The text of this study, John 2:12-22, allows us to watch Jesus in yet another setting. This time it is at a place which is larger, more intimidating, and more impersonal than the wedding scene in Cana.
This passage takes us to the temple in Jerusalem, the center of the Jewish faith and the place where Jesus would later be sentenced to crucifixion. Watching and listening to Jesus in this hostile setting allows us to see yet another side of the one who claimed to be the Son of God. What we see in this text will allow us all to know Jesus better than we did before.
Like Josiah and Hezekiah of old, Jesus purifies God’s temple. This is a gutsy move, which may suggest that Jesus is the Messiah (cf. Mal 2:2-3). The focus of this incident is not on the temple and its corruption so much as it is on Jesus and his person.
Read in conjunction with the wedding at Cana, we get a glimpse of both sides of Jesus’ ministry. On the one hand, he is the great Messiah of the new kingdom with all its lavish and delightful provisions. On the other hand, he is a suffering servant, rejected and destroyed by the Jewish leaders, only to be raised again on the third day.
All four Gospels record the cleansing of the temple. But the Synoptics place it at the end of Jesus’ ministry (Mt 21:12-13; Mk 11:15-17; Lk 19:45-46), not the beginning, like John. It is possible that there was only one cleansing and that John places it here for theological emphasis rather than chronological precision. After all, there are striking similarities (e.g., same place, animals and money changers), for obvious reasons.
There are also considerable differences. For example, only John mentions the whip, the prophecy from Psalm 69:9, and the prediction about destroying the temple. The Synoptics also add the prophecies of Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7:11-14, as well as Mark’s comment about Jesus halting traffic through the temple. This leads us to conclude that Jesus did, in fact, cleanse the temple twice. This bold action serves both to open and to close his public ministry.
John alone allows us to date Jesus’ ministry based on the various feasts he attended: (1) First Passover (2:13); (2) Second Passover (supposedly), (5:1); (3) Third Passover (6:4); (4) Tabernacles (7:2); (5) Dedication (10:22); (6) Fourth Passover (11:55).
Furthermore, John the Baptist’s ministry can be dated in a.d. 26 (Lk 3:1), probably in the fall. Jesus was likely baptized that winter.
He spent forty days in the wilderness (Mt 4:2); seven days gaining his first disciples and going to the wedding at Cana (Jn 1:29, 35, 43; 2:1). He visits Capernaum for a few days (Jn 2:12) and then hot-foots it to Jerusalem for the Passover which would take place on the 15th of Nisan (approximately April), a.d. 27. This is further confirmed by verse 20, since Herod began rebuilding his temple in 19 b.c., 46 years would place Jesus in a.d. 27.
“After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother and brothers and his disciples. There they stayed for a few days.”
The “temple” of our text is the temple in Jerusalem. It was not the first temple, built by Solomon (see 1 Kings 6-7), nor the second temple, rebuilt by the Jews returning from their Babylonian captivity (Ezra 6:15). It was the third temple, known as “Herod’s Temple.” This temple was built by Herod, not so much to facilitate Israel’s worship, but as an attempt to reconcile the Jews to their Idumaean king. Construction of this temple began in 19 B.C. and continued for 46 years. The temple was largely complete in the time of our Lord, but was fully completed a mere 6 years before it was destroyed in 70 A.D. Perhaps it did not have the glory of the first temple built by Solomon, but it must have exceeded the beauty and splendor of the second temple (compare Ezra 3:12; Mark 13:1).
In His early infancy, Jesus had been taken to the temple in Jerusalem for His purification, and there both Simeon and Anna worshipped Him as the promised Messiah (Luke 2:21-38). When our Lord was 12 years of age, He accompanied His parents to Jerusalem, where He absolutely amazed them and others:
41 Now Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem every year for the feast of the Passover. 42 When he was twelve years old, they went up according to custom. 43 But when the feast was ended, as they were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. His parents did not know it, 44 but because they assumed that he was in their group of travelers they went a day’s journey. Then they began to look for him among their relatives and acquaintances. 45 When they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem to look for him. 46 After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 47 And all who heard Jesus were astonished at his understanding and his answers. 48 When his parents saw him they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Child, why have you treated us like this? Look, your father and I have been looking for you anxiously.” 49 But he replied, “Why were you looking for me? Didn’t you know that I must be in my Father’s house?” 50 Yet his parents did not understand the remark he made to them. 51 Then he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them. But his mother kept all these things in her heart (Luke 2:41-51).
Our Lord’s parents certainly found Jesus a model child, a young man whom they could trust. They felt no need to check on Him, and as they were traveling in a caravan, they didn’t even miss Him on their return from Jerusalem. Eventually, they realized He was not with them and made their way back to Jerusalem, where they found Him in the temple. There He was, sitting in the midst of the Old Testament scholars, not only asking intelligent questions, but giving answers to their questions (Wouldn’t you love to know what some of these questions and answers were?). The scholars were amazed, and most certainly so were our Lord’s parents.
Nevertheless, Jesus caused them considerable inconvenience by not telling them He was staying behind. His absence caused them to leave the caravan of worshippers and return to Jerusalem, a day’s journey away. There was certainly a hint of frustration in their rebuke when they scolded Him for staying behind, but Jesus was not taken aback. He was surprised they had to look for Him. Did they not know where He would be? Did they think it was wrong for Him to be there? He was in His Father’s house, doing “His Father’s business” (verse 49). It was not He who was wrong, but they, for not seeing this situation for what it was. Even at the age of 12, our Lord had a good grasp of who He was and what He was sent to do. The “temple” Jesus visited in Luke 2 was the kind of place it should have been, a place to worship God and to study His Word. The “temple” Jesus finds nearly 20 years later seems to have greatly changed, and thus the need for its cleansing.
One may wonder about John’s reasons for including this verse. John is not a man to waste time or space. His words are carefully selected (John 20:30-31; 21:25). Why then does he include them? One reason is that we know Capernaum will become our Lord’s headquarters for His ministry (See Matthew 4:13; 9:1). His family appears to have relocated there. It is where the centurion (and others—see John 6:24) come to find Jesus, to plead with Him to heal his servant (Matthew 8:5-13). Capernaum is deemed worthy of greater condemnation, because the people of this city have seen more of our Lord and His miracles (Matthew 11:23; see Luke 4:23). Another reason is that this seems to have been our Lord’s final stay with His family. His “family” is about to change (see Mark 3:31-35).
Finally, John wants us to see these events as closely following one upon the other. He is maintaining a rather precise account of the timing of the crucial events at the outset of our Lord’s ministry. John therefore describes the first few days of our Lord’s public ministry in chapter 1 and the first 11 verses of chapter 2. Then, he tells us that after the wedding, Jesus, His disciples, and His family make their way down to Capernaum. The disciples appear to be taken in by our Lord’s family for the few days they stay in Capernaum. From what we know of our Lord’s brothers at this point in time, they do not believe in Jesus as the promised Messiah (John 7:5). They may even resent the intrusion of Jesus and His disciples. Jesus and the men who accompany Him do not stay long in Capernaum. After a few (“not … many”) days, they make their way up to Jerusalem for the Passover celebration.
Capernaum was Jesus’ hometown, though He was rarely there. When there, He performed many miracles and gave the people every opportunity to believe on Him and follow Him. But the hearts of the people were hardened by unbelief. Thus Jesus denounced them by the words of Matthew 11:23: “And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted up to the skies? No, you will go down to the depths. If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day.” This is also the last mention of His mother until the crucifixion.
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Here we have a very interesting thing. At first sight John has a quite different chronology of the life of Jesus from that of the other three gospels. In them Jesus is depicted as going to Jerusalem only once. The Passover Feast at which he was crucified is the only one they mention, and his only visit to Jerusalem except the visit to the Temple when he was a boy. But in John we find Jesus making frequent visits to Jerusalem. John tells us of no fewer than three Passovers-this present one, the one in John 6:4 and the one in John 11:55. In addition, according to John’s story, Jesus was in Jerusalem for an unnamed feast in 5:1; for the Feast of Tabernacles in 7:2, 10; and for the Feast of the Dedication in 10:22. In point of fact in the other three gospels the main ministry of Jesus is in Galilee; in John Jesus is in Galilee only for brief periods (2:1-12; 4:43-5:1; 6:1-7:14), and his main ministry is in Jerusalem.
The truth is that there is no real contradiction here. John and the others are telling the story from different points of view. They do not contradict but complement each other. Matthew, Mark and Luke concentrate on the ministry in Galilee; John concentrates on the ministry in Jerusalem. Although the other three tell us of only one visit to Jerusalem and one Passover there, they imply that there must have been many others. At his last visit they show us Jesus mourning over Jerusalem: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!” (Matthew 23:37). Jesus could never have spoken like that if he had not made repeated appeals to Jerusalem and if the visit at which he was crucified was his first. We ought not to talk about the contradictions between the Fourth Gospel and the other three, but to use them all to get as complete a picture of the life of Jesus as possible.
I suppose all of us have owned something we consider very special, something we would not wish to be “defiled” by misuse. Whatever this precious object may be, it could not be as precious to us as the “temple” was to our Lord. Our lesson is about our Lord’s “cleansing” of the temple as described in John, chapter 2. John considered this incident one of the more significant actions of our Lord at the outset of His public ministry. Our task is to learn why this is true, and what the temple cleansing has to do with men and women living centuries later. I assure you this incident is important, and that it has much to say to us today. I urge you to seriously consider this text and its message to us today, and especially its message to you.
