Jesus' Cleansing of the Temple - Dr. Andy Miller III - Wesley Biblical Seminary Chapel

This message was preached at Wesley Biblical Seminary during Holy Week of 2023 

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Transcript

At moments of convenience. I have seen people on various sides of political the political aisle take this passage and use it to their advantage. Just in the past few years, I've seen Alexandria Ocasio, Cortez, AOC and Donald Trump alike take this passage and apply it to themselves, as if or or they're at least their followers. As if they are the ones who are stepping. And clearing out the temple with their either socialist policies or their MAGA policies, right? This has been something that has been clearly used by political groups or even us when maybe there's actions that seem a little bit out of the ordinary. But despite this political appropriation. Mean is easy to overlook like this story is one that's easy for us not to think about. Sometimes we would rather not think about this somewhat embarrassing action of Jesus in John Chapter 2 and is interested. Of course, every gospel writer gives us this story. They put it at different places. We're going to talk about that. Nevertheless, it's something that is significant, but might seem like it's something outside of Jesus's character. Just before this passage, at the beginning of John Chapter two, we have a story that, even for a teetotaling institution like ours, we might resonate with that one. We'll take Jesus's turning the water into wine maybe ahead. Of him clearing the temple? Or how about the feeding of the 5000 or the healings or even the chief sign that leads to Jesus's death and crucified Jesus's crucifixion of raising of Lazarus? That's a good one. But clearing the temple, it's easy for us to kind of change our view of Jesus and just forget that he did this. I mean, after all, would we take this and apply it to ourselves by me? A good 1990s youth group Christian, and take a WWJD bracelet? And next time there's a bake sale at the back of the church, whether it's old ladies or teenagers, go and kick them out. Right. Because or next time Gigis brownies, which I know many of you are very fond of. My daughter's brownie, come. That's right. Made it into a den. A A House of thieves. And the next time she makes her way through the halls of Wesley Biblical Seminary. Should we then kick her out and take her little order sheet and put it into the shredder? Right. Oh, I know. That would really make some people. Mad would that be? Appropriate appropriation or application that we shouldn't do this? I think something else is happening in this passage. Each gospel writer brings us into this story. And sometimes you know, we have in synoptic tradition it shows this happening in the events of Holy Week. This is something that happens likely after Jesus's triumphal entry. Sometimes it happens the next day, sometimes it happens immediately, and then we have the perplexing situation that we likely cover in New Testament introduction. Thinking about why does John? Put this in John chapter. Now, likely I'd probably fall on the side that he is not trying to treat this story in a chronological way, but nevertheless there's something about this story that must be significant. We don't know what the exact offense was. It's interesting. I think that every gospel writer seems to assume that something is wrong with these money changers. And then of course, John gives us his really interesting detail. Not only did he just turn over the tables, not only did he take the coins and throw them on the ground. But the challenge of course, and and and those who are just war theorists, we have our own challenges, OK, of Jesus statements, Jesus statements can confront us. But the pacifist has a challenge. The fact that Jesus actually created a whip. And drove people out of the temple and that's what John gives us his story and it it's confusing and it's easier for us just to think maybe this is something that we can just jump over. Why would he do this? Still, there's others who might suggest. Shouldn't Jesus just be a little bit more tolerant? I mean, after all, there's nothing. That is happening in the life of the temple that a good committee couldn't deal with, right? Couldn't we just not be so rash? After all, we could take this to faculty assembly, have it ratified by the Board of trustees, insert it into the Student handbook, and then we'll have a good policy that we'll be able to implement. Or maybe. You know those of my friends who are serving in a. Methodist Church. Let's just relax a little bit. Here the book of discipline hasn't changed. Let's just allow ourselves some time to think through this. After all, we don't want to be too rash. Let's be a little bit more tolerant and this has been the tradition, the history of interpretation, for a period of years thought of this passage in a way that was unique. They would think what Jesus was after here was just and this is the Protestant lie. Just some reforms to the temple, something similar to what the Essenes had said, like, OK, there's problems in the temple that need to be just adjusted a little. Let's just make a few tweaks to the temple system. And they suggest that that's what Jesus is saying. Like, OK, let's just get the money changers. Let's move them about 20 feet. The other the other way, like that's really the problem. And then there's even some who would just even go as. Far as to. Say those who don't. Really I would, I would think, subscribe to the idea that Jesus was truly and properly God and truly and properly man just flat out say like they do with some of. The other Jesus. Some about Jesus's other statements. He's just wrong here. Like I've heard that this is the suggestion John Howard Yoder, right, Jesus is just wrong. Like he's he's he's. Acting in his humanity and obviously just wrong it and and. We we we could very easily as an evangelical institution. You know, kind of look down our noses at the Protestant Liberals who think such things, but then when it comes to us applying this passage, we might think to ourselves too well, I'm not really interested in. And Jesus get into my business. I don't really want Jesus to come and tell me the things. I need to Jesus. If you mess with my resentment that I'm holding on to. If you mess with my jealousy, if you mess with my marriage me mess with the way that I'm operating and dealing with some of these things. But my my addictions. The way I'm getting through this class thinking of some of our students just to kind of make it work. I don't have to give my 100% effort. We could say to Jesus too, like the Protestant liberals, you're wrong here. I'm not particularly interested in you critiquing me. Since our President last week, I heard him for 5 minutes. Do impressions of the office. I take that as a blank check to use an illustration from the office in a seminary Chapel, nevertheless. There was this moment. Where the young intern Ryan. Comes in and I think there's this is. This is at a place where there's a change happening and he's trying to think of what type of. Leader he wants. And he says this, he says, lead me. I I want guidance. I want leadership, he said. But but don't just boss me around, like, leave me. And then he says this interesting line, he says lead me. When I'm in the mood to be LED.

