Have you ever come between a mother bear and her cubs?  We were in gathered as a family in the mountains of Tennessee one summer to celebrate our 50^th anniversary of marriage with our kids and grandkids.  What a fun few days this was!  We rented a huge cabin that housed all of us high in the mountains.  The wraparound deck was the place to gather to gaze at the magnificent mountain views.  One morning, Randy decided to take walk down the mountain to stretch his legs.  Not used to the altitude, he tired when he began to hike the steep road back to the lodge.  Something within me, decided that he was taking too long to return so a couple of granddaughters followed me to see where he was.  He was okay but we sent for a car to come and get us. 

Only minutes later, we all decided to pile into our vans to go sight-seeing.  As we came down the mountain, a mother bear with three cubs following close behind her, appeared on the path—the same path that Randy had walked.  She guarded her cubs by bringing them close to her, then she angrily looked at our stopped vans.  Time stood still.  We had enough wisdom not to get out our vans, but we did stop to take video of the scene.  She rose up to let us know, this is where she lived with her family and we were intruding!  And she was right!  We respected her territory and at the same time, admired the way she protected her cubs.  She would have given her life for theirs, if necessary.  This God-created instinct to protect and draw your offspring close to you is prevalent in the animal kingdom.

When we read the display of emotion of what seems to us to be anger and retaliation of Jesus at the Temple, our minds are troubled.  Jesus is kind, compassionate, gentle, and loving—just like His Father!  So why is this happening? 

John 2, The Message

Tear Down This Temple . . .

^13-14 When the Passover Feast, celebrated each spring by the Jews, was about to take place, Jesus traveled up to Jerusalem. He found the Temple teeming with people selling cattle and sheep and doves. The loan sharks were also there in full strength.

^15-17 Jesus put together a whip out of strips of leather and chased them out of the Temple, stampeding the sheep and cattle, upending the tables of the loan sharks, spilling coins left and right. He told the dove merchants, “Get your things out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a shopping mall!” That’s when his disciples remembered the Scripture, “Zeal for your house consumes me.”

^18-19 But the Jews were upset. They asked, “What credentials can you present to justify this?” Jesus answered, “Tear down this Temple and in three days I’ll put it back together.”

^20-22 They were indignant: “It took forty-six years to build this Temple, and you’re going to rebuild it in three days?” But Jesus was talking about his body as the Temple. Later, after he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered he had said this. They then put two and two together and believed both what was written in Scripture and what Jesus had said.

^23-25 During the time he was in Jerusalem, those days of the Passover Feast, many people noticed the signs he was displaying and, seeing they pointed straight to God, entrusted their lives to him. But Jesus didn’t entrust his life to them. He knew them inside and out, knew how untrustworthy they were. He didn’t need any help in seeing right through them.

WHAT DO WE LEARN—HOW DO WE RESPOND?

Jesus loves like His Father.  The Temple was built as a safe, beautiful haven for God’s people to come to Him in prayer and receive word from Him.  The sins of His people were ceremoniously placed on the heads of animals as directed by God and then sacrificed as a offering to God.  This sacrifice was the way for God to “cover” over their sins with the blood of an animal.  So, when Jesus sees that The Temple had become anything but what it was meant to be, His love for God, His love for God’s place of worship for His people, along with the love of God’s people stirred within Him.  Jesus’ heart of protection for God’s people rose up within Him.  He saw for Himself how God’s people were being cheated by the riff-raff and carnival barkers trying to sell them “sacrifices” at gouged prices.  The Temple because a market place for the profit of individuals.

It was Jesus’ deep love for His Father and for God’s people that drove him to protect His people from this obvious threat of disrespect, distraction, and deception; that if left unnoticed would eventually result in destroying the purpose of God and His Temple.  There is nothing that will destroy God but the evil one opposed to God will do every thing in his limited power to bring destruction to the souls of God’s people.  Jesus knows this.  Jesus loves us so greatly that He will rise up to protect his own, giving His own life, to save us! 

Jesus has authority from God and is in consistent communication with God, the Father. It was the God in Jesus who had been angered by the idolatry of the courtyard carnies.  Our God is a compassionate Father who so loved the world that He gave us His Son as the once and for all sacrifice for our sins.  Our God so loved that He protects us from the evil one’s advances.  Our God so loved that he laid down the life of His One and Only Son so that we would receive eternal life when we believe and repent in Jesus’ Name.

Jesus is the Temple.  Jesus tells his opponents exactly what they will do later…try to destroy His mission to seek and to save lost people and reconcile (connect) them to God by killing his Body.  “Tear down this Temple and in three days I’ll put it back together.”  Jesus declares who He is but they do not recognize Him.  The scriptures point to Jesus as Messiah, but His very own do not accept Him.  The religious leaders only see brick and mortar but are blind to the Son of God standing right in front of them in power, authority, mixed with a love and compassion they have never known or experienced.

We are God’s Temple.  Upon believing that Jesus died to pay the debt of our own sins, repenting by asking for forgiveness, we are redeemed.  By believing that Jesus rose from death to life, victorious over death forever on that third day; we become His Temple of Hope where His Holy Spirit comes to reside.  “Remain in Me and I will remain in you,” says Jesus. 

Jesus is still cleaning out the Temples of our hearts!  Like a mother bear, God’s Holy Spirit will rise up within us to warn us again the evil schemes of this world meant to distract us from God.  God’s Holy Spirit is our Counselor who lives in us to confront us when the “chief among liars” attempts to deceive us with what looks right but is not of God. The Holy Spirit of God flashes warning lights in our minds when we prefer to think we can do life all by ourselves because we think our way is the best way without knowing what lies ahead.  His Holy Spirit protects us from destructive, negative thinking that is prompted by our real enemy. 

God’s Spirit, our Helper who lives within us protects, guides, comforts, draws us close in adversity, challenges us to learn and grow in our faith and teaches us how to love like God loves—sacrificially.

So, when we read this passage, I now think of the great love of Jesus.  Jesus loved enough to confront sin.  Jesus loved us enough to die for our sins.  Jesus loved His Father and His House enough to be “consumed with zeal” for God with protection for God’s people.  “Like Father, like Son.”

Lord,

This passage no longer bothers my heart for I see the love expressed by you for people wanting to worship you in spirit and in truth. I pray for your churches today to be on guard against the enemy who is in our midst trying to distract and deceive us within the walls of brick and mortar.  I pray that we would rise up when warned by Your Spirit to clean out the Temple of our hearts daily, removing all that is not You.  Cleanse our hearts, renew our minds, refresh our souls with your new mercies, and restore the joy of your salvation at work within us.  I believe.  I will remain in You.  Come, Holy Spirit for you are welcome.

In Jesus Name, For Your Glory, Amen