JOHN 2:13-25 Lesson # 4
Cleaning the Temple:? Bringing Justice
I. Introduction:
Q? Have you ever done the right thing spiritually, but it was not appreciated, how did you feel? (Would anyone like to share?)
Others have experienced this too, one such is the writer of Psalm 69, let’s turn together and see what he did.? Part of the beauty of the Psalms is that they are able to express what we often feel in such powerful and beautiful language….
You read Psalm 69:1-4
There is even another who experienced this and it is Jesus.? Jesus did not have an easy life, and that included his ministry.
Turn with me to John 2:13
II.? The Cleansing: 2:13-16
Have someone read John 2:13.
Q? Why was Jerusalem so important?
An =? In Jesus’ day the center and focus of worship was the Jerusalem Temple.? It was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.? It was enormous.? It sat on a platform that encompassed 35-40 acres.? The very top of the dome was covered with gold.? The court yards where Jesus would enter and clean out were enormous and could handle thousands of people.?
Q? Why did Jesus go there at the Passover?
An =? First of all Jerusalem (specifically the Temple) was the only place in the world for Jewish people to offer sacrifices.? Some people would travel six months from Babylon or four months from Rome.? Many would save all their lives just to travel once and “appear before Yahweh” as the Torah taught them.? Jerusalem would swell to 3 times it population at Passover, one of the key times to “appear before Yahweh”. The Passover was one of the three key times to “appear before Yahweh”
In addition, at Jesus’ time six times as many Jews lived outside of Palestine than in it.? Though the Jewish people were scattered all over the world they were still Jewish and still believed in the one true God.? Though they were scattered, they still knew that home was Palestine, that home was the promised land.? The center of the land was Jerusalem, and the center of Jerusalem was the Temple.? It was the focus of national identity as well as religious life.?
Q Why were people attracted to the God of Israel?? Why were even Gentiles and pagans attracted to the God of Israel?
An = Because the Jewish people had the Torah, and it taught of a view of God that superseded any view of God the world had ever seen.? Put in simple terms, the Torah revealed a God who was one God, endless in power, but full of justice.?? In the God of Israel, justice and power were wed.
Therefore, people came from all over the world to worship at the Temple.? However, when they came, they had to worship properly and there was the rub.? The priests controlled the Temple and so when someone brought a lamb or other type of offering the Jerusalem priests would declare it “blemished”.? These priests forced the visitors to buy at exurbanite prices.? The pilgrims would try to pay in the currency of their home countries and were not allowed to use “foreign, pagan” currency and had to buy in “Jerusalem shekels” and so had to exchange their money (at a loss) to Jerusalem money changers.? To come to the Temple was to come and get robbed.
To come to the Temple was to approach the Lord of Glory.? To approach His courts was to come to the foundation and fountain head of justice.? But at Jesus’ time, the temptation to make money had corrupted the place.? To approach the Judge of all the earth, entailed getting robbed in the process.? It is confusing to people to come to God and get cheated by God’s servants in God’s holy city.? It hurts people’s faith.
Have someone read John 2:14-16
Q? Was Jesus upset?? Why?
An = In the Synoptic Gospels, Jesus is reported as getting angry because people were getting cheated right in front of the presence of the Lord who is the foundation and origin of justice.? In Matthew 21:13, Jesus says they have turned God’s house from a house of prayer to a “robber’s den” (and Mark (11:15-17) and Luke (19:45-47) say the same thing.?
Q? What does this show us about God?? What will make Him mad?
An = Injustice.? We are not to mock the Lord.? When we hurt people in Jesus’ Name, and defile the one place they should have hope, we are on dangerous ground.? If we hurt the weak in Jesus’ Name, we will encounter His wrath.
Q? However according to verse 16, why is Jesus upset?
An = The injustice is implied, but John gives us another reason for Jesus’ anger.? They have turned His Father’s house into a “Market Square”.? They are running down the reverence and awesomeness of worship and substituting it for a chance to make money.? How can one worship when one is surrounded with such chaos?