Leave. Leave me in.

The in the mood when I when I'm in the mood to be LED and that's how we. Feel what? Jesus. Is movement here like. Yeah, geez, I'm glad for you to take out these other areas to come and clear these temples, but don't. Don't mess with me in this area. This is a hard passage for us to work through. What do? We do with it. Jesus takes clear indefinite action and I think it leads us to a place where we have to think about what is actually happening in the life of the temple. Like there's one place where we just think about it like, well, they're exchanging one thing. For another, they're exchanging, and we're told they're money changers. They're in the temple. Maybe they're taking things that are meant for worship, certainly like things for the sacrificial system. Animals, probably all sorts of other religious paraphernalia for the sake of their own immediate gain. But I think there's something more here, like think about what's going on like they're actually doing something good for the sacrificial system. Jesus critique is so much more than just the fact that they're after a few dollars. I think he's after the whole temple. The concept of the temple in general. Like what these people are doing, turning over the money changers isn't just about the fact that they're after a few bucks. He's after the. Temple as a whole. He's saying the whole institution is off. What the temple has done, what the temple wasn't doing. When I was making notes for this in Evernote, I was dictating a few notes, and I tell our preaching students to do that too sometimes and when. I was when? I was doing that I I said they were traitors, traitors, TRADERS, traitors. But it dictated it trait tours. TRAITORS. Traitors. But there's something similar with these. Right. What? What is a traitor? Do Benedict Arnold. He takes something that exists in one place like he had a mission to be a part of the American Revolution. And he traded TRD. TRADERS. He traded that for something else. He traded the original purpose that he was a part of something for his own gain. He is exchanging one thing for another. And could that be what we're doing, like we'll not respond to the sin in our lives, will not respond to the sin in the life of the church. And of course, it's easy to kind of pick on what's going on in the Methodist Church at this moment, right? Oh, we're not respond. To that, but this is so poignant in our own lives. Like I want us to focus in on that. Not just the institutional side. Are we willing to trade? What makes us immediately satisfied? For God's original purpose. Each of the gospel writers, I think, has an illusion in mind, and some of them are more direct than others, and they take us back to Zechariah. The last chapter of Zechariah, not Zechariah, Zechariah. You know that book that almost made it as a last book of the Old Testament, the 2nd to last book. Old Testament in the 14th chapter. You could go there if you have. Your Bibles with you and it's really interesting. How it ends? I mean, it has this beautiful ending, and of course this is very when when you hear this, like when you almost read this, if you're going through a Bible reading plan, you finally get to Zechariah chapter 14. It shows us things about this week. It says. On that day in verse four, his feet and of course on that day, is that common eschatological theme that keeps coming through on that day, his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives will be split. It just sounds like something coming up here, right on that day there will be 1, Lord, his name will be the only name on that day there will neither be sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. On that day, it keeps on going these. Beautiful pictures that. The Lord is king, but then it ends in this seemingly anticlimactic. Way was it say in verse 21 and on that day there shall no longer be a trader in the House of the in the House of the Lord of Host on that day. Now I think we'll come back to keep your finger in that passage. There's something going on there that's connected to this picture of what God wants to see happen. The Gospel writer saw and looked for a time where those who were filling the temple and exchanging the immediate for eternal realities would be cleared out. You you all know Abby's having surgery tomorrow and we're really thankful that her parents are coming into town. To help us out. And so whenever family come into town, we get to clean the house. And I I like a clean we we're not clean freaks, but we'd like to clean the house. And I tell you though. As much therapeutic value as there is in pushing a vacuum cleaner or smelling the lemony smell of, you know, pledge. I I don't clean the house because I like the sound of the vacuum cleaner. I cleaned the house because the house becomes more of what it's meant to be. That's why I cleaned the house. And Jesus comes into the temple here, maybe with this picture of mind zachariah's prophecy. Certainly the gospel writers think that. That's the case. Not because he wants to destroy it. But because he knows what the temple should be. He knows what the temple can be. He clears out the temple, not to destroy it, but to bring it to its ultimate fulfillment. When Jesus steps in the temple, he's foreshadowing what will come as a result of his life, death and resurrection. And of course, John points us there and he gets us there pretty quickly in a way that other gospel writers don't. The last year that my wife and I were serving in Tampa, FL I I remember some really clear moments. And one of those were like, we wanted to go see the Florida orchestra one last time. Now we had a car that was like provided for us by the Salvation Army. But this was one of these cars that was passed