Now let us see why Jesus acted as he did. His anger is a terrifying thing; the picture of Jesus with the whip is an awe-inspiring sight. We must see what moved Jesus to this white-hot anger in the Temple Courts.
The passover was the greatest of all the Jewish feasts. As we have already seen, the law laid it down that every adult male Jew who lived within fifteen miles of Jerusalem was bound to attend it. But it was not only the Jews in Palestine who came to the Passover. By this time Jews were scattered all over the world, but they never forgot their ancestral faith and their ancestral land; and it was the dream and aim of every Jew, no matter in what land he stayed, to celebrate at least one Passover in Jerusalem. Astonishing as it may sound, it is likely that as many as two and a quarter million Jews sometimes assembled in the Holy City to keep the Passover.
There was a tax that every Jew over nineteen years of age must pay. That was the Temple tax. It was necessary that all should pay that tax so that the Temple sacrifices and the Temple ritual might be carried out day by day. The tax was one half-shekel. We must always remember, when we are thinking of sums of money, that at this time a working man’s wage was about less than 4p per day. The value of a half-shekel was about 6p. It was, therefore, equivalent to almost two days’ wages. For all ordinary purposes in Palestine all kinds of currency were valid. Silver coins from Rome and Greece and Egypt and Tyre and Sidon and Palestine itself all were in circulation and all were valid. But the Temple tax had to be paid either in Galilaean shekels or in shekels of the sanctuary. These were Jewish coins, and so could be used as a gift to the Temple; the other currencies were foreign and so were unclean; they might be used to pay ordinary debts, but not a debt to God.
Pilgrims arrived from all over the world with all kinds of coins. So in the Temple courts there sat the money-changers. If their trade had been straightforward they would have been fulfilling an honest and a necessary purpose. But what they did was to charge one ma’ah, a coin worth about 1p, for every half-shekel they changed, and to charge another ma’ah on every half-shekel of change they had to give if a larger coin was tendered. So, if a man came with a coin the value of which was two shekels, he had to pay 1p to get it changed, and other 3p to get his change of three half-shekels. In other words the money-changers made 4p out of him-and that, remember, was one day’s wage.
The wealth which accrued from the Temple tax and from this method of money-changing was fantastic. The annual revenue of the Temple from the Temple tax has been estimated at £75,000, and the annual profit of the money-changers at £9,000. When Crassus captured Jerusalem and raided the Temple treasury in 54 B.C. he took from it £2,500,000 without coming near to exhausting it.
The fact that the money-changers received some discount when they changed the coins of the pilgrims was not in itself wrong. The Talmud laid it down: “It is necessary that everyone should have half a shekel to pay for himself. Therefore when he comes to the exchange to change a shekel for two half-shekels he is obliged to allow the money-changer some gain.” The word for this discount was kollubos and the money-changers are called kollubistai. This word kollubos produced the comedy character name Kollybos in Greek and Collybus in Latin, which meant much the same as Shylock in English.
What enraged Jesus was that pilgrims to the Passover who could ill afford it, were being fleeced at an exorbitant rate by the money-changers. It was a rampant and shameless social in-justice-and what was worse, it was being done in the name of religion.
Besides the money-changers there were also the sellers of oxen and sheep and doves. Frequently a visit to the Temple meant a sacrifice. Many a pilgrim would wish to make thank-offering for a favourable journey to the Holy City; and most acts and events in life had their appropriate sacrifice. It might therefore seem to be a natural and helpful thing that the victims for the sacrifices could be bought in the Temple court. It might well have been so. But the law was that any animal offered in sacrifice must be perfect and unblemished. The Temple authorities had appointed inspectors (mumcheh) to examine the victims which were to be offered. The fee for inspection was 1p. If a worshipper bought a victim outside the Temple, it was to all intents and purposes certain that it would be rejected after examination. Again that might not have mattered much, but a pair of doves could cost as little as 4p outside the Temple, and as much as 75p inside. Here again was bare-faced extortion at the expense of poor and humble pilgrims, who were practically blackmailed into buying their victims from the Temple booths if they wished to sacrifice at all-once more a glaring social injustice aggravated by the fact that it was perpetrated in the name of pure religion.
It was that which moved Jesus to flaming anger. We are told that he took cords and made a whip. Jerome thinks that the very sight of Jesus made the whip unnecessary. “A certain fiery and starry light shone from his eyes, and the majesty of the Godhead gleamed in his face.” Just because Jesus loved God, he loved God’s children, and it was impossible for him to stand passively by while the worshippers of Jerusalem were treated in this way.
We have seen that it was the exploitation of the pilgrims by conscienceless men which moved Jesus to immediate wrath; but there were deep things behind the cleansing of the Temple. Let us see if we can penetrate to the even deeper reasons why Jesus took this drastic step.
No two of the evangelists give Jesus’s words in precisely the same way. They all remembered their own version. It is only by putting all the accounts together that we get a true picture of what Jesus said. So then let us set down the different ways in which the writers report the words of Jesus. Matthew gives them as: “My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you make it a den of robbers” (Matthew 21:13). Mark has it: “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations. But you have made it a den of robbers” (Mark 11:17). Luke has it: “My house shall be a house of prayer; but you have made it a den of robbers” (Luke 19:46). John has it: “Take these things away; you shall not make my Father’s house a house of trade” (John 2:16).
There were at least three reasons why Jesus acted as he did, and why anger was in his heart.
(i) He acted as he did because God’s house was being desecrated. In the Temple there was worship without reverence. Reverence is an instinctive thing. Edward Seago, the artist, tells how he took two gipsy children on a visit to a cathedral in England. They were wild enough children at ordinary times. But from the moment they came into the cathedral they were strangely quiet; all the way home they were unusually solemn; and it was not until the evening that they returned to their normal boisterousness. Instinctive reverence was in their uninstructed hearts.
Worship without reverence can be a terrible thing. It may be worship which is formalized and pushed through anyhow; the most dignified prayers on earth can be read like a passage from an auctioneer’s catalogue. It may be worship which does not realize the holiness of God, and which sounds as if, in H. H. Farmer’s phrase, the worshipper was “pally with the Deity.” It may be worship in which leader or congregation are completely unprepared. It may be the use of the house of God for purposes and in a way where reverence and the true function of God’s house are forgotten. In that court of God’s house at Jerusalem there would be arguments about prices, disputes about coins that were worn and thin, the clatter of the market place. That particular form of irreverence may not be common now, but there are other ways of offering an irreverent worship to God.
(ii) Jesus acted as he did in order to show that the whole paraphernalia of animal sacrifice was completely irrelevant. For centuries the prophets had been saying exactly that. “What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? says the Lord; I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed beasts; I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs, or of goats. . . . Bring no more vain offerings” (Isaiah 1:11-17). “For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices” (Jeremiah 7:22). “With their flocks and herds they shall go to seek the Lord, but they will not find him” (Hosea 5:6). “They love sacrifice; they sacrifice flesh and eat it; but the Lord has no delight in them” (Hosea 8:13). “For thou hast no delight in sacrifice; were I to give a burnt offering, thou wouldst not be pleased” (Psalm 51:16). There was a chorus of prophetic voices telling men of the sheer irrelevancy of the burnt offerings and the animal sacrifices which smoked continuously upon the altar at Jerusalem. Jesus acted as he did to show that no sacrifice of any animal can ever put a man right with God.
We are not totally free from this very tendency today. True, we will not offer animal sacrifice to God. But we can identify his service with the installation of stained glass windows, the obtaining of a more sonorous organ, the lavishing of money on stone and lime and carved wood, while real worship is far away. It is not that these things are to be condemned-far from it. They are often-thank God-the lovely offerings of the loving heart. When they are aids to true devotion they are God-blessed things; but when they are substitutes for true devotion they make God sick at heart.
(iii) There is still another reason why Jesus acted as he did. Mark has a curious little addition which none of the other gospels has: “My house shall be called the house of prayer for all the nations” (Mark 11:17). The Temple consisted of a series of courts leading into the Temple proper and to the Holy Place. There was first the Court of the Gentiles, then the Court of the Women, then the Court of the Israelites, then the Court of the Priests. All this buying and selling was going on in the Court of the Gentiles which was the only place into which a Gentile might come. Beyond that point, access to him was barred. So then if there was a Gentile whose heart God had touched, he might come into the Court of the Gentiles to mediate and pray and distantly touch God. The Court of the Gentiles was the only place of prayer he knew.
The Temple authorities and the Jewish traders were making the Court of the Gentiles into an uproar and a rabble where no man could pray. The lowing of the oxen, the bleating of the sheep, the cooing of the doves, the shouts of the hucksters, the rattle of the coins, the voices raised in bargaining disputes-all these combined to make the Court of the Gentiles a place where no man could worship. The conduct in the Temple court shut out the seeking Gentile from the presence of God. It may well be that this was most in Jesus’s mind; it may well be that Mark alone preserved the little phrase which means so much. Jesus was moved to the depths of his heart because seeking men were being shut out from the presence of God.
Is there anything in our church life-a snobbishness, an exclusiveness, a coldness, a lack of welcome, a tendency to make the congregation into a closed club, an arrogance, a fastidiousness-which keeps the seeking stranger out? Let us remember the wrath of Jesus against those who made it difficult and even impossible for the seeking stranger to make contact with God.
