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Jesus used a whip of cords to chase the money-changers from the temple. This seems extreme to us until we remember the gravity and importance of the purpose for which the temple was made.
My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations (see Mark 11:17, Isaiah 56:7).
The temple was meant to be a place of encounter with the living God, a place defined by presence and relationship, and not be status, commerce, or means. The particular part of the temple that Jesus cleansed was known as the Court of the Gentiles. It represented the very closest that Gentiles were allowed to come to the God of Israel under the dispensation of the Old Covenant. Yet the sacred purpose of that area and of the temple in general had been subverted by the mundane and the secular. Profit seeking was preferred to seeking God himself.
While acknowledging that the cleansing of the temple was an extreme measure, let us remember that what Jesus did externally in cleansing the temple was something which he himself was willing to receive upon the true temple of his body.
Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged (see John 19:1).
There were no money-changers taking up space in the heart of Jesus, nor did he himself need any cleansing. It was rather that he held us in his heart when he endured that anguish. The purification that resulted redounded to our own souls, so that we could be cleansed of greed and idolatry and be made true temples of the Holy Spirit. The zeal which Jesus demonstrated for the old temple was just a shadow of the zeal he has for us. It only hinted at the lengths he himself was willing to go so that, by the indwelling Spirit, our hearts could become houses of prayer.
Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. ... But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth (see John 4:21-23).
The zeal of Jesus for his temple should inspire holy fear in us, but not despair or anxiety. For he himself demonstrated that he was willing to bear the cost of our purification even while we were yet sinners, before we were ready to cooperate with his plan in any way. Now that he has done so the call for us is to unite our own sufferings with which he freely bore so that the fruit of that purifying power can be realized in us.
Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? I anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple (see First Corinthians 3:16-17).
We now have some sense of the degree to which Jesus is zealous that his people become a people of prayer, with hearts unencumbered enough by the world to enter into worship. We see the lengths to which he went to ensure that it would be possible, not just generally, but for each one of us. We recognize that he will not be content to rest on his laurels until that possibility is realized in us. If this means, occasionally, a whip of cords, we can know that we endure together with him, that we are in that very moment held and strengthened by his love.
The purpose of our lives is meant to be worship. If we have become overfilled with the Pagan, with greed and idolatry, or even over secular matters that seem harmless but now leave us no room for God, it is time that we rededicate ourselves just as Judas and his brothers rededicated the temple.
on that very day it was reconsecrated
with songs, harps, flutes, and cymbals.
All the people prostrated themselves and adored and praised Heaven,
who had given them success.
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