down. Through the years like it, it had five other. Operators before us that our Stavish army officers and so it was an old car and it was a lemon of a car, teddy. It just was a rough one. You wouldn't take it, you would not take it at all. And for the third time, it broke down on me. And this time it broke down when Abby. And I were trying. To go to. The Florida orchestra it was. I was so frustrated. So we took and I decided we were going to sell this. And so we went up to Pep boys. I had to get the car fixed before I could sell it. But I went in to take a picture of the car before I would sell. Because it you know, we needed to have that so they could assess its value and just. As I was about to. Take a picture of the car. I realized that the bumper was hanging off in the front. So, and I knew how to fix this bumper it was. Nice solid kick. Well, I didn't need duct tape that. So I went up and I went to kick it. And after I kicked it, the very large strong mechanic came and grabbed me by the shoulders and. Said what are? You doing and he pulled me back. And he looked at me and he scolded me. And he. Said, what are you thinking? Said this is a great car. And I thought this car has failed me three times. What are you talking about? But I didn't say that to him because he was looking up at him and then he came down and he sat down. I got down on his knees. I'm telling you the truth. And he started petting. The car and he said they're there. They're there. You're a good boy. You're a good boy. You're a good car. Daddy just doesn't know how to show you he loves you. Am I in a alternate universe here or something? And then he came back to me and told me over and over again why I shouldn't sell this car. Why is a perfectly good car? And I'm telling you, in that moment, I realized that this guy sees something in this car that I cannot see. And I did the next day, take the car and. I sold the car. But he saw something in there that I couldn't. See and I think when Jesus comes into. The temple he. Sees something that we can't and he. Comes into our lives. And he wants to clean things out. Because he sees things. He sees what it can be. He sees what you can be. He sees what I say biblically. Seminar could be he sees. What our students can be. If they work through the challenges that we put in front of them. And I think that that's what's going on in this passage of Zachariah, is that there's something more that Jesus sees the temple being. No notice. It's the go. Back to Zachariah, chapter 14, verse 20. Before he gets his place where he talks about, there'll be no longer, there will be no more traitors in the temple, he says on that day. In all, caps in in NIV holy to the Lord will be inscribed on the bells of the horses and the cooking pots and the house, O Lord, will be like the Sacred Bowls in front of the altar. Every pot in Jerusalem and Judah will be holy to the Lord Almighty, and all who come to sacrifice. Will take some of the pots and cooking them and then the verse that I read earlier and on that day there will no longer be a traitor in the House of the Lord Almighty. Saying that all of the pots and pans, that's what Jesus is after. That every pot and pan in Israel is just as valuable is just as important as the pots and pans that are on the altar. That everything becomes holy, that the temple is not just this one place where this happens, instead that somehow through him. Everything will be made right? So Jesus is coming back into Jerusalem here and Matt talked about this last week. He enters in. He enters in to redeem it. This is such a classic piece of this story that I think is so important that Jesus doesn't just isn't just like this hero that goes away and says he's a hero that comes back, he comes back to take care of the problems. He comes back as CS, Lewis says, into enemy occupied territory. He comes back and he laments over Jerusalem. He comes back and he has zeal. As John tells us, for the House of the Lord, because he knows what it can be. I have a a person who helps me with various things in our House cause this is the first time in my adult life that I've. Owned a house. First time I've lived in a house that's owned by somebody who lives in the house like I've always lived in a. Parsonage like my. Whole life. So it's very different from me, but the person who helps me with my house is also a philosopher and a theologian. And you might, you might know him. His name is Jonathan Blakemore. And as we are working on a deck few years, a few months ago, I mean, I'm so thankful God has sent him to me because on many fronts. But beyond that, he challenged me to read GK Chesterton's the everlasting man and I I gave up on that book when I was in my 20s. It was too hard for me. He talked me into it. And I just found this amazing passage in this in this book where he's talking about Jesus coming back into the temple. And he says that. This is not GK Chesterton, not Jonathan, but Jonathan could say this. Too, this is not. This story is not only a romance of travel. But it's a romance of return. And the end of enemy occupation. Kind of wonder where CS Lewis got that statement and in the occupied territory of mere Christianity. It's the end of that occupation. Jesus is coming to bust up the temple. Because it's not living. Up to its purpose. And then John gives us. This extra wrinkle that is so. Wild to me, he says in verse 20. But he was speaking when he talks about the fact that the temple will be destroyed and raised up in three days. He was speaking about the temple of his body. Oh my, we do not have the time in your seminary education. To cover what that statement means, this is an ecclesiological statement. Is an eschatological statement. It's an analogical statement.

