TEMPLE UPSIDEDOWN
John 2:13-22; I Corinthians 1:18-25
The foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength."
Today, I want to look at the "unexpressed text" in our passage from John—a familiar passage to many, especially since it covers an event that is recorded in all four gospels. This story is always taught in Sunday School, probably because it is very dramatic. It also challenges our stereotypical characterization of Jesus as always being kind, good, and soft-spoken; and it involves a lot of yelling and running, as well as imperfect people running afoul of the perfect Christ.
Bear with me as we go deeper into the text, to what I see as an underlying human condition that leads people astray, a condition that we can learn to counteract through a proper perspective of God’s divine authority and Christ’s sacrifice for our sin.
There are three features of John’s report of the cleansing of the Temple that do not all appear in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. These features are the presence of oxen and sheep inside the Temple precinct; the making of a whip; and the prophetic words of Jesus in v 19.
There are no Jewish historical texts that mention animals in the Temple. Knowing what we know about animals and the call of nature, the reason they were not allowed within the Temple is more than obvious.
No weapons were allowed inside the Temple, so the best guestimate is that Jesus grabbed the bulrushes (used for bedding for the animals who were not supposed to be there) and made a whip out of those. Today’s crime scene investigators might call the bulrushes a "weapon of opportunity."
It also appears as if Jesus drove out the merchants as if they were animals. However, none can imagine that Jesus would resort to violence in order to make a point. He preferred preaching parables to wielding weapons.
The third unique feature of John’s record is verse 19: "Destroy this Temple and in three days I will raise it up." The Jews pounce on his words at that moment and also bring it up at his trial, distorting the meaning into little more than sorcery.
How had the sacred Temple at Passover time deteriorated from a holy house of prayer, reverence and worship into a bellowing barnyard of cheating, money changing, out-right thievery? Enter the human condition of slowly, unnoticeably, imperceptibly forgetting our good intentions. What starts out as a righteous reason for a noble action can deteriorate over time into a pointless practice or, as in the case of the Temple merchants, an occasion for what might be called "sanctioned sin."
How did the chosen people of God corrode into the self-chosen people of God? The same way any of us does, by forgetting our purpose, our call, our reason for being; by losing sight of our right-side-up selves that God created us to be; by living as though we grant God his power and his wisdom.
When we forget whose we are, major correction is necessary. We need to be turned upside down, perhaps (figuratively or literally) dropped on our heads so that we start using our hearts for God.
If any believer allows the safety of human intellect to inform the ways our "business" of faith is conducted, then believers have forgotten who is in charge.
It is time to remember well the words of Paul in I Corinthians: "The foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength" (v 25).
Look at the merchants in the Temple: the services they provided could very well have started out as a helpful means of providing a convenient way for the pilgrims to enter the Temple. The services of the Merchants provided the faithful the necessary elements to fulfill their holy obligations. The best animals for their sacrifices and the right coinage for their Temple taxes were made easily available, what could be so bad about that?
Somewhere along the line, perhaps through the passage of time, the merchants’ motivations oozed into desires for personal gain under the guise of business transactions, and it was in this meandering metamorphosis that sin silently replaced sanctuary.
"Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!" Jesus was angry, incensed. Nothing less than turning the temple upside down would achieve total cleansing. This was not an occasion for a parable.
John does not relate this event as a reason to kill the Church, nor is it an attack upon all our rites, customs and designated holy places, but upon our tendency to elevate these things to positions of higher holiness than we ascribe to God.
We tend to give these places and customs the worship and devotion that belongs to God, and God alone.
When we love things that cannot love us back, we misplace our love. When we present Christ-like attitudes to achieve personal gain, we abuse our Lord. When we define God within our own terms, we confine our hope to the weakened structures of a fallen world. Salvation means little more than satisfying human ideology.
Through God’s gift of Jesus Christ to the world, we have been given the presence of the highest love, the model of the deepest commitment, and the grace of the finest forgiveness.
Turning the temple upside down is the best way to turn Christians right side up for the journey with Christ to the cross on Calvary hill and the salvation joy of resurrection morning—proving Jesus’ words to be true: the temple destroyed and rebuilt in three days. Amen.
3/15/2009//1st Parish Fed Church, S Berwick, ME/Rev DL Muise