“In the temple courts he found men selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money.”
The Jewish Passover celebration commemorates the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, when the death angel passed over every home where the first Passover was observed and the blood of the paschal lamb was placed on the two door posts and the lintel (see Exodus 12 and 13). The celebration of the Passover also commenced the Feast of Unleavened bread, so that the entire Passover celebration took a week.[1] Attendance for adult Israelite males was compulsory:
Every male Jew, from the age of twelve and up, was expected to attend the Passover at Jerusalem, a feast celebrated to commemorate the deliverance of the people of Israel from Egyptian bondage. On the tenth of the month Abib or Nisan (which generally corresponds to our March, though its closing days sometimes extend into our April) a male lamb, of the first year, without blemish, was taken, and on the fourteenth day, between three and six o’clock in the afternoon, it was killed.
It is very difficult to imagine the scene that our Lord’s eyes fall upon as He enters Jerusalem and approaches the temple. We know from the scene at Pentecost, described in Acts 2, that a great many people thronged to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover, as they also did to the Feast of Tabernacles and the Feast of Pentecost (or, the Feast of Weeks). It is very difficult to estimate the influx of people to Jerusalem, not only from other parts of Israel, but from all over the world (see Acts 2:5-12). These Jews and proselytes would have to pay the half-shekel temple tax in the coinage of the temple, and thus foreign monies were unacceptable and had to be exchanged for the proper coins. These worshippers also had to offer up their sacrifices, and for many of these travelers, the only solution was to buy a sacrificial animal there in Jerusalem.
In days gone by, they would have been able to purchase these animals and exchange their money in a place outside the temple courts: “At one time the animal merchants set up their stalls across the Kidron Valley on the slopes of the Mount of Olives, but at this point they were in the temple courts, doubtless in the Court of the Gentiles (the outermost court).” For some reason, the animals have now been brought into the temple courts. It is certainly more “convenient.” People can purchase their sacrificial animals right at the temple, and they can also exchange their money. It is very difficult to believe that this is the real reason this is done, however.
It is true, in the abstract, that each worshipper was allowed to bring to the temple an animal of his own selection. But let him try it! In all likelihood it would not be approved by the judges, the privileged venders who filled the money-chests of Annas! Hence, to save trouble and disappointment, animals for sacrifice were bought right here in the outer court, which was called the court of the Gentiles because they were permitted to enter it. Of course, the dealers in cattle and sheep would be tempted to charge exorbitant prices for such animals. They would exploit the worshippers. And those who sold pigeons would do likewise, charging, perhaps, $4 for a pair of doves worth a nickel (A. Edersheim, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, New York, 1897, vol. I, p. 370). And then there were the money-changers, sitting cross-legged behind their little coin-covered tables. They gave the worshipper lawful, Jewish coin in exchange for foreign currency. It must be borne in mind that only Jewish coins were allowed to be offered in the temple, and every worshipper—women, slaves, and minors excepted—had to pay the annual temple tribute of half a shekel (cf. Ex. 30:13). The money-changers would charge a certain fee for every exchange-transaction. Here, too, there were abundant opportunities for deception and abuse. And in view of these conditions the Holy Temple, intended as a house of prayer for all people, had become a den of robbers (cf. Isa. 56:7; Jer. 7:11; Mark 11:17).
The view represented here is one commonly accepted by students of the New Testament Gospels. Those who attempted to bring their own sacrificial animals may very well have had them “rejected” by the temple priests, and thereby were forced to purchase “approved” animals at much higher prices. The same gouging no doubt took place at the money-exchangers’ tables. I doubt very much that our Lord later called the temple a “robbers’ den” (Mark 11:17) without having such corruption in mind. In our text, however, John does not focus on the way in which these merchandisers go about their business, but rather on where they are conducting their business—in the temple courts.
Mark’s Gospel seems to take up this theme as well, pointing out that “where” these businessmen are doing business interferes with an essential purpose of the temple. The temple was to be a “house of prayer for all nations” (Mark 11:17). The outer courts of the temple are the only places where Gentiles could worship. They are not allowed to pass beyond a certain point (see Acts 21:27-30). If the outer courts are filled with oxen and lambs and doves, there is no place for the Gentiles to pray and to worship God. Can you imagine trying to pray in the midst of a virtual stockyard, with all the noises of the animals and the bickering businessmen? Can you conceive of trying to squeeze in between cattle who are tied up in the courts? Think of what it would be like to have to watch where you walked, lest you step in something undesirable? It appears that Gentile worship is functionally prohibited, and I doubt this troubled many of the Jews, who are not all that excited about including the Gentiles in their worship in the first place.
What Jesus sees going on in the temple courts troubles Him a great deal! The place of prayer has become a place of profit-taking. It sounds more like the trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange than the outer courts of the temple of God. It smells more like a barnyard than the place where one would seek God’s presence. Jesus enters the outer court of the temple, fashioning a whip from materials at hand (probably from the cords used to tie up the animals). He then drives them all out of the temple area. By the word “all,” I understand Him to have driven out not only the animals, but also those who are selling them as well. The coins of the moneychangers are poured out and scattered on the ground and their tables overturned. To those selling the doves, Jesus says, “Take these things away from here! Do not make my Father’s house a marketplace!”[2]
After His death and resurrection, our Lord’s disciples remembered that it was written,[3] “Passion for your house will devour me” (verse 17). The disciples came to view this cleansing of the temple in the light of Psalm 69:
8 I have become a stranger to my brothers, And an alien to my mother’s children; 9 Because zeal for Your house has eaten me up, And the reproaches of those who reproach You have fallen on Me (Psalm 69:8-9, NKJV).
Several things catch my attention in these two verses. The first is that this Messianic Psalm speaks of the alienation of the Messiah from his “mother’s children.” Could this be part of the reason for John’s mention of the brief family gathering in Capernaum (John 2:12)? Our Lord’s mother is not mentioned again until the cross, and the reference to our Lord’s “brothers” in John 7:3-5 reveals their skepticism about Jesus and His ministry. Has Jesus already begun to feel alienated from His own brothers?
In addition, you will notice that in Psalm 69:9 David writes in the past tense: “Because zeal for Your house has eaten me up.” There are some differences in the Greek texts of John, so that the KJV and the NKJV employ the past tense: “Zeal for Your house has eaten Me up.” As a rule, the other versions render it in the future tense, following what appear to be the best Greek texts.[4] I like the way the New English Bible renders it best:
“Zeal for thy house shall destroy me.”
Psalm 69 is a psalm of David. It is a prayer for his deliverance, due to his piety. The psalm speaks of David’s imminent danger due to the enemies of God who hate him for his fervent devotion to God, and thus who seek his death. Later portions of this psalm depict events that occur at the crucifixion of our Lord (see Ps. 69:21). It seems clear in this psalm that there is a prophecy of our Lord’s sacrificial death, due to His zeal for pure worship.
Jesus acts out of zeal for His Father’s house, laying claim to the temple and cleansing it in His Father’s name. In so doing, He fulfills a prophecy that our Lord’s zeal for His Father’s house will bring about His death. It is the second cleansing[5] of the temple (Matthew 21:10-17; Mark 11:15-19; Luke 19:45-46) that actually sets into motion the events which lead to our Lord’s crucifixion.[6]
As Jesus walked into the temple it looked and smelled like a hybrid stockyard/circus. There would be blood spattered about the altar, oxen and sheep lowing, birds cooing, squawking, and flitting about when they were manhandled. The people were cosmopolitan (as well as neapolitan), from all over the Roman world. They brought with them vacation money in a desire to make a sacrifice to their God. For the wealthy pious, this was an annual affair. For the poorer class it may be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. How disappointing for them this scene must have been.
The whole spectacle came to be known as the “Bazaar of Annas.” He was the Jewish high priest. His power was only exceeded by his avarice and greed. He was revered and feared. He had set up quite a profitable venture for himself in the courts of the sacred temple.
It worked something like this (cf. Edersheim, I:369): If a worshiper brought in an animal to be sacrificed the officiating priest would undoubtedly find something wrong with it and offer to buy it off him at a devalued price. The animal would then be taken back to the pens of the priests, blessed and sold to another worshiper for an inflated price. The original worshiper then had to purchase a “kosher” animal at an exorbitant price, sometimes four or five times its actual value. When he pulled his money out of his pocket, if it was not Palestinian coinage, he would have to visit the money changer to get the proper currency. When he did, he was charged a fifteen to twenty percent fee for the exchange. It was quite a scam.
In addition to the sacrifices, every Jew was required to submit a half-shekel temple tax annually (Exod 30:13; Mt 17:24). Jews from other areas (e.g., Persia, Tyre, Syria, Egypt, Greece, and Rome), who used different coinage, would also have to pay the exchange fee. Hamilton observes that the temple in Jerusalem, like the pagan religious temples of the day, served as the central bank of the area (cf. 2 Macc. 3:6-15). There were a lot of financial moguls running around taking advantage of these pious pilgrims.
All this made the visitors bitter. But they had no other choice if they wanted to fulfill their pious inclinations. To make matters worse there were no set fees for the animals. It was all up for grabs. Thus there was constant and heated haggling going on over prices. Faces were red, fists were clenched, and voices were raised … all for the worship of God.
Their suspicion and jealousy were revealed through His cleansing the temple, which was His protest against their commercializing of the temple, which was His Father’s house.