A metaphysical physical.

It's a statement describing all of reality that the temple somehow is his body. Body and what is the temple? We think of this as Jesus's body being raised, but also it. There's also a nuptial theme to this that somehow we are the bride of Christ, and when we also individually are the temples of the Holy Spirit, we are the body of Christ. The church is the body of Christ. Oh my goodness. What does this mean? And John tells us this at the very beginning of his gospel. And I think part of the reason he does this. Is to clear the way for. What's gonna happen through Jesus's life? This is preparation and realization, don't you think, Rick? This is this is getting us ready for what is to come that Jesus's body what he does. In his body, through his life, death, and resurrection. Then somehow we are mystically intertwined with that, that we become one with Christ. And Jesus sets the stage for this. Here in John two, this shows us that Jesus will take definite action, that he's not gonna leave things as they are misdirected in their purpose. The purpose of the temple, the purpose of Israel, was to be a light to the nations, not to be, not to exist for themselves. It also shows us that Jesus is going to respond to that which is. Evil in our world. We might wonder. Well, you know, why don't you? God, why don't you just do something about these problems? He did. He will. And we have a foreshadowing of that in this gospel story that God is going to respond and he responds here and is foreshadows the fact that through his life, death, and resurrection, he will continue to respond. He will respond for his his world. He will respond for the temple. He will respond. To the church, God will respond. To sin, God will respond to injustice. God will respond to in idolatry. God will respond to pain. God will respond to suffering. God will step in and he will fix all the things that are wrong and we have a picture of that here when? He clears the temple. But the way we realize is that and the way this happens. How's this happen?

Through his body.

In his body. And in order for God's. Action to happen. It might mean we need to be ready. For him to clear us out. As I would have said. Growing up in Chicago. He needs to bust us up. And I think this. Is where the idea of Zachariah? Comes together as at every area of our life, has opportunity to show that. I I I was, you know, Stan Keith said this and it made a deep impact on me and I think he got it from Doctor Ken Law and he probably got it from somewhere else. But the idea that we then are those who are conquered. By Jesus the great hymn by George Matheson make me a captive Lord. Then at last I shall be free. We allow Jesus to tackle us, to bust us up, to clean us out. So that we get to be agents. Of his redemption. This is in part why we fight. I didn't anticipate the fact that as accepting this job meant that I would be the academic disciplinarian. Sorry, Matt, you should have told me that. And right now, like I don't know if people are watching this, who were are receiving that discipline, I hope you are. That people, as a result of our education, have to be confronted. With their own performance. And sometimes when that fails. They have to redeem that. And you have to take. The steps to go through. The hard work of becoming stronger. To let yourself be cleaned out. To let your resentment, your jealousy, your pain. Be cleaned out so that you can be a temple that God uses. This is this is in part, I think what Jesus is trying to do, not just make us uncomfortable. But to lead us to a place? Where his body and somehow that is us. Where his body? Can do what the temple was meant to do. Thank you, Lord, for the way you have led us here as we are led through this Holy Week. If there's something you need to clean out in US. Would you do it? Would your Holy Spirit help us to submit to your leadership? So that we can be your agents of change of truth. Of beauty of all goodness. Thank you for taking this definite action for us. So that every air of our life. All the pots and pans. Every aspect. Is made wholly imperfect for your purpose. We say this to the glory of our triune God, and in Jesus's name, Amen. God bless you all.