Cleansing the Temple

Isaiah 56:7 - Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people.
Matt.21:13 - And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.
Mk.11:17 - And he taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den of thieves.
Lk.19:46 - Saying unto them, It is written, My house is the house of prayer: but ye have made it a den of thieves.

Every vacation Bible school student is taught the story of how Jesus went into the same Temple in which He was dedicated and circumcised and made a whip and turned over the money changing tables and cleansed the Temple from that uncleanness. The Temple had become a place where poor people were charged excessive amounts of money for flawed animal sacrifices, and this was done right at the Temple gates. Jesus not only rebukes them as thieves that are defiling the Temple, but He quotes the Prophet Isaiah saying “for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people“. This is just before the Lord’s crucifixion and Jesus was surely making many major statements both to the Jews at that time and for us today.

Many people attempt to portray Jesus as benign and without any anger and with that they teach that God Himself has no anger today. Jesus showed mercy to the woman caught in adultery, He showed patience to Peter’s often outbursts, He even pleaded for forgiveness for His executioners, but somehow Christ’s wrath explodes when faced with abject wickedness in His own church. The corruption of God’s church seems to be the most intense object of God’s anger. Most of the churches referred to in the book of Revelation are rebuked and warned from God’s own mouth. God has little patience with those who would corrupt His church and one doesn’t have to be clairvoyant to understand why. Jesus is protecting His sheep from contamination.

So what application is there for Christ’s church and us as individual believers today? I am sure, like all of God’s Word, that the applications are many, but I will deal with and expound the two most obvious teachings gleaned from this event in our Lord’s life. The most obvious principle that Jesus is teaching concerns the merchandising and the doctrinal variance that weans God’s people off of meat and onto that which leads them away from God. In Christ’s time the Scriptural view of a blameless and spotless sacrifice that should reflect the coming Messiah had imploded into a sacrifice that could be the refuse of the herd and one by which money could be made. It was blasphemous.

Look around at the ecclesiastical expressions of Christianity today and wipe your eyes as you see what man has done to God’s unspeakable gift. Of course there are the obvious liars who promise that God will make you rich by giving to them and people by the millions, deceived by the lusts of their own flesh, follow after these false teachers and give to make the preachers wealthy personally. How could anyone believe such unbiblical teachings? The depth and power of deception is far greater than we have ever been able to realize, and if you say with confidence that you could never be deceived then you have placed yourself as a candidate for deception. Maybe you will never believe the health and wealth deception, but that is only one of many thousands of deceptions whose unifying purpose is to silently shake people away from the truth, turn them unto fables, and in so doing lead them away from Christ.

Although the health and wealth deception is very prominent, there are several new and rapidly growing deceptions that may not appeal to the lusts of the eye (wealth) but appeal to the pride of life. One of the strongest idols that man has ever bowed before is his own mind. The intellect of man has now moved into a prominent place in some of the newer movements that have arisen from within the church itself. Some of the identifying aspects of these movements are first and foremost a transitioning away from the basic truths of the church in past generations, and in many cases a total rejection of even redemptive views and what part Scripture plays in gleaning those truths. This is no boy crying wolf, this is much worse that most of us could imagine.

Please do not underestimate what is happening today, and just as in Jerusalem Christ is cleansing His temple again today. And in Jerusalem He cleansed His house just before He would return to heaven, today He cleanses just before He returns to Jerusalem. Oh how we should grieve for our brethren that are unknowingly following a spiritual concoction that emanates from the idol of men’s minds. Any time new revelation becomes frequent and predictable, a red flag should arise in our spirits. When a preacher doesn’t use the proven truths of the church but builds his own new and attractive foundation, we should run and adhere Paul’s admonition to be simple concerning evil. And when you survey the composition of the listeners and discover them to be predominately white, middle and upper middle class people, much of whom have some post high school education, then you must ask yourself what is it that is drawing them and not so much others.

Some wavering movements use music to draw, some use extravagant promises to garner followship, but some use an intellectual approach that allows the listeners to identify and understand much which ministers to one’s pride, and yet they present just enough new and mysterious interpretations so as to maintain both the hunger for more and the air of idolatry toward the teacher himself. You see, people are excited to identify with this teacher because he isn’t just presenting the gospel and Biblical truth with an unusual anointing and with a genuineness that both builds up and tears down, he is redefining truth and we are a part of his revolutionary journey that is finally correcting all the errors taught by the men of church history who we thought were used of God to expound God’s truth.

Teaching science or sociology or astronomy or anything else without clearly and forthrightly meshing it with the gospel of Jesus Christ is the idolatry of men’s mind. Jesus’ words about becoming like a little child ring hollow in many so called evangelical circles today. The cerebral aggrandizement of titillating philosophy is by definition a round table journey without a destination and serves only to cement into people’s theology that we can be certain about almost nothing. Meeting in a rented bar is not an issue, it is what has drawn people to that gathering enough to pay to hear some preacher expound upon issues that secular scholars could just as well present. To claim that is a Christian meeting without a clear gospel presentation is nothing more than a lie. But these are some of the things that Jesus through the power of the Spirit wishes to cleanse and commands us not to be a partaker of those carnal gatherings and meaningless monologues. God is not impressed with anyone’s intellect and God says, “Let not the wise man glory in is wisdom”.

