March 23, 2003
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Prayer: Be with us O God,
as we hear your commandments, look to the cross of Jesus Christ, and find room
in your house for ourselves and then make room for others. We love you God, and
you are high and lifted up in this place. Bless us now, and let the words of my
mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, our
strength and our redeemer. Amen. The theme for these Lenten
seasons is “Renewed by Faith”. To be renewed is to be restored. In the
church, renewal is about finding new life.
During this season, we have considered how our faith in God and Jesus
Christ leads us to renewal. We will need that renewal as we follow Jesus through
his ministry to Jerusalem one final time. We are renewed when we offer ourselves
for baptism, we face down tests to our faith, and we proclaim the good news that
is Jesus Christ. Our faith is renewed and
we grow wiser when we understand what is important to God. The instructions we
know as the Ten Commandments tells us that right relationships with God and with
each other are important to God. Moses brought the people
to the foot of Mt. Sinai, where they stood
waiting. While they waited they heard thunder, they saw lightening, they
heard the trumpet blast. Finally, they heard the voice of God. Listen as God says, “I
brought you out of Egypt, liberated you from slavery, and in this desert
wilderness I am here with you. As you travel to the land of promise, when you
cross over to the place where you are going, keep your faith in me, make me the
first object of your spirit’s devotion and loyalty. I know you will encounter
other gods, but your first relationship is with me. Every other relationship
will follow from the one between you and me. “I
know you will see people making idols and images of their gods. Carry me in your
heart. Know that you carry in your being the image of the one who created you.
And watch how you use my name".
Philip Bence says about this verse what many of us feel. “When I was
young, this commandment kept me away from swear words. I think God has more in
mind, however. In ancient contexts, a name signified more than a convenient
label. One’s name related closely to the essence of that person. When God asks
us to be careful how we use his name, he says more than ‘Be
careful how you use the word God’”
(Philip Bence. The Risen Savior. Lent 2003
Nashville. Abingdon, 2003, p.27). God’s
name is used when we pray and offer praise. It is used in our longings and in
our joy. The name of God is used when we seek the very foundation of our lives. Remember to keep the
Sabbath day, as a day of rest and gratitude for what God has done in your life. Honor your parents,
assuming they do not abuse or exploit them. If they do, love them enough to hold
them accountable, and love yourself enough to get yourself out of harm’s way. Don’t murder. Don’t
commit adultery. Don’t steal. Don’t lie. Don’t envy and covet. Whether you have watched
the news this week supporting this war or railing against it, keep these words
of Terence Fretheim in mind: “The divine intention in creation is that no life
be taken. Life is thus not for human beings to do with as they will; they are
not God. It is up to God to determine what shall be done with life. The issue
thus becomes one of discernment regarding that divine determination” (Terence
E. Fretheim. Genesis. Louisville, John Knox Press. 1991, p. 228). Why does God demand total
loyalty? Why does God prohibit anything? We are free moral agents, why can’t
we just do as we please? Because
each of these prohibitions destroys community. These are the one’s we struggle
with and against. Our culture tells us they are OK, and that some are even
justified. But each one, steals a bit of our souls. These commandments are
about helping us to remember so we can gain faith and wisdom and behave as if
knowing God makes a difference in our lives. We get in trouble when we forget
what is sacred, and what is faithful behavior. Families and relationships have
been destroyed by unfaithfulness, communities and people are violated by theft,
trust is broken by lying, and our lives are made miserable when they are
consumed by our desperate need to have what our neighbors have, and to live
lifestyles we cannot afford. We are renewed when we discern what is true and
right. Such discernment is the beginning of wisdom. Genesis asks us to grow
wiser as we understand what it means to be in a positive relationship with God.
We are also made wiser when we give ourselves to the one who reminds us of what
is holy and who clears space for us. Let me be clear about what
this story is not. The story of Jesus cleansing the Temple is not a story about
bake sales, tag sales, lunch sales, or flower sales. It is not about fund
raising. It is not about stewardship. It is about concerned with turning a
profit that there is no room for people to come and worship. That is what Jesus did in
the Temple courtyard that day in Jerusalem that day in the first of three
Passover stories John tells. Passover was the event by which death quite
literally passed over the homes of the Hebrew slaves all those years ago in
Egypt. When death did not claim them, they were spared for liberation. The
Passover is among the central stories in the Hebrew faith and it comes to us in
the church as we celebrate the Lord’s supper each week.
Verse thirteen tells us
that Jesus went up to Jerusalem. He and others “go up to Jerusalem”. The
city of Jerusalem sits on a mountain, so people had to go up in order to get
there. Jerusalem is also the holy city, so going to Jerusalem would give a
pilgrim a sense of going up into the presence of God. People came from as far as
Rome to be part of the most sacred of all the faith festivals. It was here in
the Jerusalem Temple that sacrifices could be made. Some estimate that at
Passover, the population of the city would increase more than three fold.
