Joel Littlefield

“Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’” Matthew 21:12-13

It’s not often that we read of the incarnate Son of God being angry, so let’s pay attention to what He was angry about.

A Den of Robbers

The Temple was designed by God to be a place of prayer. It had become something altogether different. Men were selling animals for sacrifice at exorbitant prices. People were coming with their unblemished animals only to be told they were not good enough. They had no choice but to purchase the higher priced offering. Their desire to worship God was blockaded by greedy men who had searched the Scriptures but missed the whole point. Jesus. They were robbing God of worship, and robbing worshippers of God.

House of Prayer

If Jesus entered our church buildings this Easter Sunday, what would he find, and would He be pleased? Our gatherings should be houses of prayer. When we come together in His name, we want nothing hindering us from prayer. Now, what is prayer? It is more then making requests. Prayer encompasses all that we do as Christians. When we sing, we’re praying praises, and admitting truth. When we read Scripture, we are praying for understanding, and acknowledging His supremacy. When we hear the preaching of the Word, we are praying prayers of confession and repentance. The “house of the Lord” is for prayer.

Hate What God Hates

Jesus entered the Temple and found the leaders making much of themselves, forgetting the weak, and robbing God of His glory. The money changers profited from their exchange rates, and the Temple became nothing more than a market place. Those who had come to pray and to meet with God were met with greed and gross self absorption.

God is not tolerant of worship tainted with sin, greed, and hypocrisy. We shouldn’t be either. We should learn to hate it, first in our own hearts, and then in others. Hating it in other’s requires humility. We can’t go around physically disrupting worship services all over the place (as much as you might feel like it), but we can reproof and rebuke with the Word.

Let’s let the prophet, Jeremiah, help us out a bit. This is what Jesus was thinking about when He rebuked the money changers. It was being fulfilled in His time too.

“Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known, and then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are delivered!’—only to go on doing all these abominations? 11 Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I myself have seen it, declares the LORD.” (Jeremiah 7:9-11)

Here are three exhortations on this “Holy Monday”.

1. Do not ignore or reinterpret what God has made clear about worship in His Word.
2. When you live like Hell all week, and then pretend to be godly on Sunday, you are participating in the very thing Jeremiah was rebuking. God hates hypocrisy!
3. Be a person who worships according to truth, and help (do not hinder) others from doing so. Let your worship and conduct point others to see the heart of God.

Just one final concluding truth. Jesus is the Lamb of God without blemish or spot. He cannot be matched or replaced. No matter how slick the salesman, don’t let anyone sell you a different gospel no matter how glamorous. There isn’t anything better, more perfect, more needful, more sufficient for you than Jesus Christ crucified and risen.

“And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God.” (Heb 10:11–12)

Hosanna!

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