The temple Jesus found when He arrived at Jerusalem was actually the third temple in Israel’s history. Following temples built by Solomon and Zerubbabel, this one was known as Herod’s Temple, taking its name from Herod the Great, who was responsible for its construction. When Jesus entered the temple on this occasion, it had already been under construction for forty-six years (2:20) and would not be completed for another thirty-five years, in A.D. 64. The temple grounds were actually a large area of vast courtyards and walls leading to the temple itself.
Upon entering the temple grounds, the first courtyard was the Court of the Gentiles. Anyone could enter this area. Beyond this was the Court of the Women, where only Jews could enter. The next gate led to the Court of Israel, where only Jewish men could go. Finally, there was a court where only Jewish priests were allowed. This was the location of the building most of us think of when we say the word “temple.”
Because the Court of the Gentiles was the one place in the temple where everyone could go, it became the place where merchants and moneychangers set up shop.
Worshipers coming from far away would need to buy an animal to sacrifice, so there was a brisk business in selling sheep, doves, and cows.
Every Jewish man over twenty years of age was expected to pay a temple tax, creating a business opportunity for moneychangers at the temple grounds. All this activity probably produced a lot of noise and a fair amount of chaos in the temple courtyard, but in time people had come to accept it all as normal. Then came Jesus.
When Jesus walked into the temple, He saw what was going on differently than everyone else there.
“So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple area, 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! How dare you turn my Father’s house into a market!”
Jesus revealed His zeal for God first of all by cleaning the temple. The tragedy, of course, is that the business being conducted was in the court of Gentiles, the place where the Jews should have been meeting the Gentiles and telling them about the true God. Any Gentile searching for truth would not likely find it among the religious leaders in the temple.
Jesus had come to assert the claims of God upon His own nation, and He felt keenly the spiritual indifference which had turned worship into a means of profit! His act presupposed authority as the representative of God. His resurrection would be the chief proof of His ministry!
Jesus was careful not to destroy anyone’s property (He did not release the doves, for instance); but He made it clear that He was in command.
How is it that Jesus got away with this when he is so totally outnumbered? There may be several explanations:
- Even in his incarnate state, Jesus’ purity and passion were divine. That, in itself, is intimidating.
- The money changers are hirelings. They run in the face of danger. Besides, some of them likely have a deep sense of guilt about what they are doing—they know it is not right.
- The people must have been cheering as Jesus turned over tables and spilled change all over the floor. It was a popular move and in his angry zeal the people would no doubt support him.
- There is a Roman garrison watching the proceedings of the feast from the Tower of Antonia. Jesus has already captured their attention. The last thing the Sadducees want to do is to fan it into flame. They could lose their positions and possibly even their lives. These are perilous times. People are looking for a savior and are willing to fight if they find one.
The temple (church) can be abused by…
- forgetting what worship is all about.
- misusing the facilities and buildings of God’s house.
- ignoring God’s holiness and forgetting one’s duty to reverence God.
- allowing questionable, non-worshipful activities.
He says to them “Stop making my Father’s house a house of commerce.” John weaves into the narrative his own commentary in v. 17. The disciples remember Psalm 69:9a, “Zeal for thy house will consume me.”
That is an interesting quotation for several reasons.
First, Psalm 69 is Messianic (cf. v. 21). This is part of their very early understanding of Jesus.
Second, the word “consume” is literally “eaten up.” This verse does not merely mean to suggest that Jesus had a driving passion for the temple. In its original context it is a cry of pain and desperation. Like David, Jesus’ passion for God is going to get him into trouble.
Third, the verb tense of this word “consume” has been changed from the past in the LXX to the future here in John.
Historically, as David wrote Psalm 69, he had already experienced suffering because of his zeal for God. Jesus, however, was looking for it in the future. Even now, he was challenging the authority of both the High Priest and the Procurator, both of whom claimed control of the central bank of the temple.
The condition of the temple was a vivid indication of the spiritual condition of the nation. Their religion was a dull routine, presided over by worldly minded men whose main desire was to exercise authority and get rich.
This was the beginning of a struggle that continued for three years. The rulers hardly let it rest for a moment from this time forth!
When Matthew, Mark, and Luke related the story of the cleansing of the temple, they indicated that Jesus objected to the way the merchants had made the temple a “robbers’ den,” indicating that Jesus was angry about dishonest business.
John, however, indicated that Jesus was objecting to the presence of any business in the temple. The temple was designed as a house of prayer, a place where people from all nations could come and worship God.
What Jesus saw looked more like an emporium or a marketplace than a spiritual retreat. He must have been impressive, even frightening, as He took control of the situation and ran the merchants and the animals out of the temple.
Anger as a way of life is condemned by both Jesus and Paul; but Jesus, on occasion, did become angry–and was able to do so without sinning.”
What is the difference between these two types of anger? One apparently is anger that springs from human pettiness, insecurity, or frustration. Godly anger, on the other hand, is anger that arises when people are being hurt or kept from God by the actions of others.
Jesus saw that the transactions in the temple were keeping people away from God, and that could not be tolerated!
One simple application of the scene at the temple has to do with the way we treat our brothers and sisters when we gather for worship. I have known many people, particularly medical doctors and business owners, who have trouble worshiping because people insist on asking them business questions before and after church. They want to come to a “house of prayer” but find only “a house of commerce.”
Periodically, we all need to be reminded to leave business outside our church assemblies so that everyone can worship unhindered.
DEEPER STUDY – (2:14) Temple: a person must understand the layout of the temple in order to see what was happening in this event. The temple sat on the top of Mt. Zion, and it is thought to have covered about thirty acres of land. The temple consisted of two parts, the temple building itself and the temple precincts or courtyards. The Greek language has two different words to distinguish which is meant.
The temple building (naos) was a small ornate structure which sat in the center of the temple property. It was called the Holy Place or Holy of Holies. Only the High Priest could enter its walls, and he could enter only once during the year, on the Day of Atonement.
The temple precincts (hieron) were four courtyards that surrounded the temple building, each decreasing in their importance to the Jewish mind. It is important to know that great walls separated the courts from each other.
First, there was the Court of the Priests. Only the priests were allowed to enter this court. Within the courtyard of the Priests stood the great furnishings of worship: the Altar of Burnt Offering, the Brazen Laver, the Seven Branched lamp-stand, the Altar of Incense, and the Table of Showbread.
Second, there was the Court of the Israelites. This was a huge courtyard where Jewish worshippers met together for joint services on the great feast days. It was also where worshippers handed over their sacrifices to the priests.
Third, there was the Court of the Women. Women were usually limited to this area except for joint worship with men. They could, however, enter the Court of the Israelites when they came to make a sacrifice or worship in a joint assembly on a great feast day.
Last was the Court of the Gentiles. It covered a vast space, surrounding all the other courtyards, and was the place of worship for all Gentile converts to Judaism.
Two facts need to be noted about the Court of the Gentiles.
It was the courtyard farthest removed from the center of worship, the Holy of Holies, which represented God’s very presence (see note, pt.2— Ephes. 2:14-15).
A high wall separated the Court of the Gentiles from the other courts, disallowing any Gentile a closer approach into God’s presence. In fact, there were tablets hanging all around the wall threatening death to any Gentile who went beyond their own courtyard or center of worship.
In our lives, the major application of Jesus’ behavior in the temple comes from asking ourselves, “Do we get angry over the situations that would anger Jesus'”
The temptation is for us to become angry over matters that do not anger Jesus and then to be calm over problems such as the one that led Jesus to cleanse the temple. Jesus’ anger was appropriate, positive, and focused. It was always an outgrowth of His love, leading Him to act in the interest of others.
Most of us have an anger problem. For some it is the presence in our lives of far too much of the wrong kind of anger. For others it is the near-absence of godly anger.
For example, do you get angry enough about the moral decline in our country to vote? In the 1990 U.S. national elections, 90 percent of confessed homosexuals voted while only 35 percent of those who confessed to following Jesus did the same. Such apathy reflects the need for godly anger.
The temple is not to be used as a commercial center. It is not to be a place for buying and selling, marketing and retailing, stealing and cheating. It is not to be profaned. The temple is the House of God, God’s House of worship. It is to be a place of sanctity, refined and purified by God Himself. It is to be a place of quietness and meditation, a place set aside for worship, not for buying and selling where man gets gain.
“His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.” {18} Then the Jews demanded of him, “What miraculous 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} The Jews 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.”
“The Jews”—in particular the Jewish religious leaders directly challenged by our Lord’s actions in cleansing the temple—confront Jesus with a challenge. They demand a sign to demonstrate His authority to act as He has. The irony is that Jesus’ actions are the sign:[7]
1 “Behold, I send My messenger, And he will prepare the way before Me. And the Lord, whom you seek, Will suddenly come to His temple, Even the Messenger of the covenant, In whom you delight. Behold, He is coming,” Says the LORD of hosts. 2 “But who can endure the day of His coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He is like a refiner’s fire And like launderer’s soap. 3 He will sit as a refiner and a purifier of silver; He will purify the sons of Levi, And purge them as gold and silver, That they may offer to the LORD An offering in righteousness” (Malachi 3:1-3, NKJV).