Normally 50,000 people lived in Jerusalem. At Passover, the population swelled
to 180,000 (www.lectionary.org).
Imagine the gridlock. It surely looked like Time Square and Las Vegas Boulevard
on New Year’s Eve. What Jesus found as we
walked into the Temple court was not what he expected to see. He expected to see
Gentiles worshipers of God in the place reserved for them in the Temple
courtyard, called the Court of the Gentiles. But they were not there, because
there was no room. Instead of seeing Gentile worshipers gathered there, there
were vendors. There was not merely a booth here or there, but an open market
with people selling thousands of birds, and thousands of animals. There were
money changers in the courtyard too. Why were they there? They would say that they
were merely providing a service and making money for the Temple at the same
time. After all, part of the observance of Passover required the sacrifice of
animals. Pilgrims would wait to purchase their animals at the Temple because is
hard to travel with live animals, they might escape or get injured on the
journey and what was required was unblemished animals. Money exchangers were
there because only coins minted in the region of Tyre could be used for paying
the Temple tax. Certainly no coin bearing the likeness of Caesar was acceptable. Animals and money were necessary for making sacrifices and
for paying the Temple tax. The Temple was as Jesus
and others saw it being used not to help the people gathered for worship, but
rather it was being abused in order to enrich the people doing business there. All those smelly animals
with their scents wafting into the Temple itself, all those people yelling and
screaming get in the way of people actually worshiping God. They are a
distraction, they are a barrier to life with God, and it is too much for Jesus,
who wants to make a place where Gentiles can worship, and to remove anything
that hindered people from approaching God.
Jesus took strong action. He makes a whip and cleans the place out. He
yells at the vendors, “take this stuff out of here. Go outside the gates with
your animals and your currency exchange. This is my father’s house, it is not
the local mall!” He’s got their attention
now. The animals have scattered, the birds have flown away, the money changers
are on their hands and knees in an area so packed they cannot move, trying to
find their money. No worship or offering is possible now.
The Temple is closed for the day which upsets the religious leaders. “By what sign and by
what authority did you create this chaos?” “Tear this
Temple down and in three days it will rise”. “What are you talking
about? It has taken almost fifty years to build this temple, you would tear it
down and rebuild it in three days? We don’t think so!” The leaders are not wise
enough to get it. Jesus knows so
because he knows that after Jerusalem, after the cross, after the resurrection
– he will be the site and the focus of our worship. We know that understanding
is not the same as knowing what to do. That is why even the disciples will not
get it until after the resurrection. Our good news is that we
are among those who live after the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We are the ones
whose faith is renewed as we grow wiser about our relationship with God. When we
find renewal and wisdom, we will know what to do. We can find wisdom enough
to honor the God who honors us with a covenant that calls us into good and right
relationships with God and each other. I know we can. We can honor the Son of
God who has made room for you and room for me no matter who we are. Once the
Temple courtyard has been cleared, Jesus brings into the Temple grounds those
who were excluded – the poor, the sick, the outcasts. We honor Christ by
making room in this room and in these hearts for those too easily cast away.
Surely we can honor the Holy Spirit of God, willed to us by Jesus Christ and
find that as the breath of God moves in us, we find space to make room for
others. You may have read in
Thursday’s Dispatch of a documentary that was screened at the Wexner
Center this weekend. It is called Flag
Wars and it describes the tension between folks who have lived in Olde Towne
East a long time but have limited resources and people who have resources but
who are fairly new to the community. We can be a bridge here. Our statement of
affirmation says we can: We
affirm that God has called us to be and to live the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Welcoming all to the table, we acknowledge that Christ’s call reaches across
the worldly divisions of race, nationality, ability, gender, sexual identity,
and socioeconomic status. We seek, therefore, to be Christlike in our response
to one another and to the world through our actions by the creation of policies,
procedures, and programs. We seek also to be Christlike through community
service and partnerships that create an affirming community of love, care, and
support for all. Our presence here by
membership, by our attendance, by our presence on this corner bears witness to
our desire to be a faithful reconciled and reconciling community of Christians,
Our Christ calls us to be nothing less. Our zeal for God’s house will lead us
to make this a place of Sabbath rest and joyful worship and service. Our renewed
faith will give us wisdom to know how to do it. When we live in right
relationship, when we praise God for making room for us, by making room for
others we will find ourselves renewed and even more faithful than we already
are. We will discover a
companion on the journey. God who invites us in will lead us every step of the
way. This is the word and promise of God. It is our hope. Praise and thanks be
to God forever. Amen. Dr.
LaTaunya M. Bynum |
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Broad
Street Christian Church
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