Matthew – God’s Purposes
There was that time when Randy and I thought our three children were finally old enough to be left alone for a few hours while we went grocery shopping along with other errands. They were of the age of assuming certain responsibilities such as cleaning their rooms, kitchen and bathrooms while were were gone. They didn’t want to go on these errands but doing their chores while we were gone was not too appealing either.
So, as most kids will do, they put all chores off until the heard the motor of our vehicle pull into the driveway. I don’t know who they thought they were fooling, but we walked into a messy house with three industrious kids working as if they had been working the whole time we were gone. Back in that day we could feel the measure of warmth of the TV and knew it was the focus of their activity while we were gone.
We expected the best but realized that kids at their age have not quite caught the vision of setting all things right BEFORE mom and dad arrive.
Did Jesus know before arriving at the Temple that people had made a mess of His House?
Matthew 21, NLT
Jesus Clears the Temple
12 Jesus entered the Temple and began to drive out all the people buying and selling animals for sacrifice. He knocked over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves. 13 He said to them, “The Scriptures declare, ‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves!”14 The blind and the lame came to him in the Temple, and he healed them. 15 The leading priests and the teachers of religious law saw these wonderful miracles and heard even the children in the Temple shouting, “Praise God for the Son of David.”
But the leaders were indignant. 16 They asked Jesus, “Do you hear what these children are saying?”
“Yes,” Jesus replied. “Haven’t you ever read the Scriptures? For they say, ‘You have taught children and infants to give you praise.’” 17 Then he returned to Bethany, where he stayed overnight.
GOING DEEPER…
Jesus had opened His ministry with a similar act (John 2:13–25). Now, three years later, the temple was defiled again by the “religious business” of the leaders. They had turned the court of the Gentiles into a place where foreign Jews could exchange money and purchase sacrifices. What had begun as a service and convenience for visitors from other lands soon turned into a lucrative business. The dealers charged exorbitant prices and no one could compete with them or oppose them. Historians tell us that Annas, the former high priest, was the manager of this enterprise, assisted by his sons. The purpose of the court of the Gentiles in the temple was to give the “outcasts” an opportunity to enter the temple and learn from Israel about the true God. But the presence of this “religious market” turned many sensitive Gentiles away from the witness of Israel. The court of the Gentiles was used for mercenary business, not missionary business.
When Jesus called the temple “my house,” He was affirming that He is God. When He called it “my house of prayer,” He was quoting Isaiah 56:7. The entire fifty-sixth chapter of Isaiah denounces the unfaithful leaders of Israel. The phrase “den of robbers” comes from Jeremiah 7:11 and is part of a long sermon that Jeremiah delivered in the gate of the temple, rebuking the people for the same sins that Jesus saw and judged in His day.
Why did Jesus call the temple “a den of thieves”? Because the place where thieves hide is called a den. The religious leaders, and some of the people, were using the temple and the Jewish religion to cover up their sins.
What does God want in His house? God wants prayer among His people for true prayer is an evidence of our dependence on God and our faith in His Word. He also wants people being helped (Matt. 21:14). The needy should feel welcome and should find the kind of help they need. There should be power in God’s house, the power of God working to change people. Praise is another feature of God’s house (Matt. 21:15–16). Here Jesus quoted from Psalm 8:2.
Jesus used this event to teach His disciples a practical lesson about faith and prayer. The temple was supposed to be a “house of prayer,” and the nation was to be a believing people. But both of these essentials were missing. We too must beware of the peril of fruitlessness.
Our hearts, minds and souls are now God’s Temple where He abides with all who believe in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. If Jesus was to come back, what would He find? Would Jesus walk into a house (attitude) of prayer with a cleaned up heart of love for Him and for others?
As He walks through our minds, are they humbly repentant and cleaned by Him?
As He resides in our souls, is there room for Him to move around freely, having complete run of the place? What clutter of this world needs to go?
Are we hiding anything from Him? Or are we completely His?
Does praise flow continuously from our lips with child-like faith?
Dear Heavenly Father,You are God and we are not. You have given us a lot to think about this morning. We are so grateful for Your saving grace because of Your love and mercy. Thank you for saving my soul and making me whole and Spiritually fruitful daily in my walk. It is all about You and Your purposes, therefore all praise and glory, honor and gratefulness goes to You! We are your Temple. May You walk freely in and find us faithful to You.
In Jesus Name, Amen
As Jesus and the disciples approached Jerusalem, they came to the town of Bethphage on the Mount of Olives. Jesus sent two of them on ahead. 2 “Go into the village over there,” he said. “As soon as you enter it, you will see a donkey tied there, with its colt beside it. Untie them and bring them to me. 3 If anyone asks what you are doing, just say, ‘The Lord needs them,’ and he will immediately let you take them.”
There was a second reason for this public presentation: It forced the Jewish leaders to act. When they saw the spontaneous demonstration of the people, they concluded that Jesus had to be destroyed (see John 12:19). The prophetic Scriptures required that the Lamb of God be crucified on Passover. This demonstration of Christ’s popularity incited the rulers to act. 
Given what I know, how willfully blind am I to God’s Truth in the Person of Jesus Christ? Is He my Savior in which I put ALL my hope and trust? Is He LORD of my life? ALL of it? Do I allow Him to guide my thinking, being and doing?
