because, too, it was the place of sacrifice. You see, if you wanted to meet with God, you had to provide a sacrifice. Because in order to atone for the sin in you, the sins you've committed, you had to atone for that. You had to pay that debt off before you could meet with the holy God and be in the presence of God. And here's the thing, here's why this matters. Because when Jesus shows up in verse 19, and he says this incredible line, some scholars say this is the line that literally led Jesus to the cross. When he says in verse 19, destroy this temple, and I will raise it three days later. What is he implying? He is implying, guys, guess what? You thought this physical building was the temple, the dwelling place of God Almighty. I'm showing up, I'm telling you, no, I am the temple. I am the temple. I am the physical dwelling place of our Father, God, our Father, on earth. But it doesn't just stop there. He's also the place of sacrifice, the perfect sacrifice, the one who atones for the sins of all of humanity. And here is why this matters. And so if you've been tracking with me, here's the important part. Because through the death and resurrection of Jesus, every follower of Jesus is now made right with God, and we ourselves become living, breathing temples of the Holy Spirit. Here's how Paul put it: 1 Corinthians 6, 19 through 20. Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own. You were bought at a price. Therefore, honor God with your bodies. I want to tell you this morning, you are a living temple of the Most High God. His spirit dwells and resides in you. The same spirit that raised Christ from the dead is alive in you. If you've professed Jesus, if you've said yes to him, accepted him into your heart, accepted his death and resurrection, he is Lord and King. His spirit is in you. And so when Jesus cleanses the temple, and you please get this, when Jesus cleanses the temple, we get a glimpse of how the Holy Spirit works in us. See what Jesus did in the temple 2,000 years ago is what I feel the Holy Spirit doing in me daily. And I think as believers, that's a good thing. But what is it precisely that Jesus does in the temple that then the Holy Spirit does in us? He cleanses it, but he does three things. He identifies, he purifies, he consecrates. Three quick things. First, he identifies, meaning he identifies the problem. Jesus walks in the temple, takes one look around, and he sees they're selling cattle in here, they're selling sheep, there are doves, there are money changers. And I mean, I don't know like what you picture in this moment, but let me tell you what I picture. I picture Costco on a Saturday. I picture H E B on a Saturday, like peak hours, right? The aisles are packed, you can't get through with your cart, kids are running all over the place, you have no idea where your kids are. You lost them like hours ago. And it's so loud, it's like it's so noisy. The minute this happens to me, I don't know if this happens to anybody else, but like the minute I crossed the threshold, like into HEB, I forget why I stepped in in the first place. I'm like, I have I'm not smart enough to take a list. Like, no, like there's so much chaos happening in there, my mind is all over the place. And I forget why I'm there in the first place. I wonder if this was kind of the cultural vibe or feel in the temple. There's so much happening, so much, so many transactions, so many sales are being made. But here's the real problem: the problem is not the selling of animals. They had to sell animals to sacrifice. The problem was where and how they were doing it. Okay, I want you to just put yourself in the shoes of somebody who'd have to go to the temple. Think for a moment. It's Passover. You have to make your pilgrimage to the temple. And let's say you live in Galilee. That's a three to four-day journey. You know what I don't want to be taken with me on that three to four-day journey? The little lamb that I'm about to sacrifice. Like leash and all, like you gotta lead it, you gotta care for it, you gotta plan your route accordingly. Like logistically, that's kind of a nightmare. And so what the temple would do is they had animals like over here on tap, ready just in case you wanted to purchase one. But the problem was, the problem was, this practice got closer and closer and closer to the temple. And eventually it got into the temple. Where they were doing this practice was wrong. Now, how? How did they do it? Well, the Sadducees, kind of the temple treasury people of the time, they realized, oh, this is a good, this is a good business strategy right here. We'll start up charging the animals, and then when people bring in their foreign currency, we're gonna tap on an exchange rate there. And what they were doing is they were using the sacrificial system to literally oppress people who are going to the temple to worship. And Jesus, he shows up in the other gospels, he's getting off the donkey, he just arrives to Jerusalem, and his first stop is the temple. And he identifies the problem instantly. He says, Where you're doing this, how you're doing this, it's unacceptable. Why? Because my father's house is supposed to be a place of prayer. But instead, it actually looks and feels like a marketplace. The problem was they allowed something common. Something as common as the marketplace to take up residence in the dwelling place of God. What a travesty. What a travesty. But you know, depending on how you read this story, it can sound a little harsh. But I actually think I want you to see the kindness here. Because it's actually good to be able to identify the problem areas. See, it reminds me my senior year