III.? The Response to His Action:? John 2:17-22
Note:? What John does is to record three responses to Jesus shattering, disturbing action….
A. The first Response, a later remembrance of the meaning of His action:? 2:17
Have someone read John 2:17
Q? Later on, what were the disciples to figure out about Jesus’ actions here in the Temple?
An = That He fulfilled Scripture, that He was in line with what the Old Testament taught.? That He was like what they would later read about in the Psalms.? Jesus is acting out Psalm 69:9.? “For zeal for Thy house has consumed me….”
Note:?? Have everyone turn to Psalm 69.?
Have someone read Psalm 69:5-9
Note:? Here is a man who is slandered for caring about the honor of God. Similarly, Jesus was later to be attacked because He cared for God and God’s will.
Have someone read Psalm 69:10-12
Note: The Psalm goes on to describe a man who fasted in sorrow and was mocked and slandered.? The disciples were to later realize that their Lord was the fulfillment of such a Psalm and they were to be like their Lord later on in their ministry.
B. An Immediate Response, a disbelief and challenge:? 2:18-21
Have someone read John 2:18-21.
Q Were the people in charge of the Temple happy with Jesus’ concern for God’s honor and the spiritual well being of the visitors who came to pray?
An = No, they were not!? They demand a sign, a show of authorization.? If these people really cared about God’s honor or about the faith of people they would see the obvious.? People who ask for a sign of authorization for what is obvious to any fair minded person, are much like the child who gets caught with his hands in the cookie jar and then says “What?”.
Have someone read John 3:19-21.
Q? What condemns us and sells us into hell?
An = Our own choices, first our own evil, then our refusal to hear the truth about evil.
Back to our story….
Q? Did Jesus give them a sign?? What sign did Jesus give them?
An = A sign that went right over their heads.? He spoke of His resurrection and they did not even get it.? No one did.? One of the signs of judgment is when we can no longer understand what God says.? When we refuse to listen to the obvious, then the deeper things of God become lost to our understanding.?
Such danger exists today.? When we disobey the obvious commands of the Lord, we as Christians become numb to all else that God is saying.? We become like the Israelites of old.
Q? What is Jesus doing? ?Why did He give them a sign they could not understand?? Jesus was the greatest of communicators, but this clearly went right over their heads, why?
An = Jesus is doing what God does in the Old Testament, and still does today.? When we disobey the obvious, He then speaks and we no longer understand.? We become amazingly unable to hear and perceive His truth.? This is scary to say, but true.
C.? Another later Response,? again a remembrance that His response was a prophesy: 2:22.
Have someone read John 2:22
Q? What did the disciples later remember?
An = That Jesus had predicted His death right in the beginning of His ministry.? Jesus did not explain it to them, but later they understood.?? Then they believed.? Remember 2:11?? They saw immediate signs and later signs.? They got early confirmation and later confirmation and so it will be with you.? More is to come.
RQ? Do you realize that God will later make clear a great deal that you do not presently understand?? That is good news, God will confirm your faith even more than He already has!
IV. Later On in Jerusalem: John 2:23-25
Have someone read John 2:23
Q Why did many believe?
An = Because of the signs.
Have someone read John 2:24-25.
Q? How did Jesus respond to their belief?? Did He trust it?
An = No, He did not. He knew men were fickle. He knew that three short years later the crowds of Jerusalem were to give Him up to be crucified (19:6,7,15) and even one of His own disciples was to betray Him (13:11).
God knows we humans are not much of a catch. He knows what we are really like.
Q? If God knows us so well then why did He come to earth to die for us?
An = That is part of the story of grace and certainly grace is surrounded with mystery. “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son”.
God knows you tonight. He knows everything evil and fickle about you. As you go from this place tonight, God will reveal to you yourself, if you are able to bear it. You will be pained but you will grow! You will grow in the strength of your knowledge of grace, in the knowledge of His amazing love. You will sing with deep reverence “Amazing Grace, How sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.” It will not be a mere statement of words, or even of theological words, but will be a profound realization of truth, of the truth about God, about you and about Who He really is.