Zeal for God’s House
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2020 · 26 July 2020
John 2:12 – 17, “After this He went down to Capernaum, He and His mother, His brothers and His disciples, and they did not stay there many days. 13 Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers doing business. 15 When He had made a whip of cords.”
“He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers’ money and overturned the tables. 16 And He said to those who sold doves, “Take these things away! Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!” 17 Then his disciples remembered this prophecy from the Scriptures: “Passion for God’s house will consume me.”
All the way through, by the miracles of Jesus, by the works of Jesus and by the words of Jesus there is evidence that Jesus is God. Now when we come to the miracle that we just read, which on the surface may not appear as a miracle because nothing really supernatural takes place, as it does in a healing, or the casting out of demons, or the creation of wine as we saw in the first miracle, this is still a miracle.
It is a miracle driven not by compassion, but driven by holy anger. The first miracle that John records at the beginning of miracles that Jesus did was a private miracle. It just happened among family and friends in the little town of Cana, nine miles out of Nazareth with people they knew and grew up with. Mary was there and the family of Jesus and this was His first miracle.
The second miracle is not a private miracle; this is a miracle in which tens of thousands of people participate, and they’re not just innocent bystanders. They’re in the middle of the drama, the power and the divine energy of this miracle. It is not a miracle of kindness and compassion. But at the beginning of His ministry and the end of His ministry, Jesus threw the entire mass of humanity out of the temple at Passover.
Those two were not miracles of compassion, those were miracles of holy anger and they were previews of future judgment, a judgment that would come in the destruction of Jerusalem not long afterwards and a final judgment before the throne of God at the Great White Throne. And what causes Jesus to do what He does here is a religious problem and one that we will address as well.
Go back to Isaiah 1:11, “What are your multiplied sacrifices to Me?” says the Lord.” Josephus says there would have been a quarter of a million animal sacrifices offered at Passover. “I’ve had enough of burnt offering of rams and the fat of fed cattle. I take no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats. 12 When you come to appear before Me, who requires of you this trampling of My courts?”
“13 Bring your worthless offerings no longer. Incense is an abomination to me. New moon and Sabbath, the calling of assemblies, I cannot endure iniquity and the solemn assembly. 14 I hate your new moon festivals and your appointed feasts. They have become a burden to Me. I’m weary of bearing them. 15 So when you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide My eyes from you.”
“Yes, even though you multiply prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are covered with blood. 16 Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean, remove the evil of your deeds from My sight. Cease to do evil, 17 learn to do good, seek justice, reprove the ruthless, defend the orphan, plead for the widow. 18 Come now and let us reason together,’ says the Lord, ‘though your sins are as scarlet they will be as white as snow.”
“Though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool. 19 If you consent and obey, you will eat the best of the lamb. 20 But if you refuse and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword. Truly the mouth of the Lord has spoken.’” That message could have been given by Jesus on the day He cleaned out the temple. It’s the problem of hypocrisy in Israel, false religion and superficial worship.
And it infuriates Jesus because it is irreverent and it is blasphemous. In Amos the Lord says, “Stop your songs; I don’t want to hear your songs.” The Lord feels today and here and now exactly the way He did in Isaiah’s day and in our Lord Jesus’ day about false worship, superficial worship and about hypocrisy. So let’s look at this story and how it applies to us right now.
Verse 12 says, “After this Jesus went down to Capernaum, He, His mother, His brothers and His disciples.” John tells us later in John 7:5 that even his brothers did not believe in Him yet. Jesus did so many miracles in Capernaum that their unbelief was worse than Sodom and Gomorrah. Jesus said in Matthew 11:23 that if it had been done in Sodom and Gomorrah they would have repented.
On this occasion they stay only a few days because they’re headed to Jerusalem for the Passover. Verse 13, “Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.” The Passover is an annual feast followed by another feast of seven days of unleavened bread that God mandated. Remember when Israel was delivered from Egypt in Exodus 12, the last plague is going to be the death of the firstborn.
The angel of death is going to come and kill all the firstborn. And if you want the angel to pass over your house, you need to sprinkle its blood on the doorposts and the crosspiece, eat a meal together and have unleavened bread, and be ready to go. That was a symbol of the work that Messiah would do when He put His blood on the cross and provided for deliverance from divine judgment.
So the Passover is instituted in Exodus 12. In Exodus 23:14 God mandates that they keep that Passover every year along with a couple of other feasts as well. Jesus, being always obedient to the Word of God to do everything in the Old Testament, fulfilled all righteousness, Scripture says. And so, as He always did, He comes to the Passover. In fact, His ministry begins at Passover and ends at Passover.
And at both Passovers, the first and the last, He does the same action against the Temple. At the first Passover, He cleanses the Temple to publicly begin His ministry. At the last, He cleanses the Temple to publicly end His ministry; then Jesus becomes the Passover Lamb. This time as He enters into the Temple to begin His ministry He comes with a different mindset.
We had a glimpse of Jesus coming there, when He was twelve. And at that point He’s only asking questions, trying to get answers out of the leaders in the Temple. But this time He has entered in His messianic ministry and He is going to do His Father’s business. And they have turned His Father’s house into a place of worldly business, but He is going to do His Father’s heavenly business.