in college one day, woke up and I was freaking out because I woke up with like hives all over. Like allergic reaction to something, face, swollen, lips, swollen, all of it. And I woke up, I was like, I gotta get to the doctors, figure out what's going on. They're like, hey, you're probably just having like a mild reaction. And I was like, what? This is mild, like what the heck? And so they're like, hey, take 24 hours here, here's a pill, take that, you know, send me on my way. Uh 24 hours, nothing changes. Week later, nothing changes. Months later, nothing changes. Go back to the doctor, I saw all the specialists, got all the blood work done, like all the things. I literally tried everything. And I was finally diagnosed, was just like they're like, hey, this is just like chronic hives. We don't know why it's here. It's just here. And y'all, someday, like I remember hiding out in my college dorm room because I would wake up and my eye would be swollen shut, my lips would be swollen. Like one time I passed Holly, my wife, who was then my girlfriend, she didn't even recognize me. She passed me, she didn't even know that I was there. Like, and after a year and a half, it went away. I think it was really bad cafeteria food and probably stress. But after a year and a half, it just went away one day. But the most like frustrating thing about all of that was no specialist could tell me, here's the cause. Like the symptoms were horrible. Like the pain, the itching, the swelling, all of it. So, so horrible. But the worse than that was I had no idea what was causing it. And that right there, that is the real problem. Is that sometimes I think a sign of someone who's walking in step with the spirit, and this is the kindness. When somebody is walking in step with the spirit, and the spirit is alive and well on the inside of them, one of the signs is that you'll have this ability to start identifying the problem areas in your life. And it feels like this maybe the only way I know how to put it is maybe it feels like for the first time in life you're being transformed on the inside. The Holy Spirit's bringing out different things on the inside that nobody else could maybe see, but you know they're there. And starts transforming those things on the inside, and then that transforms the outside. And that's what Jesus does in the temple. He goes into the middle of the temple and he purifies it from the inside out. And this is the second thing we see here. Jesus purifies the temple, meaning he deals with the problem. Look at this. Look at how he does this. First, he makes a whip. Step one, okay, like I don't know if if you've ever binge-watched some like crime shows on Netflix or Hulu or whatever, but like, here's what this shows me. This shows me that this was premeditated. Okay? This is premeditated because Jesus didn't like just like all of a sudden get like whatever he could find his hand on and act out in rage. Like, no, he sat there. Let's say it takes 10 minutes. I don't know how long it takes to make a whip. Let's just say 10 minutes. He's sitting there for 10 minutes fashioning this whip. And he's just like looking around the temple. Okay, how am I gonna do this? Like this is this is premeditated. Like, like, this isn't a quick fit of rage. This is a planned attack. Then he drives the animals from the temple courts. This is Passover. This is like the highest holiday. This temple is packed. This is like Easter service, okay? Like it's full. People are pressing in. And now he starts whipping the animals and they're running through the temple courts. My question is like, dude, like, where are the temple police? Like, like what? Like, they're just letting Jesus do this? Like this, this would be a wild, wild scene. Then he he looks over at the money changers. He's like, I'm coming for you too. And he walks over there. He flips their tables, he gets their bags of money, he's dumping it all over the place. It's like, what is going on? This is such a wild scene. Some of you in this room, you're like, I resonate with this Jesus. Let's go, you know. Like, I know you Texans, you know. But what does this show us? It shows us that Jesus is acting intentionally, and he's acting with urgency. Jesus goes into the temple with laser focus. Jesus knows that there's corruption in my father's house, and I have to deal with it. I have to purify it. I have to drive it out of here. It reminds me of Ming the Tiger. Anybody ever hear this? Ming the Tiger. Anybody? Two people, maybe. Okay, awesome. This is great. I want to share this story with you. A guy named Anton Yates bought an eight-week-old Siberian Bengal tiger cup. He lived in New York and he kept this little tiger cub locked up in his apartment in the guest room in Harlem, New York. And how many of y'all know, like, that tiger didn't stay a cup, right? Like, you know where this story is going. This uh little tiger, Ming the tiger, would consume, get this, 20 pounds of chicken a day. And this thing grew up to weigh 400 pounds. And your boy Anton is just keeping this tiger locked up in the guest room. Wild. But here's a picture. I want to show you this picture up here. This is the tiger locked up in the apartment. Now, cops are on the scene because uh you know what happened. Anton got attacked, uh, bit up his arm pretty good, clawed him up pretty good, bit his leg pretty good. Um, and uh he he was able to escape. He he made it to the doctors, made it, checked himself into the ER, and the the doctors were like, uh, dude, what happened? And he was like, uh, my pit bull bit me. And the doctors were like, uh, sure, okay, like, sure. And so the cops did some investigating, they show