Cleansing of the Temple

Sermon 11^th March 2012 (Cleansing of the Temple)

Exodus 20:1-17; 1 Corinthians 1:18-25; & John 2:13-22

+ In the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen

It sometimes seems that those of us inside the church (and often outside the church too) want to try to wrap Jesus up in a great big bundle of love. We become so used to hearing the stories of him reaching out to others, of him healing and embracing the outsider that it is easy to forget or push to one side those stories where he doesn’t seem quite so nice and fluffy. So often people perhaps stay with the image of Jesus as a helpless babe in the manger, or as some sort of nice guy with a beard who looks as though he wouldn’t say boo to a goose!

Today’s gospel reading demolishes that image. We see a side to Jesus that seems to be quite at odds with the nice guy image that we are usually more comfortable with. It certainly isn’t the nicely sanitised and airbrushed image of gentle Jesus meek and mild that so often comes to mind. So what on earth is going on here?

This is a story that appears in all four of the gospels, though in Matthew, Mark and Luke it appears towards the end of Jesus ministry. Here in John’s gospel however it comes at the beginning of the account his ministry and it provides a lens through which the rest of his ministry may be seen.

It comes as the Jews prepare to celebrate Passover, when they remember their deliverance from so many years in the wilderness. And, as with so many Jewish celebrations of that time the focal point was the Temple, the holiest and most sacred place in all of Judaism. The Temple was seen as a place where the faithful could meet with God in a way quite unlike anywhere else. The centrality of the Temple in worship was absolute. There was no other place that could fulfil its function.

And so here we are, faced with this image of Jesus, his eyes blazing with fury and outrage, storming into this most sacred of spaces. Turning over the tables of the money-changers who quite possibly were ripping people off and speaking out against those who sold doves to the poor at often inflated prices for sacrifice! This was a very physical side to Jesus that we don’t often otherwise see in the gospels.

Yet it was so much more than that. It wasn’t simply about Jesus barnstorming into the Temple and defiantly challenging the status quo, though that was certainly a part of it.

In John’s gospel this cleansing of the Temple was very firmly linked with the upcoming death and resurrection of Jesus. When challenged about his actions he speaks in words which foretell not only the physical destruction of the Temple, but also its raising again within three days. To those who questioned him this was simply absurd, the Temple couldn’t be destroyed and then rebuilt within a few days!

Yet as his disciples understood, Jesus was talking not of the Temple in which they stood, but of himself. He was looking towards a time beyond the need for Temple worship when he will be the one around whom all will gather for worship. He himself becomes the direct link with God.  The upcoming destruction of his body upon the cross, on the face of it a sign of defeat and weakness becomes anything but! Out of that weakness and foolishness we hear in our epistle reading from Corinthians comes wisdom and strength. “For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s strength is stronger than human strength” (1Cor 1:25). The status quo is turned completely upside down! Further along in the same letter to the Corinthians we read of how we ourselves are now the temple of the Holy Spirit (1Cor 6:19). The physical Temple where Jesus stormed into with such force is now transformed into a spiritual one. A temple that is within the very being of each of us.

 Instead of having to find God within the confines of a physical temple we have now become the very dwelling place of God. Through the apparent foolishness and tragedy of Jesus death upon a cross comes the way by which all of humanity can now know what it is to be in the loving presence of God.

As we continue to observe these final weeks of Lent we look towards the events of Holy Week with a sense of inevitability but also anticipation. We prepare ourselves to walk that road with our Lord. For some that has meant perhaps walking and praying the Stations of the Cross here in church these last few Saturdays. Others may have different ways by which they are able to reach a place where God is able to speak into their hearts. We are all different, yet the same God dwells within each one of us, changing and transforming us from within.

May each of us in these next few weeks be open to allowing God’s Holy Spirit to remove the clutter and distractions from our lives as we move closer towards his Passion. As he swept away all that was unnecessary in the Temple, may he sweep away all that is unnecessary within us and replace it with his unending wisdom and love, that we keep it not for ourselves, but let it shine out through our lives in the world.

+ In the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

AMEN