Verse 14, “And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers doing business.” The city of Jerusalem normally would have several hundred thousand inhabitants. That means that every room in every inn was turned into a room for occupancy. People were packed into rooms in multiples to get this mass of people in. The population was fourfold what it normally would be.
And the focal point is the Temple, the Temple courtyard and the outside Court of the Gentiles. Josephus mentioned 250 thousand people. The slaughter of the animals took place between three and six o’clock in the afternoon of the Passover. But apparently the people now who used to buy and sell outside the Temple have now moved inside the Courtyard because the High Priest has now taken over this business.
So when you get inside, you not only have this crush of humanity of people coming and going and many people coming to talk to God, to praise God, to worship God, to see the Temple as pilgrims do from other places. In the middle of this there are people selling oxen, sheep and doves. The reason is that people from far away would have to purchase an animal. And there are moneychangers seated at their tables.
If they brought an animal, it would be rejected by the people that checked out the animal and if the animal was refused, they would have to buy one of the temple animals anyway. They rejected the ones that were brought so they could make money on exorbitant prices of the ones they sold. So, everybody had to pay for the animal and the temple tax in the currency that was accepted in Israel.
Jesus sees all of this, selling sacrificial animals, money changing, and He sees that they have totally polluted His Father’s house. They are irreverent. This should have been a place of repentance, a place of reverence, a place of worship, a place of praise; instead it’s a chaotic marketplace where corruption takes place. Nothing enraged Jesus more with holy anger like irreverence.
And Jesus did His most severe action in these two incidents. The rest of the time it was compassion and mercy. And they were done against hypocritical worship. The Jews expected the Messiah to come and attack the Gentiles. Instead, the Messiah came and attacked them. And He attacked them in the middle of their hypocritical worship, at the Passover in the Temple.
They expected a warrior for sure, who would conquer the nations that had abused them, and were currently occupying them. But instead He sends a message that judgment is coming on them, not their enemies. At the end of His ministry Jesus looked at the Temple and told His disciples that disaster is coming where not one stone will be left on another. And that happened on 70 A. D.
Verse 15, “He made a scourge of cords.” It doesn’t seem much of a weapon against tens of thousands of people who were all going to have plenty of reason to resist what He is doing. Now remember, this is an unknown man, this is the beginning of His ministry. They don’t know who He is. He’s just a man at the Passover, perhaps recognizable as a Galilean by the way He dressed.
Verse 16, “And He said to those who sold doves, “Take these things away! Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!” Then Jesus unleashes His miracle power. Again we see how understated the miracles of Scripture are. He just drove them all out. How did He do that? Well, the reverse happened in Galilee when the people tried to kill Him and He just disappeared.
Jesus was in the middle of a crowd and they wanted to stone Him and He just left. This time all the animals leave, and all the people with the doves grab their crates and leave. He flips over all the tables of the moneychangers. They scramble to get whatever they can and they evacuate the place in such an orderly fashion that we don’t even have any word that the Romans came down to pacify the crowd.
Jesus did no harm to people, He attacked their religious system. The merchants would want to stop Him. The Temple police would feel responsible to stop Him. The crowd would want to stop Him. But this is miraculous power. He goes from this private family miracle to this massive public miracle in which tens of thousands of people participate and no one can do anything. Everybody is completely obedient.
This is a preview of the power that Jesus has to judge. He says, “You have polluted My Father’s house.” This is the loyal Son of God who is loyal to His Father. Jesus will do this on a massive scale at His Second Coming. Revelation says a sword will come out of His mouth and there will be a slaughter, the likes of which the world has never seen. Now this has happened before.
In a book called “The Jews at the Time of Jesus” there was a high priest in the Temple at one of these events and the Jews were unhappy with the high priest. So they started throwing lemons at Him. He unleashed His mercenary army, and according to the record, slaughtered many thousands of people in the courtyard. Jesus doesn’t kill anybody, but He judges their entire religious system.
Verse 17 then says, “His disciples remembered that it was written.” Now remember, these six men were true Old Testament believers. They have been with Him now for a week at least. And when they see Jesus do this, they remember Psalm 69:9, “Zeal for Your house will consume me.” David was calling the people to true worship, but the people resisted with hatred and hostility.
The people in Jesus’ time were in the same condition. You know that you are spiritually mature; when God is dishonored and you feel the pain. And they see Jesus doing the same thing. That psalm is messianic in that sense. And Jesus felt the pain far more than David. God is to be glorified. And He was not being glorified there and Jesus declares their whole religious system blasphemous.
So what does that have to do with us? There’s no Temple anymore. Now we as believers are the Temple. Turn to 1 Peter 4:17, “For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God and it begins with us first.” Ephesians 2:19, “You are fellow citizens with the saints and you are God’s household.” The judgment begins with the house of God. We are the Temple of the living God.
If we judge ourselves, we won’t be judged. If we don’t judge ourselves rightly and discern our condition and come in a pure way, then we are exposed to the judgment of God in forms of discipline. What would happen if the Lord showed up here? Would He do something like He did then? Jesus is here and He will judge those who will not examine themselves and repent. So let us pray.