Jesus Clears the Temple- John 2:12-25

The temple was a very sacred to Jesus.

After the wedding at Cana, Jesus and his family, and his disciples, spent a few days in Capernaum. When it was almost time for the Passover Feast, which all Jews were required to celebrate, Jesus went to the temple and was angered by what he saw.

There were money changers and merchants selling cattle, sheep and doves in the outer court of the temple. The Jews were required to offer a sacrifice and those traveling from far away, often needed to purchase one. That in itself, was not the problem. These people were offering a needed service. There was also only certain currency that was allowed to be used in the temple. The money changers were providing a service. This was not the problem either.

The problem was, that in jockeying for the “best position,” these folks had decided not to just provide these services when the traveling pilgrims got close to the temple; they decided to go onto the temple property itself. This outer court, was the only place that the Gentiles, the non-Jews who may be seeking God, were allowed to pray. The Gentiles were not allowed inside the temple.

So, if a Gentile were to come to pray during Passover, they were greeted with a marketplace and since they weren’t allowed to go inside, this would be all they would get to witness of the Jews worshiping God. This made Jesus very angry.

We rarely think of Jesus as being angry. This is the man who willingly gave his life for all of mankind. This is the man who asked God to forgive those who taunted him as he was dying on the cross. But, defiling God’s house made him angry. Not only did it make him angry, he fashioned a whip out of cords and drove them out.

What does this display tell us? Well, it’s kind of comforting to me to know that it is okay to get angry about something we are passionate about. The Bible has many places where God gets angry. Anger is a natural emotion for us and is sometimes justified.

But, I think the bigger story here may be that the greed of these merchants may have been a stumbling block for those who were seeking God. I don’t think he had a problem with them providing a service or even making a reasonable amount of money. I think his issue was they had taken their greed and moved it into the temple, into God’s house. That made him furious.

I think it’s also important to note that Jesus wasn’t just some passive person. He was the Son of God. He was strong and he was passionate. I think we would like to put him in a neat little box where he was never angry and always had a smile on his face. The scripture paints a different story.

The chapter ends with him telling the religious leaders who were angry at his display that they could destroy the temple and he would rebuild it in three days. They thought he was crazy, but he was already referring to his death and resurrection. Jesus knew exactly what was coming.

What do you think about Jesus clearing the temple? I’d love to hear from you.

Have an awesome day!

Wendy 🙂