I find the words of the Jews most interesting. They do not argue with Jesus about the evil of making the temple courts an emporium. I suspect the Pharisees agree with Him on this point. The issue is not what has been done, but who has done it. They raise the issues of Jesus’ identity and authority, which is not altogether hard to understand. Suppose you ran a stop sign and were pulled over by a police officer. If you were smart, you would politely listen to the officer, admit you were wrong, take the ticket, and pay it. If, however, you ran a stop sign and were pulled over by an irate citizen, you would be much less inclined to listen politely. Even if you were wrong, you would likely protest, “Who do you think you are, pulling me over to lecture me about my driving?”
In one sense, the Jews do view our Lord’s actions as a sign. For someone to cleanse the temple and correct wrongdoing found there implies having the authority to do so. If Jesus is acting in God’s behalf (they cannot yet grasp that He is acting as God), then let Him establish His credentials by an exercise of divine power. If He is acting with God’s authority, let Him perform a sign to prove it. We have an irreverent expression, which captures the spirit of the Jews’ challenge (who are not very reverent either): “Put up, or shut up!” They have thrown down the gauntlet. It is Jesus’ turn to respond.
Jesus does not give them a sign. He does not even refer to any of the signs He seems to have already performed in Jerusalem (see 2:23; 3:2). He is not about to jump through their hoops. He does not even try to convince them who He is. Instead, He speaks to them of the “ultimate sign,” His death and resurrection: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up again” (verse 19). Typically, the Jews can think only in the most literal terms (see Nicodemus in chapter 3). They assume Jesus is referring to Herod’s temple, a temple which has been under construction for “forty-six years.” Does Jesus think He can build a temple in three days that has already been under construction for forty-six years and is not yet complete?
John tells his readers what we already know. Jesus is not speaking of that earthly temple; He knows that it, too, will soon be destroyed (Mark 13:1-2). But He is speaking of Himself as the temple of God, and of His coming crucifixion. He is not trying to persuade these Jews to believe in Him, but rather to prophesy that they will not believe, and that they will put Him to death on Calvary. His triumph will be evident in three days, when He will be “raised up” from the dead.[8]
The Jews do not understand at all. They probably walk away, shaking their heads, convinced that Jesus is out of His mind. The disciples don’t understand either. Not until after our Lord’s death and resurrection does this prophecy come to mind, and they see how He fulfilled it exactly as He said. Then they believe both the Scripture and what Jesus has spoken. One might say they believe that what Jesus said and what was written in the Scriptures are one and the same, and both were fulfilled.[9] They came to believe in Jesus, and His words as the fulfillment of Scripture.
We are not actually told here what “Scripture” John has in mind, which the disciples remember and believe. After our Lord’s resurrection, the apostles used the Scriptures to prove that Jesus was the Messiah, and that His death and resurrection were foretold (see Acts 2:14-36; 13:16-41). Jesus Himself gives His disciples a lesson from the Old Testament on these matters before He ascends to the Father (Luke 24:44-49).
Note four things.
- The religionists questioned Jesus’ authority. What right did He have to do what He was doing? He claimed that the temple was His Father’s. They knew that He was claiming to be the Messiah; therefore, they wanted proof that His claim was true. They wanted some spectacular sign.
- His sign was to be given in the future. He was going to build a new meeting place for God. Note His exact words: “[You] destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”
- His puzzling statement was misunderstood . They could not understand how He could possibly build a temple in three days. The present temple had taken forty-six years to build.
- His puzzling statement had a symbolic meaning. Jesus was speaking of His body, of His death and resurrection.
- The proof that He was the Son of God with authority over God’s house was to be given. The sign was to be His body, His death and resurrection. The resurrection was to be the supreme proof of His Messiahship. They were to destroy (kill) Him, but He would be raised from the dead after three days.
- His death and resurrection was to provide a new temple, a new meeting place for God and man. It was to be in Him that men would thereafter meet God. The temple of His body was to become the temple of men, the temple whereby men would worship and be reconciled to God.
The Jews (i.e., Sadducean priests) were in a pickle. They were about to lose a bunch of money, which was one of their greatest loves.
On the other hand, they were about to get beat up if they oppose this Jesus. They address him with cautious cordiality. They do not deny his identity but they do ask for proof of it. They ask for a sign. According to popular Jewish expectations the Messiah would come with great signs and wonders. Thus, these Sadducees, who did not even believe in a literal Messiah, were coddling to the crowd.
Jesus doesn’t want to play their game. The only sign Jesus offers is the resurrection. They misunderstand him because they take his words literally (cf. Jn 3:3-4; 4:14-15; 4:32-33; 6:51-52; 7:34-35; 8:51-52; 11:11-12; 14:4-5). They can’t see how Jesus could rebuild an edifice in three days that it took construction crews forty-six years to build.
This will come up again at Jesus’ trial (Mt 26:61; Mk 14:58) as well as at Stephen’s (Acts 6:14), when they are charged with threatening to destroy the temple. And yet it would appear that the Pharisees understood what Jesus intended when they put guards at the tomb (Mt 27:62-66).
It is significant that the word “temple” of v. 14, is changed in v. 19-21. This latter word, strictly speaking, is the “shrine” where a god dwells. It is used in 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 and 6:19 to refer to the body of the Christian. Obviously, Jesus was speaking about his own body as the dwelling place of God. The disciples later remembered this very discussion and it sparked in them even greater faith in Jesus.
This incident is not about the temple edifice, but the person of Jesus. Nevertheless, Jesus’ death did, in fact, make the temple obsolete. The final sacrifice had been made and the veil was torn in two. God was no longer in the Holy of Holies. Instead, God dwells in the hearts of men through the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 6:19).
Furthermore, God’s judgment fell upon the Jews and their temple for killing Jesus. It would be destroyed in a.d. 70. To this day OT worship in the temple has not been restored.
Psalm 69 is clearly a messianic psalm that is quoted several times in the New Testament: vs. 4 (John 15:25); vs. 8: (John 7:3-5); vs. 9 (John 2:17, Romans 15:3); vs. 21 (Matt. 27:34, 48); and vs. 22 (Rom. 11: 9-10).
When He cleared the temple, Jesus declared ‘war’ on the hypocritical religious leaders (Matt. 23), and this ultimately led to His death.
According to Jewish tradition, the arrival of the Messiah was to be heralded by great wonders and upheavals. They thought this may be part of it…when they asked for a sign, verse 19 talks of the destroyed temple being raised in three days.
Certainly, they misunderstood (1 Cor. 2:14) Him, but remembered His statement years later. The temple was an important element of the Jewish faith, for in it God was supposed to dwell. All of the ceremonies and sacrifices of the Jewish religion centered in the temple. When Jesus suggested that their precious building would be destroyed, their angry reaction was predictable. After all, if His body is the temple, then the Jewish temple would be needed no more!
It had taken more than 46 years to build the Temple, and their statement must have been associated with the reign of Herod, who began his reign in 37 B.C., and according to Josephus, began construction in the 18th year of that reign, in the year 19 B.C.
Thus the Jews could say 46 years to that date, though it was not completed (it was not completed until 64 A.D., or 34 years after Jesus’ crucifixion, just a few years before being destroyed by the Romans in A.D. 70. And, in reality, Jesus predicted the end of the entire Jewish religious system, for in A.D. 70, when the temple was destroyed, it did end.
Remember, too, that this gospel was written after the Temple was destroyed. Titus, the Roman general, came during the Passover season, and some three million Jews were there at the time, Josephus tells us.
By the temple cleansing, Jesus: attacked the secularizing spirit of the Jews. One should not tamper with holy things. He exposed their graft and greed, in addition to assailing their anti-missionary spirit. The court of the Gentiles had been built as an invitation for them to worship the God of Israel (Mark 11:17). But Annas and his sons were using it for selfish purposes.
This act also fulfilled Messianic prophesy. (Psalm 69 and Malachi 3). His “sign” was the greatest miracle of all, which changed the course of all history and mankind! Matthew 21:21f, Mark 11:15-17, and Luke 10:45f record a second cleansing of the temple, at the close of Jesus’ ministry.
It was logical for the religious leaders to ask Him to show the source of His authority. After all, they were the guardians of the Jewish faith, and they had the right to test any new prophet who appeared.
“The Jews require a sign” was a phrase we see often in the gospels. He almost always refused to do so, except for the sign of Jonah (Matt. 12:39ff), which was his death, burial and resurrection.
Verses 17 and 22 indicate John’s thoughts for us “after the facts.” These events served to anger the traders, but aided in reminding the disciples. But it came slowly, only after the resurrection were they convinced! While His disciples remembered this after He was raised from the dead, his enemies also remembered it and used it at His trial (Matt. 26:59-61)! And some of the people mocked Him with it when He was dying on the cross (Matt. 27:40).
A special notation here: In writing this gospel, John included a number of vivid pictures of the death of the Savior. The first is the slaying of the Lamb in John 1:29, indicating that His death would be that of a substitute for sinners.
The second is here, the destroying of the temple, suggesting a violent death that would end in victorious resurrection. The third is that of the serpent lifted up (3:14), a reference to Numbers 21:5-9.
The Savior would be made sin for us (1 Peter 2:24). His death would be voluntary (John 10:11-18): the Shepherd would lay down His life for the sheep. Finally, the planting of the seed (12:20-25) teaches that His death would produce fruit to the glory of God. His death and burial would look like failure, but in the end, God would bring victory.
Jesus Christ and the special knowledge (2:23-25).
“Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many people saw the miraculous signs he was doing and believed in his name. {24} But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all men. {25} He did not need man’s testimony about man, for he knew what was in a man.”
For some time, John the Baptist had been preaching to the nation Israel, calling men to repentance in preparation for the coming of Messiah. At that time, even John the Baptist did not know for certain who the Messiah was. And so he spoke about Him in general terms.
6 A man came, sent from God, whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify about the light so that everyone may believe through him. 8 He himself was not the light, but he came to testify about the light. 9 The true light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world (John 1:6-9).
John testified about him and cried out,
“This one was the one about whom I said, ‘He who comes after me is greater than I am, because he existed before me’” (John 1:15).
26 John answered them, “I baptize with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, 27 who comes after me. I am not worthy to untie the strap of his sandal” (John 1:26-27).
Finally, God revealed the identity of the Messiah to John as he was baptizing Jesus:
30 “This is the one about whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who is greater than I am, because he existed before me.’ 31 I did not recognize him, but I came baptizing with water so that he could be revealed to Israel.” 32 Then John testified, “I saw the Spirit descend as a dove from heaven, and it remained on him. 33 And I did not recognize him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘The one on whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining, this is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ 34 I have both seen and testified that this man is the Chosen One of God” (John 1:30-34).
John was quick to point out to his disciples and others that Jesus was the One of whom he had been speaking. It was not long before several disciples attached themselves to Jesus, traveling along with Him, and even staying with His family in Capernaum (John 1:35ff.). They accompanied our Lord to the wedding at Cana of Galilee (2:1-2). It certainly seemed that it was time for Jesus to make His debut as Israel’s Messiah. This may have been in Mary’s mind when she informed Jesus that the wedding party had run out of wine. Jesus provided the wine, but He did so in a way which kept His identity—and even His power—a secret.
A few days later, Jesus and His disciples went up to Jerusalem, where our Lord publicly proclaimed His identity in a most unusual way. He cleansed the temple by driving out the sheep and the oxen, and also the men who were making His Father’s house a place of business. While John does not call this a “sign,” it surely was a “statement” by our Lord, a very public statement. Jesus was not merely correcting some evil; He was doing so as One who had the right to do so—Israel’s Messiah.
In Jerusalem, Jesus was beginning to gain a following. This looked like the start of something big. It is precisely that for which the disciples had hoped. It is what our Lord’s brothers almost defied Him to do (see John 7:1-5). One would expect our Lord to “fan the flames” of His rising popularity and expand the ranks of His followers. Instead, we read these words, which are not recorded in any other Gospel: “But Jesus was not entrusting himself to them, because he knew all people. 25 He did not need anyone to testify about man, for he knew what was in man” (John 2:24-25).
What does Jesus have against popularity and large numbers? What does it mean when John tells us that Jesus would not “entrust Himself” to these people who believed in Him? Why does Jesus keep His distance from those who want to be near Him? What are we to learn from all this? The purpose of this message is to learn the answers to these questions, and then to explore their implications for Christians today. It is my belief that these three verses which conclude the second chapter of John set the stage for chapters that follow. Let us listen closely to the words of John, and let us look to the Spirit of God to interpret and apply them to our hearts and lives.
John does not relate the story of any wonder that Jesus did in Jerusalem at the Passover season; but Jesus did do wonders there; and there were many who, when they saw his powers, believed in him. The question John is answering here is-if there were many who believed in Jerusalem right at the beginning, why did Jesus not there and then set up his standard and openly declare himself?
The answer is that Jesus knew human nature only too well. He knew that there were many to whom he was only a nine-days’ wonder. He knew that there were many who were attracted only by the sensational things he did. He knew that there were none who understood the way that he had chosen. He knew that there were many who would have followed him while he continued to produce miracles and wonders and signs, but who, if he had begun to talk to them about service and self-denial, if he had begun to talk to them about self-surrender to the will of God, if he had begun to talk to them about a cross and about carrying a cross, would have stared at him with blank incomprehension and left him on the spot.
It is a great characteristic of Jesus that he did not want followers unless they clearly knew and definitely accepted what was involved in following him. He refused-in the modern phrase-to cash in on a moment’s popularity. If he had entrusted himself to the mob in Jerusalem, they would have declared him Messiah there and then and would have waited for the kind of material action they expected the Messiah to take. But Jesus was a leader who refused to ask men ever to accept him until they understood what accepting meant. He insisted that a man should know what he was doing.
Jesus knew human nature. He knew the fickleness and instability of the heart of man. He knew that a man can be swept away in a moment of emotion, and then back out when he discovers what decision really means. He knew how human nature hungers for sensations. He wanted not a crowd of men cheering they knew not what, but a small company who knew what they were doing and who were prepared to follow to the end.
We will continue to see the Jewish people divided over the meaning of these miracles. The same miracles that attracted Nicodemus to Jesus caused some of the other religious leaders to want to kill Him! They even asserted that His disciples were done in the power of Satan!
“He knew what was in man” is a statement that is proved several times in this gospel:
– Jesus knew the character of Simon (1:42)
– He knew what Nathanael was like (1:46ff)
– He told the Samaritan woman “all things” that she had ever done (4:29)
– He knew that the Jewish leaders did not have God’s love in their hearts (5:42)
– He saw the repentance in the heart of the adulteress (8:10-11)
– several times in the upper room, he revealed to His disciples their own inner feelings and questions
Christ knows everything about everyone. As this Scripture says: He knows “all men” and He knows what is “in man”: all his thoughts and deeds—good or bad, done in the light or in the dark, in the open or behind closed doors, publicly or secretly.
A few days before this, our Lord turned the ceremonial cleansing water into wine. He then went up to Jerusalem with His disciples. Upon His arrival at the temple, Jesus drove out those who had made “His Father’s house” a place of business. One might think that this temple cleansing was counter-productive, so far as our Lord’s popularity is concerned. Other than making Jesus unpopular with the religious elite, this does not seem to be the case at all. In reading the Gospels, one does not get the impression that the Jewish religious leaders were exceedingly popular.
They seem to have been arrogant snobs, who cared little about the common people and much about their position and power. Listen to the response of these leaders to the officers who were sent to arrest Jesus when they came back empty handed:
45 Then the officers returned to the chief priests and Pharisees, who said to them, “Why didn’t you bring him back with you?” 46 The officers replied, “No one ever spoke like this man!” 47 Then the Pharisees answered, “You haven’t been deceived too, have you? 48 None of the rulers or the Pharisees have believed in him, have they? 49 But this rabble who do not know the law are accursed!” (John 7:45-49, emphasis mine.)
The religious elite did not appear to share the attitude of the common people toward the rule of Rome. The common people seemed eager to “throw the rascals out.” They seemed to look to the Messiah to do this. But listen to the words of the chief priests and Pharisees, when they realize how popular Jesus has become, due in part to the recent raising of Lazarus:
47 Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called the council together and said, “What are we doing? For this man is performing many miraculous signs. 48 If we allow him to go on in this way, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away our sanctuary and our nation” (John 11:47-48).
When Jesus took on the religious leaders and exposed their ignorance, arrogance, and hypocrisy, the common people seemed to love it:
35 While Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, he said, “How is it that the experts in the law say that the Christ is David’s son? 36 David himself, by the Holy Spirit, said, ‘The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet.”
37 David himself calls him ‘Lord.’ So how can he be his son?” And the large crowd was listening to him with delight (Mark 12:35-37, emphasis mine).
At this very early stage of our Lord’s ministry in John’s Gospel, I am inclined to think that even the Pharisees were pleased by what Jesus had done when He cleansed the temple. It seems to be the high priest and the Sadducees who were most involved in the temple market Jesus “closed” when He made His debut at the temple. The high priests seem to have been Sadducees (see Acts 5:17). The Pharisees appear to be laymen, as opposed to the priests and religious officials. The Pharisees and Sadducees[10] had some very sharp differences (see Acts 23:6-8). We might sum up these differences by saying that the Sadducees were liberals, while the Pharisees were very conservative, theologically speaking.
When Jesus cleansed the temple, He was confronting and challenging the Sadducees. As rivals of the Sadducees, the Pharisees probably enjoyed watching one “man” (of apparently common stock) make the religious establishment look bad. This “Jesus” might come in handy to the Pharisees, or so they might have thought. Such thinking would quickly vanish, but it may have been present in the first days of our Lord’s ministry, while He was still in Jerusalem.
Yet another factor added to our Lord’s popularity. While He was in Jerusalem, Jesus performed a number of signs:
Now while Jesus was in Jerusalem at the feast of the Passover, many people believed in his name because they saw the miraculous signs he was doing (John 2:23, emphasis mine).
He came to Jesus at night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could do the miraculous signs that you do unless God were with him” (John 3:2, emphasis mine).
So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him because they had seen all the things he had done in Jerusalem at the feast (for they themselves had gone to the feast) (John 4:45, emphasis mine).
John is very selective in the signs he chooses to include in his Gospel. The turning of water into wine seems to be our Lord’s first public sign. John now tells us that while Jesus was in Jerusalem, He performed a number of signs. These signs made a great impact on many who observed them. Many who witnessed them “believed in His name” (verse 23).