The closing event of Matthew 20 is the healing of Bartimaeus and his friend, both of whom were blind
29 As Jesus and the disciples left the town of Jericho, a large crowd followed behind. 30 Two blind men were sitting beside the road. When they heard that Jesus was coming that way, they began shouting, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!”
To call on Jesus is to acknowledge who Jesus is. The blind men called out, “Lord, Son of David…” This got Jesus’ attention.
We are such easily distracted humans, especially when we are pulled away from God’s purpose for us to selfish ambitions and natural desires to be great. It makes sense that Jesus would pause and remind them again about what He will face in Jerusalem, predicting his death by telling them a few details of what will happen to Him. But are the disciples who are walking along beside our Savior really listening? Nope. There is a side conversation happening.
Matthew 20, NLT
LET’S GO OVER THIS AGAIN…
Nothing I would do as a teacher would get a bigger gut groan from students than when I would turn their line around for lunch or recess! My purpose was to stop the running to be first in line. They would push and shove, knocking people from the head of the line. Some would run, knocking over chairs for the coveted title of “being first” to go anywhere. The first time the students tried this method of lining up, they experienced “the first shall be last and the last shall be first”. Yes, I would say this out loud as I went the back of the battered line of last people who didn’t make it to the front and lead them around the room and out the door. 
20 “For the Kingdom of Heaven is like the landowner who went out early one morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay the normal daily wage and sent them out to work.
8 “That evening he told the foreman to call the workers in and pay them, beginning with the last workers first. 9 When those hired at five o’clock were paid, each received a full day’s wage. 10 When those hired first came to get their pay, they assumed they would receive more. But they, too, were paid a day’s wage. 11 When they received their pay, they protested to the owner, 12 ‘Those people worked only one hour, and yet you’ve paid them just as much as you paid us who worked all day in the scorching heat.’
When we did deeper, it is most about those who receive salvation late in life. We should rejoice but our human minds wonder if they will receive the same reward of heaven. OF COURSE, they will. No matter when our friends and family accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior, we rejoice! We should not think or say, “well, it’s about time” and then wonder about the reward. “When we ALL get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be…” Remember that old hymn?
When we all get to heaven
16 Someone came to Jesus with this question: “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?”
It is not a matter of what you will get, but with Whom you can have a relationship with forever!
Randy and I are in the last few weeks of working at Santa Cruz Children’s Learning Center with all kinds of children, younger and older, all precious humans created by God for His glory, honor and praise. I stop in the busyness of teaching at times to realize what a privilege it is to be invited to God’s work of growing and maturing His created to be and do all that they were designed to be. 
This passage opens with “parents brought their children to Jesus…” Oh, how I pray for parents to bring their children to Jesus today! I immediately think of what God commanded, not suggested, of parents who were ready to enter the promised land of God…TEACH your children about Me and what I have done for you “and all will go well with you”.
Marriage is a bond between two people, male and female. If the male and female seek God first, then their marriage is blessed by God. Will there be disagreements and trials in this relationship? Absolutely, for male and female are distinctly designed in different ways with specific gifts and abilities. The blessing in this bond between two people who love God is strengthened BECAUSE of their differences working together to achieve more than what only one person could achieve in following God’s best for them.
Jesus reclaims what God intended for male and female coming together in marriage. In Moses time, trying to keep God’s people focused on Him, many strayed. That’s probably why they spent so much time in the wilderness wandering around. They were always under God’s care but chose to complain, argue, and lament over their present circumstances. It is no wonder their marriages didn’t last because of this selfishness. Moses used the “paper” of divorce to protect the women sent away by men from the bond, a “concession to hard hearts” of sinful men, freeing her to marry someone else who would care for her. It is not what God intended but they were doing many things not of God at the time. 
19 When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went down to the region of Judea east of the Jordan River. 2 Large crowds followed him there, and he healed their sick.
8 Jesus replied, “Moses permitted divorce only as a concession to your hard hearts, but it was not what God had originally intended. 9 And I tell you this, whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery—unless his wife has been unfaithful.”
But then we think of how little we deserve the mercy and complete forgiveness of Jesus Christ that was displayed to the mocking world on a cruel cross. Did Jesus ask God, “How often should I forgive?” His answer, “Only once and forever.”
Matthew 18, NLT
31 “When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that had happened. 32 Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. 33 Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?’ 34 Then the angry king sent the man to prison to be tortured until he had paid his entire debt.
*Leave a trail of forgiveness and mercy so that others will forgive and show mercy.
Dear Heavenly Father,
Our kind of lame, first answer is God’s church is made up of imperfect people who make mistakes. But as I think more deeply about this answer, it isn’t good enough. We are a redeemed, forgiven, chosen people because of Jesus’ dying and rising again from death as a result of excruciating pain and agony a cruel cross. Why, then do we continue to hurt Jesus by the way we behave as believers with one another when he clearly told us (through His disciples) to “Love God and Love each other” like I have loved you? Our disagreeable stuff pales in comparison! Can we begin there? Can we love each other deeply enough to confront them and love them back into living how Jesus taught us to live?
Matthew 18, NLT
How sweet it is when brothers and sisters agree on the goal helping each other find and follow Christ. Healthy Bodies of Christ know this. Issues resolved in a spirit of love and unity so we can get back to what God has called us to BE and DO is monumental to growing in His love. The closer we are to Christ, the closer we are to each other!
