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Week:10, Season:1,
2015
Posted on Saturday by PCT
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Building a Temple of Prayer
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Scripture：《
John 2:13-22
》
13 When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” 17 His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.” 18 The Jews then responded to him, “What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.” 20 They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” 21 But the temple he had spoken of was his body. 22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.
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The meaning of building the temple of God
The Bible passage this week, on the third Sunday of Lent, gives us insight into three points: 1. we should keep the temple or church as a place for worshipping God and we should respect God’s holiness by ensuring our behaviour is appropriate there: respect the holiness of God by keep our behaviours holy ; 2. fill the temple or church with God’s healing power and blessing and so make it a place for people to rely on God’s glorious works and to receive spiritual help; 3. Keep the temple or church a place of worship with purity, truth and faith; make it a place for people to rely on the faithful and never-changing God.
This passage from John 2:13-22 about Jesus’ action of driving out the merchants doing business in the temple helps us to reflect on our own faith. We should not blame the merchants trading in the temple as from ancient times to the present, the market exists because there is a demand. At the time of Jesus, selling cattle, sheep and doves, and exchanging money in the temple was not purely commercial behaviour but it was related to the practice of offering sacrifice to God for sins. The problem was, firstly, that not every household had appropriate livestock to offer as a sacrifice; secondly, not everyone who came to the temple carried Hebrew coins. Therefore, for the convenience of offering sacrifice to God in the temple and for the purpose of sanctification, people had to buy flawless livestock sold near the temple and exchanged the Romans coins engraved with the Roman emperor’s portrait for Hebrew coins to offer these to God.
This may look like a picture of a Taiwanese temple. The crowds gather in front of the temple to buy incense, paper gold, and fruit for offerings. At first, the sellers gathered in the temple because there was a demand, and gradually it became a place of battle between different competitors. The saturated market along with the Taiwanese temple culture formed a chaotic scene in which the demands of daily living has become more important than the desire for religious faith and has broken the purity of worship.
The Bible passage today tells us that Jesus saw a chaotic scene inside God’s temple and that people had forgotten about the true meaning of worship. To Jesus, his “Father’s house” was desecrated. The first temple in Israel was built by King Solomon (2 Chronicles chapter 2 to 5). It was a temple God had promised to his people and was the centre of the religious, cultural, social and political activities at the time. In 586 BC, the Kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Babylon. King Nebuchadnezzar II destroyed the temple in Jerusalem temple and conquered the people of God, forcing them into exile. In 539 BC, the Babylonian Empire was defeated by the Persian Empire. God called a new king of Israel to take his people back to Jerusalem and to rebuild the temple. Under the leadership of Zerubbabel, the house of the Lord was rebuilt in 520 BC in Jerusalem for the first time; it was destroyed again by Antiochus IV and his Greek army and made into a place for worshipping idols. Then in 19 BC, under the Romans’ authority, Herod the Great rebuilt the temple to show friendliness to the Jewish people.
In this passage, Jesus saw that the temple of God was filled with those conducting business. It was as if the Father had lost the heavenly glory. Jesus understood the history of this temple and God’s mind of salvation. The fact that the temple was once destroyed but then rebuilt again shows that people’s disobedience did not hinder God’s plan of salvation. The collapse of God’s temple indicated that his people no longer worshiped him but Jesus knew it was the Lord’s will to rebuild this temple; so he said, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.”
Raise the temple and the spiritual life
Rebuilding the temple indicates God’s purpose of regaining lives belonging to him. Our faith should be an inner response to our Heavenly Father. The notion behind this reconstruction is that the Lord is with his people; this should be the most important message to us. The temple of Jerusalem built by the Israelites contained the deep desire to build faith, groups, worship, and prayer in order to turn the weak faith in each era into strong.
When I looked at the historical pictures of Ershui Presbyterian Church of Taiwan, they told me the story of this church over the past 117 years. Following the timeline from pictures of Ershui Presbyterian Church, in 1898, the church was just a cottage; in 1907, it became a wooden house and later in 1917-1934, after a serious earthquake, the church was rebuilt as a brick house with an arch, until in 1991-1993, it was refurbished as a modern church building. The four different architectures represent not the economic status of this church but God’s wonderful plan to build such a beautiful temple for his people to use to establish a heavenly faith which connects with their life, fellowship and service.
There must be a mission to build people’s spiritual lives when building a temple of God. The members of the church need to believe in Christ’s resurrection and the presence of the Lord so as not to fall into arguments about the success or failure of the construction. Building a temple requires constant prayer to see the instruction of God and allow him to work to gain new lives in this generation to be saved by his grace.
Jesus claimed that the house of father is a “temple of prayer.” We should see through Jesus’ eyes that the most important fact behind his action of rebuilding God’s temple is that a church of God should be filled with the true voice of prayer rather than the sounds of selling merchandise. A temple without sincere worship from its people is not a holy place anymore. This is the meaning behind why Jesus said he would “raise” the temple.
Listen to the voice that cannot be heard; see things that cannot be seen
I have a reflection while reading John chapter 2 which I would like to share with my reader. We should “listen to the voice that cannot be heard; see things that cannot be seen.” As Christians, we need to live a holy life full of hope as pleases God. We live in a sinful world and often our faith is weak as it often seems that we live in a world which is unstable and insecure and we feel that no one cares; and the reality often is that other people do not have time to care about you because they might in bigger troubles than you.
John chapter 2 tells us about the crisis of faith at Jesus’ time but Jesus explained to all that their deconsecration of God’s temple has made it lose its religious and teaching function which can set people free and bring comfort to them. Moreover, everyone who entered this temple only heard the sounds of those selling merchandise and not the voice of God. Listening to the voice that cannot be heard is to pay attention to the work of the Holy Spirit; seeing things that cannot be seen is to witness the mercy of God. Christians should not live only by what we see and hear but should connect with our heavenly father and see, hear and feel what he says to us, so we are working with the Lord with all our hearts and minds and are committed to our mission.
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For discussion：
1. Ask yourself how long has it been since you heard the voice of God in your church except for complaints and murmuring against others
2. Are you willing to set aside feelings of insecurity which do not belong to God？ How may you focus on your prayer and allow Jesus’ voice to be heard？
Please pray for：
1. All the Christian church. May it become a place for people to pray in faith and in truth.
2. All church brothers and sisters. May each of us treat our body as the temple of God and fill it with the holiness of the Lord.
3. That God helps us to have ability to serve others and pray for their lives. May the temple of God welcome more new lives.
Prayer：
Dear heavenly father, thank you for giving Jesus Christ to be the head of our church. Father we have built this church in this place for a while through your holy will and promise. May you call all weak souls coming to your temple. May all people receive joy, peace and power in your temple. In the name of Christ, Amen.
Something you can do：
1. During Lent, start to invite new friends to church for the Sunday service. Listen to their concerns and pray for them.
2. Write a 30-day prayer plan for your family. Make a list of prayer requests from your family members and bless each other.
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