First I must point out something that is not sufficiently clear in the English translations of this passage. John uses the same Greek term[11] to refer to the faith of those who believed (this is the word) in His name as he does for our Lord’s not entrusting (here it is again) Himself to them. The closest English approximation of the Greek text would be translated something like this: “Now while Jesus was in Jerusalem at the feast of the Passover, many people trusted in His name because they saw the miraculous signs He was doing, but Jesus was not entrusting Himself to them, …”
We are seeking to learn what John means when he tells us that Jesus did not entrust Himself to some believers. I believe we can do so by answering this pair of questions: (1) Why didn’t Jesus entrust Himself to these believers? and, (2) To whom, if any, did Jesus entrust Himself? Let us pursue these two questions, beginning with the second question.
John’s words in 2:23-25 indicate that Jesus did not entrust Himself to certain people, but by inference we would conclude that there were those to whom He did entrust Himself. Would we not agree that if our Lord entrusted Himself to any group of people it would be His disciples? Now we can move to the first question, slightly modified: “Why did Jesus entrust Himself to His disciples but not to these Jerusalem believers?”
John tells us the reason: Jesus is God. As God, He knows all things. Among the things He knows is what is in men’s hearts. We know from the Gospels that our Lord knew the thoughts of men:
3 Some people came bringing to him a paralytic, carried by four of them. 4 When they were not able to bring him in because of the crowd, they removed the roof above Jesus. Then, after tearing it out, they lowered the stretcher the paralytic was lying on. 5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” 6 Now some experts in the law were sitting there, turning these things over in their minds, 7 “Why does he speak this way? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” 8 Now at once Jesus knew in his spirit that they were contemplating such thoughts, so he said to them, “Why are you thinking such things? 9 Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your stretcher, and walk’? 10 But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins,”—he said to the paralytic—11 “I tell you, get up, take your stretcher, and go to your home” (Mark 2:3-11, emphasis mine).
A dramatic example of our Lord’s omniscience[12] has already been described by John in chapter 1. Jesus welcomed the two disciples of John the Baptist, one of whom was Andrew (1:35-40). He knew what was in the hearts of the men He chose as His disciples. He renamed Simon “Peter” (the stone). He knew what Peter’s character would be. The most dramatic example of our Lord’s omniscience was our Lord’s knowledge of Nathanael as a man in whom there was no guile, the man whom Jesus “saw” while he was unseen, under the fig tree (1:45-51). The hearts of the disciples were an “open book” to our omniscient Lord. He also knew what was in the heart of Judas, who was to betray Him (see Matthew 9:3-5; John 6:70-71; 13:26).
I take it, then, that because Jesus fully knows the hearts of all men, He does not entrust Himself to those whose faith is second class. There is a tension here, which I cannot overlook or deny. On the one hand, we have nothing to commend us to God. He does not choose to save us because of what we are, what we have done (see Titus 3:4-5), or for what we can do for His kingdom (contrary to some popular misconceptions). He chooses the weak and the foolish things to confound the wise (1 Corinthians 1:26-31). There is nothing we have but what we have received from Him (1 Corinthians 4:7). On the other hand, God does look on the heart. He rejected Saul and He chose David, not because of his stature or his good looks, but because of his heart (1 Samuel 16:7). The issue here is not God’s choice of men for salvation, but His choice of men for service, and for intimate fellowship and ministry with Him.
After John Mark abandoned Paul, the apostle refused to take this young man along on his next missionary journey. Paul did not want to entrust himself and his mission to a man who had deserted him under fire (see Acts 15:36-41). Paul instructed Timothy: “And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Timothy 2:2, emphasis mine). Leadership in the local church is restricted to those who have met certain qualifications, many of which have to do with character (see 1 Timothy 3:1-13; Titus 1:5-9). The disciples, to whom our Lord entrusts Himself, are those to whom He will give the Great Commission, those who will be the foundation of His church (Matthew 28:18-20; Ephesians 2:17-22).
What is it about these Jerusalem “believers” which causes our Lord to distance Himself from them, while He entrusts Himself to His disciples, spending a great deal of time with them? I believe our text tells us the reason: their faith was “sign faith.” John says, “Now while Jesus was in Jerusalem at the feast of the Passover, many people believed in his name because they saw the miraculous signs he was doing” (John 2:23).
The faith of these saints is based upon our Lord’s signs. I would suspect that when things got tough, their faith, if it did not grow beyond this dependency on signs, would seek for some new sign. We know, of course, that there were many who demanded to see a sign in order to believe, but these folks seem to never have enough sign-proof to believe. There are those like Nicodemus, however, who remain “secret saints,” who out of fear of the Jews keep quiet about their faith in Jesus:
However, no one spoke openly about him for fear of the Jewish authorities (John 7:13).
After this Joseph of Arimathea, a disciple of Jesus (but secretly, because he feared the Jewish authorities), asked Pilate if he could take away the body of Jesus. Pilate gave him permission, so he went and took away the body (John 19:38).
Jesus would shortly send His disciples out in teams of two to proclaim the Gospel. They would face opposition, rejection, and persecution. Jesus would not entrust Himself to those who would wither and withdraw under this kind of adversity. Jesus knew the hearts of men, and because of this He committed Himself to His disciples and kept His distance from others, whose faith was dependent on signs.
Jesus knew human nature. He knew the fickleness and instability of the heart of man. He knew that a man can be swept away in a moment of emotion, and then back out when he discovers what his decision really means.
He knew how human nature hungers for sensations. He wanted not a crowd of men cheering who knew nothing, but a small company who knew what they were doing and who were prepared to follow Him to the end!
And, too, this brief paragraph prepares us for the important interview with Nicodemus in our next lesson. But, in reality, the three main interviews which will follow exhibit Jesus’ method of dealing skillfully with three different types of personality with the purpose of bringing them to belief.
Conclusion
The cleansing of the temple does not permanently eliminate the abuses described in our text. We know that conditions in the temple were the same at the time of the second cleansing (described in the Synoptic Gospels) as they were in the first cleansing (as described by John). I suspect that immediately after our Lord departed from Jerusalem all the temple businessmen set up shop again and went right on with their evil deeds. I believe our Lord’s purpose in this first cleansing is to “make a statement,” about Himself, the temple, and the Jewish religious system—not to permanently solve the problem He attacks.
The temple is being abused, and Jesus rightly responds to such abuse. Even the hard-hearted Jewish religious leaders realize that more is going on here than this. They understand that Jesus is making a claim. He is claiming to have the authority to correct evils performed in the temple. He calls the temple “His Father’s house.” No one who actually witnessed this event fully grasped its meaning or significance. The disciples will understand, but only after our Lord’s death and resurrection, only after the coming of the Holy Spirit (see John 16:12-14). Jesus not only came with God’s authority (as a prophet might do); He came as God. In fact, He is God tabernacling among men, as John tells us (John 1:14). Later, He speaks of Himself as the temple, and so He is:
21 And the twelve gates are twelve pearls—each one of the gates is made from just one pearl! The main street of the city is pure gold like transparent glass. 22 Now I saw no temple in the city, because the Lord God All-Powerful is its temple, and the Lamb. 23 The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, because the glory of God lights it up, and its lamp is the Lamb. 24 The nations will walk by its light and the kings of the earth will bring their grandeur into it. 25 Its gates will never be closed during the day (for there will be no night there). 26 They will bring the grandeur and the wealth of the nations into it, 27 but nothing ritually unclean will ever enter into it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or practices falsehood, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life (Revelation 21:21-27, emphasis mine).
At the cleansing of the temple, our Lord symbolically comes to possess what, as God, is His. As the Son of God, the temple is His Father’s house, and thus He has the right to correct temple abuses. He has the right to drive men and animals out of the temple courts. As I read this account of this first temple cleansing, I am reminded of a comment by Leon Morris on John 1:11, which directly relates to our text. Let’s first look again at this text:
9 The true light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world was created through him, but the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to what was his own, but his own people did not receive him (John 1:9-11, emphasis mine).
Here is what Morris has to say about the expression, “His own”:
With vivid touches John highlights the tragedy of the rejection. We might translate the opening words, ‘he came home.’ It is the exact expression used of the beloved disciple when, in response to Jesus’ word from the cross, he took Mary ‘unto his own home’ (19:27; cf. 16:32). In one sense, when the Word came to this world He did not come as an alien. He came home. Moreover, He came to Israel. Had He come to some other nation it would have been bad enough, but Israel was peculiarly God’s own people. The Word did not go where He could not have expected to be known. He came home, where the people ought to have known Him.[13]
Various translations try to capture the significance of the subtle change of terms John deliberately employs in verse 11. Unfortunately, some translations render these two terms by the same expression, “His own.” The New English Bible renders this sentence, “He entered his own realm, and his own would not receive him.” The NET Bible translates, “He came to what was his own, but his own people did not receive him.” Morris would render it, “He came home, and His own would not receive Him.” Do you see it? When Jesus comes into the temple, He is coming “home.” This is His Father’s house. He is about His Father’s business. And in the process of doing so, He declares Himself to be God. In response, He is rejected—“His own did not receive Him.”
God has the right to possess what is His. Here, Jesus claims the right to possess the temple because it is His. This incident may seem very distant and detached from us today. We live in a place very distant from Jerusalem, where no temple (like Herod’s temple, which was destroyed) exists. How can this event possibly relate to us? It does, my friend; it really does.