up to this guy's house and they realize this tiger has been locked away. Now, here's the thing. Here's the thing. For Anton, he probably never saw the tiger that you and I see. For Anton, he probably just saw the little cute tiger cub he picked up years ago. The little like, the harmless tiger cub, the little manageable, cute, innocent tiger cub that he would, you know, feed from time to time. But along the way, over time, this cub grew up to become the 400-pound tiger you and I see today. You see, Jesus, he identifies the problem and he drives it out. I have to ask you, is there a problem in your life that the Holy Spirit has been convicting you of? And the Holy Spirit's like, you need to get rid of this. You need to drive this out. It's a cub now, but tomorrow it might be the thing that turns out, turns around and bites you. Do you have that thing locked up in the room and the Holy Spirit's saying, hey, you need to drive this out. You need to get it out of here. Because tomorrow it's going to consume you. Tomorrow it will devour you. Here's what Genesis 4 7 says Sin is crouching at your door. It desires to have you, but you must rule over it. The imagery here is sin is crouching. A lion crouches, a tiger crouches, and it waits to pounce on you. When you're alone, when you're vulnerable, it'll take you out. That's how sin works. Is there something in your life you need to drive out that you need to purify? That you need to say, you know what? This isn't acceptable anymore. The Holy Spirit's convicting me of this. I need to get it out. And herein lies the difference between Jesus and the temple. Jesus was 100% pure and free of sin, free of corruption. But why? Because he lived a fully consecrated life. He lived a fully consecrated life. The temple lost its holiness, it lost its purity because it was no longer consecrated. What does it mean to be consecrated? It means to be set aside for a special purpose. The temple was supposed to be set aside for a special purpose, of being the dwelling place of the presence of God. And the temple rulers failed to keep the temple set apart for special purposes. Instead, they used it to make money and to oppress the people who worshipped there. You see, consecration and holiness go hand in hand. Here's the difference. In our house, we have some special plates. Okay? I would even call them just for this illustration, we have some holy plates, some set apart plates. They're plates that only come out when Thanksgiving rolls around. Okay? My job during Thanksgiving is my one focus is I make sure it's the best turkey we've ever had. And I'm out there all day. I'm just, man, I'm smoking that turkey out there on the pit boss. Like, man, I'm going to town, I'm loving every second of it. I'm hanging outside. I'm watching football. Like this is my this is my jam. This is it. But I learned the hard way is that when I bring that turkey inside, I don't just carve it up and throw it and slap it in some tinfoil tray. Like that, that doesn't look good on the photo. You know, my wife's like, no, no, Chris, we have a special plate for that. You know, aesthetically, it's got to be pleasing, right? You know, the table has to look a certain way for Thanksgiving. And so Holly will pull out just for Thanksgiving the set apart plate, the holy plate. But what made that holy? What made it set apart? It was consecrated. Meaning at some point, Holly went to the store, looked at all the other plates, all the other things, and said, This right here, this is gonna be the special plate that the Thanksgiving Day turkey rests in. Grab that plate, pick it out, and pull it out from the many, consecrate it, and say, this is it. But how does it stay that way? It stays that way because when pizza night rolls around on Friday night, that play, that plate stays in the cabinet. It doesn't come out. It doesn't come out because it has a special purpose. The thing I just want to tell you this morning is that you have a special purpose. You've been pulled out. You have been set aside for a special purpose, and that special purpose is to be the dwelling place of God's Holy Spirit. He dwells on the inside of you. We see Jesus did this throughout his life. In the garden, he says, Not my will, but your will. That's a sign of consecration. So I didn't do this for my own glory, I did this for the glory of the Father. That is consecration. Jesus was the only one who is fully given, fully reserved for God the Father to dwell in. And so our call as followers of Jesus is to become like that, to be consecrated, set apart, so that God's Spirit could dwell on the inside of us. See, if our bodies are temples, then we're supposed to be consecrated, set apart for a special purpose. And again, if you don't hear anything, hear this. Your special purpose is that you are to house the indwelling presence of God Almighty. Just want to tell you this. This is what it looks like to be fully human. This is what it looks like to live into the way that you were created to live. See, the world would tell you, you do you, live your authentic self. And when you live your authentic self and live out your true identity, whatever that is, then you will be truly human. And God says, no, that's not what it looks like to be truly human. To be truly human is to know that you are created to be a vessel for God's Holy Spirit to live and dwell on the inside of you. And so sin isn't something we take lightly. Sin is something that when it enters into our life, we need to push it out. We need to deal with it. And so again, I ask is there anything in your heart, anything in your life that you've allowed in, and it's taking up residence. Bow your head.