Now there are other movements that are entangled with a different misguided methodology but which are still the exhibitions of the mind of man. Any theology that considers itself to have exclusive insight into the very fabric and workings of redemption directly from the mind of God, coupled with an obsession to preach and teach that particular view chronically, is again an emphasis on the intellect of man. Within the true church of Christ there are Biblical views that have been turned into idols and which are used to look down upon all other views as errors, shallow, and even “levels of unbelief”. While these are not dismantling the gospel, they have become more than just another sincere view concerning the intents of God, they have become doctrinal dwellings built upon intellectual pride and self righteous certainty. And like the former movement I addressed, this one has a common characteristic. The preponderance of systematic presentation of that particular view complete with historical quotes, redundant arguments, and verbal swipes at others views are rarely balanced with challenges to the sins within their own camp. Presenting doctrinal truth in pride is like offering a steak dinner on a garbage can lid.

But what about the different movements within our own individual hearts? How many minor and major movements have we entertained within the hidden resources of our own hearts complete with personalized components that minister to our own flesh? While we excoriate the emergent movement for their lack of doctrinal integrity are we being exposed by God for our own spiritual integrity? What spiritual integrity, you ask, I am orthodox in every way. Let us return to that specific event in our Lord’s like and take notice that it wasn’t just the manifestation of error that Jesus addressed, He also addressed the lack of spiritual manifestation in the form of prayer. And now our self righteous protestations that we have remained doctrinally faithful fall powerless within the anemic manifestations of our prayer lives. Many people will become more offended at what I have shared before than what I will share now about the prayer lives of the church collectively as well as individually.

There was Hannah as she prayed and the Word says she was so broken and so earnest she wept sore and could only move her lips but her voice would not come. Even the high priest, Eli, thought she was drunk because of the demonstrative nature of her prayers but she assured Eli that she had a sorrowful heart and she says she had “poured out her soul before the Lord”. Did you hear that my Christian brethren, she had poured out her very soul before the Lord. When was the last time you prayed in a fashion that could be described as pouring out your soul? Oh these “Polly want a cracker” prayers do little more than provide a conscience salve for our religious spirit but those certainly move no mountains. We march into the sanctuary on Sunday mornings and the “service” is comprised of more announcements than soul searching prayer. Where are the tears that authenticate the depth of our passion before the God who hears our prayers, where are the fastings that discipline the flesh and seek to focus our spirits? And with all the many departures by our brethren, where is the desperation?

We have become adept at researching and cataloguing the errors and sins of others but have we grown in length and depth and passion in our prayer closets? The individual prayer closet as well as the corporate prayer gatherings have become a disgrace and only reflect our level of unbelief in prayer itself. The church has been fragmented in all sorts of different doctrinal directions and the world itself lies in the Wicked One and yet the church house remains dark at night save for some committee meetings or some other activities. The Master kneels before heaven on the very night He was betrayed and yet the church refuses to kneel before heaven as He is betrayed again. Dry eyes gather on Sundays and dry eyes return home having enjoyed a nice and tidy doctrinal dissertation that usually re-emphasizes and reaffirms rather than challenges us to our very being so we run to the prayer closet and pour out our soul before our Savior and Maker.

Of course the Holy Spirit moves in many different ways, but why are our services so very predictable and scripted? Why doesn’t the Spirit’s ministry ever move the entire congregation with such a convicting sense of God’s presence that it moves people to their knees in tears? Why is the parking lot always filled with smiles and never tears and even groups in prayer? I am not speaking of wild emotion outside Biblical guidelines, I am speaking of prayer that corresponds to the spiritual realities that we say we believe are taking place today, to say nothing of prayer that actually substantiates our systematic theologies on the subject. Jesus said our gatherings should be remarkable by our practice of prayer and yet we have organized them around music, preaching, and many other things and have left the defining essence as peripheral. Nothing can be accomplished with Christ and His power will never be manifested without prayer.

The Scriptures say we should pray without ceasing, strong prayers, tear filled prayers, prayers with fastings, and some elongated prayer gatherings that shun the confines of schedules and time. The days are evil my friends, but we have been lulled into feeling a sense of our own accomplishment simply by remaining faithful to basic doctrines when in reality we have not attended to our own garden. Let us allow Jesus to cleanse our own temple from all the fallow ground and things that have kept us from spending the time in His presence that demonstrates we acknowledge that His power alone is sufficient for these things, to say nothing that we love Him and not just the facts about Him. Let Him cleanse us of ourselves, for in the end, we are our greatest stumbling block.

After the Lord has cleansed His Temple what will be left?