The first coming of our Lord was, in part, to claim what was His. The Second Coming of our Lord, an event still future, is a time when He will come and fully possess what is His. Jesus speaks a good deal about stewardship, as we can see in the Gospels. The reason should be obvious: We do not own anything; ultimately, He owns it all. This puts everything we think of as our “possessions” in an entirely different light. Some seem to think they own everything they have, and if they feel generous enough, they may give a percentage of it to God. In truth, God claims it all, and we are merely stewards of His possessions. If we use these to indulge ourselves, we are failing our stewardship. If we fail to make good use of them, we fail as stewards. Let us cease thinking of anything as our own. Let us hold much less tightly to the things that we call possessions. And let us use them well as His stewards.
Jesus came to possess what was His—His temple. Jesus had the right to define how men could use His temple, and the right to correct those who abused it. The church is now being built up as His temple:
19 So then you are no longer foreigners and non-citizens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of God’s household, 20 because you have been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. 21 In him the whole building, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, 22 in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit (Ephesians 2:19-22; see also 1 Peter 2:4-10).
As a result, those who in any way do damage to the church, God’s temple, are guilty of a most serious offense:
16 Do you not know that you[14] are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you? 17 If someone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, which is what you are (1 Corinthians 3:16-17).
And what mutual agreement does the temple of God have with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, “I will live in them and will walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people” (2 Corinthians 6:16).
If the church collectively is the temple of our Lord, it is also true that we are individually “temples” of the Holy Spirit. Because this is true, our sins in the body are taken most seriously.
19 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? 20 For you were bought with a price. Therefore glorify God with your body (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).
God owns us; He owns our body as His temple. We do not own ourselves.[15] In the context of 1 Corinthians 6, Paul tells us that sexual immorality, though taken very lightly by our society (see 6:13), is a most serious sin, especially for the Christian. If our body is the temple of God, then to defile it is to defile God’s temple. If Jesus took the defilement of Herod’s temple so seriously, how do you think He feels about the way you and I use our bodies? To abuse or defile them is an affront to God, to whom our bodies belong, and in which He dwells by His Spirit.
Our Lord’s words and actions also relate to our use of church buildings (or our places of worship). Let me be very clear: church buildings are not “God’s house” in the sense that the temple was. God is with His people when they gather, though it is not the “building” He indwells, but the church, His body. Nevertheless, our text has something to say about our gathering for worship.
Is it possible that we can turn the church (building) into an emporium, a house of merchandise? Whenever we begin to sell things in the church, that danger exists. At first, we may do this because we are trying to facilitate the worship of those who come. I think the temple businessmen would have said the same thing about their motivation. Whether it is songbooks, tapes and video’s being sold by a guest speaker or musician, or candy bars being sold to pay for a youth retreat, we need to be very careful that it does not turn the church into a shopping mall. There are lots of things being sold in churches today, so the danger is there.[16]
Let me press beyond the church walls for a moment, and give a word of warning about the commercialization of Christianity. Much of the ministry which was once viewed as the ministry of the church and by the church is now being handed over to “professionals” in Christian ministry. Some of this may be biblically defensible and even good, but some may not. I fear we have turned some Christian ministries into industries, “Christian industries,” where some Christians begin to view the needs of others as an opportunity to make a profit, rather than an occasion to sacrificially minister to others. I am most distressed when such “Christian ministries” are willing to minister only to those who have the means to pay, and who purposely reject or pass over those who are poor, and perhaps in the greatest need. Let us be on guard about commercializing the ministry.
We also need to be very careful about adopting “merchandising principles” as a means of assuring that we have a “successful” ministry.[17] I hear a lot about this today, as though secular business principles are the key to effective ministry. For example, a church may be engaged in a building program, trying to raise money for expansion. All too often, charts, thermometers, or advertisements dominate the auditorium (I refrain from using the word “sanctuary”) and distract from the worship that should take place there. Principles employed in the business world, which are truly biblical, may be applicable to the church. But many of the guiding principles of secular business are opposed to biblical principles. Much of the merchandizing promoted by Madison Avenue tactics is based upon an appeal to the flesh. When such is the case, Christian ministry can well do without such merchandizing principles and methods.
Finally, let me say a word about Jesus and judgment. Many like to think of Jesus as a “God of love,” who never criticizes, never judges, never condemns, whose calling is to affirm everyone and to make them happy. I must remind you that the way our Lord chose to publicly reveal Himself to the world was not by the turning of water into wine, or by raising the dead or healing the sick; Jesus revealed Himself to Israel as her Messiah by His cleansing of the temple. I would remind you that while John the Baptist foretold the coming of one who was the “Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world,” he likewise urged men and women to repent, because the Messiah was coming to judge the world. The Jesus of the Bible, the “real Jesus,” is the One who is merciful and gracious to those who trust and obey and the One who will judge those who resist and reject Him.
The changing of the water into wine and the cleansing of the temple give us a broad overview of the person and work of our Lord, Jesus Christ. He is the gentle and gracious Savior, who saved the newlywed couple from embarrassment by making water into wine. He is also the holy and righteous Judge, who will punish His enemies and correct the evils of men. As Paul writes,
Notice, therefore, the kindness and harshness of God: harshness toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness toward you, provided you continue in his kindness; otherwise you also will be cut off (Romans 11:22).
Have you considered the harshness of God, which you justly deserve as a sinner? Have you received the kindness of God in the gift of Jesus Christ, who died for your sins on the cross of Calvary? I urge you to “believe” in Him, for this is John’s purpose in writing this Gospel.
[1] “So very close was the connection between the Passover-meal proper and the immediately following Feast of Unleavened Bread that the term Passover is frequently used to cover both. Thus, in Luke 22:1—a very significant passage—we read: ‘Now the Feast of Unleavened Bread drew near, which is called the Passover.’ Also in Acts 12:4 (see the preceding verse) the term Passover clearly covers the entire seven-day festival. The Old Testament, too, calls the Passover a feast of seven days (Ezek. 45:21).” Hendriksen, pp. 121-122.
[2] The Greek word John uses here could be transliterated “emporium.” The temple courts had been transformed into a shopping mall.
[3] I do not believe John intends for us to conclude that the disciples understood this immediately, but that they eventually came to understand it, in the light of His death, burial, and resurrection, and by means of the illumination of the Holy Spirit (see John 16:12-14).
[4] “It was the failure to understand that the disciples regarded the Psalmist’s words as prophetic of Christ’s death and the assumption that they referred to the energy and fearlessness of Jesus on this occasion, that gave rise to the later and poorly attested reading followed by AV hath eaten me up in verse 17.” R. V. G. Tasker, The Gospel According to St. John: An Introduction and Commentary (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1980 [tenth printing]), p. 63.
[5] See Appendix: “Were There Two Temple Cleansings or Just One?”
[6] “With other New Testament writers, however, John detects in the experiences of David a prophetic paradigm that anticipates what must take place in the life of ‘great David’s greater Son.’ That explains why the words in 2:17, quoted from the LXX, change the tense to the future: Zeal for your house will consume me.… For John, the manner by which Jesus will be ‘consumed’ is doubtless his death.” Carson, p. 180.
[7] “‘The action is not merely that of a Jewish reformer; it is a sign of the advent of the Messiah’ (Hoskins)” Morris, p. 196.
[8] In our text, it is our Lord who raises Himself from the dead: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up again” (verse 19; see also John 10:18). Elsewhere, the resurrection of our Lord is viewed as the work of the Father (Acts 2:24, etc.) and of the Spirit (Romans 8:11). The resurrection, like creation, is the work of the Trinity.
[9] “We ought to observe the connection of the words, that they believed the Scripture, and the word which Jesus had spoken; for the Evangelist means that, by comparing the Scripture with the word of Christ, they were aided in making progress in faith.” John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries, Volume 7: The Gospels (Grand Rapids: Associated Publishers and Authors Inc., n.d.), p. 630.
[10] I should point out, however, that the term “Sadducee” never appears in the Gospel of John.
[11] I should clarify a bit. It is the same Greek verb in both verses. When describing the faith of those who believed in Jesus, John uses the aorist tense, focusing upon the moment of faith. When describing our Lord’s refusal to “commit” Himself to these “believers,” John uses the imperfect tense. John was informing us that this was Jesus’ course of action, something that He practiced consistently, in case after case, situation after situation.
[12] To be omniscient is to know all. It is an attribute of God alone. Jesus, as God, has this attribute.
[13] Morris, p. 96.
[14] The three “you’s” of verses 16 and 17 are all plural. Here, Paul is speaking of the church, collectively, as the temple of God.
[15] Here is a verse that needs to be etched in stone, and put in neon lights for any woman who would assert her right to have an abortion, because it is “her” body.
[16] Whether or not certain things should ever be sold by or to church members is another question. In our text, Jesus is most concerned about where these animals and birds were being sold.
[17] I do not wish to be understood as making a blanket condemnation here, but I do believe that many secular systems are embraced by Christians without any consideration of whether they truly have a biblical basis.
The opening ministry of Jesus in Jerusalem had attracted a great deal of attention, both favorable and unfavorable. Many of the people believed (2:23).
This section represents the first miracle Jesus performed, demonstrating His very purpose for coming to earth: to reveal the creative power of God. He had the power to create and produce what was needed to meet man’s need.
“You shall see greater things than that…. You shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.” 
Jesus called Philip personally and Philip trusted Him and followed Him. We do not know what kind of heart preparation Philip experienced, for usually God prepares a person before He calls him. We do know that Philip proved his faith by seeking to share it with his friend Nathanael.
Proud to be TJ's man 