Welcome to the Daily Blade . The Word of God is described as the sword of the Spirit , the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil . Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson , and they stand ready to equip men for the fight . Let's sharpen up .
Hey guys , welcome back . I know for the last couple of days I've gone a little bit longer than what you're normally used to , but I'll try to , you know , tighten it up a little bit or maybe not . Maybe I'll just go longer and y'all will just have to deal with it . But this week we are using John Eldridge's beautiful outlaw to help us get to know the personality of Jesus better . And before preparing all the episodes for this week , I asked that's where we've been focusing all week . So yesterday and today we're in chapter 4 , called Fierce Intention , and on yesterday's episode we discussed the intensity with which Jesus dealt with the death and his subsequent resurrection of his good
buddy Lazarus . And today we're keeping the theme of Fierce Intention of the Lord Jesus by getting into two of my favorite occurrences in the Bible , and that's Jesus cleansing the temple .
Speaker 2Now some of you immediately got confused because you're like , wait a minute , he did that twice . Well , I thought he just did it once and it was just described in all the gospels . But I am of the persuasion , and I've been certainly persuaded by biblical historians and theologians and archaeologists and all types of folks , that this is something that Jesus did at least twice . So the first cleansing was right after he did his first public miracle , and this was early in his ministry , and this is recorded in John two . And then the second cleansing . This was the final week of his life . This was , you know , this passion week . Matthew 21 , mark 11 and Luke 19 . So I want to read from beautiful outlaw , beginning on page 34 . And guys , I just got to be honest . I'm going to read several sections here . It's really hard for me to put into words what this particular passage from Eldridge's book has done for me and how I approach my Christian walk . So let's get into it right
here . Then comes the thunder at the temple and then he's going to be getting into the scripture here John 2 , verses 13 through 17 .
Speaker 2The Passover of the Jews was near and Jesus went up to Jerusalem . In the temple he found people selling cattle , sheep and doves and the money changers seated at their tables , making a whip of cords . He drove all of them out of the temple , both the sheep and the cattle . He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables . He told those who were selling the doves take these things out of here , stop making my father's house a marketplace . His disciples remembered that it was written zeal for your house will consume me . In two verses he empties the temple .
Speaker 2A report that reads like the crack of a bullwhip . But take the action slowly . First , jesus observes the shenanigans and it makes him furious . Then he takes the time to make a weapon . Where did he get these cords ? That required some looking around . Having found them , he had the patience and forethought to weave them together effectively to make a usable whip . He knows what it takes to move a large sedentary cattle and self-righteous profiteers . There's time enough here to cool off if it is merely an outburst of anger . But no , this is a planned and sustained aggression , particularly unsettling for pacifists .
Speaker 2Following the flow of the text , it says he then used the whip to drive all of them out of the temple , both the sheep and the cattle . The livestock would have been kept in some sort of corral . They would have been standing for hours , languid and sleepy . An angry man flying upon them with a whip would ignite panic , mass panic . Animals feed upon others' ? Fear in seconds . Picture cattle and sheep running for their lives , crashing down the corrals , their hooves sliding frantically on the tiles , making them even more desperate . We have a stampede here .
Speaker 2It then says he poured out the coins of the money changers and sent their tables tumbling . The money changers think men who make their living through extortion are reported to have been sitting at those tables . How easy it would have been to move carefully and quickly from the sitting position while removing your legs from the table that is being overturned in front of you . More panic , meanwhile . The coins . Jesus doesn't permit them to gather their money and move off in an orderly fashion . He dumps the coins , scatters them . This is explosive . You've probably had a small handful of change fall off of a counter . They burst in every direction like a jar of marbles . Imagine the chaos of hundreds and hundreds of coins erupting off the stone floors . Now layer all this together . The animals would have panicked in every direction , their keepers running after them , shouting , trying to get control , which only incinerates the panic . Add the greedy money changers scrambling around on the ground , grasping at their careening coins . Imagine the noise bellowing of frightened livestock , mingled with the crashing of corrals .
Speaker 2No-transcript . This is a fierce , intentional man , to be sure , but his passions are neither reckless nor momentary . In the midst of the fury , there is a touching tenderness towards the doves . These were in cages . If Christ were to hurl them to the floor , as he did with the tables , the birds innocent as well doves . They would be hurt , so he commanded them to be removed .
Speaker 2Could a small , unintimidating figure accomplish such a sustained riot ? To pull off ? Driving all of them out of the temple would require more than a few seconds and repeated blows . This is a sustained assault . If a frail man with a meek voice tried this , he'd be log jammed by the sheer number of inertia of the traffic .
Speaker 2Jesus is a locomotive , a juggernaut For all practical purposes . Here he is a bull in a china shop . This is our Jesus . But is this the Jesus of our worship songs ? The religious fog sneaks into the obscure Jesus , with lines comparing him to a rose trampled on the ground . Helpless , lovely Jesus , vegetarian , pacifist , tranquil . Oh wait , that was Gandhi , not Jesus . Can you picture Gandhi or Buddha storming into the polling place of a local election , shouting , overturning tables , sending the participants fleeing ? Now throw a small carnival into the mix , which they also need to rout Impossible .
Speaker 2Whoever did this would have to be really committed to the clearing of the building . Fierce and intentional , this is a breathtaking quality , especially when compared to our present age , where doubt masquerades as humility , passivity cloaks as rest and emasculated indecision poses as laid-back
enlightenment . Guys , I'm running out of time here , but my goodness , that is fire . I literally drew flames on that part of that last part there that I just read . And the thing is is there are a lot of beta male types out there that wish this part was not in the Bible , and there's a lot of reasons for that .
Speaker 2But here's some big takeaways here from this passage . There's three . Number one we cannot fully worship Jesus if we only see him as the lamb of God . He is fully lamb , but he's also fully lion . The second big takeaway is we should not try to declaw the line of Judah . We don't ignore passages like this . We immerse ourselves in them to try to understand how Jesus could come to this and how this level of righteous aggression could come out . And then , third , if we are to be Christ , like sometimes , we
have to turn over some tables . See you back here tomorrow as we wrap up the week .
Speaker 1Thank you for listening to today's episode Before you go . If you want to help equip other men for the fight , share this podcast around and leave us a five-star rating and review . Stay sharp .