Lent 3

Lent 3 (John 2:13-22)

“Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”

Jesus is the incarnation of the Logos, the co-eternal Word of God the Father.

The logos is the dynamic pattern our heavenly Father used to create the universe, our species and each of us individually. The Creator is God the Father. The pattern of Creation is God the Son. The active agent of Creation is God the Holy Spirit.

Lest this seem to be esoteric philosophy or academic theology, the beloved apostle John understood the reality of the logos to be the key to understanding Jesus. John was about fourteen years old when he met Jesus. He was seventeen when Jesus died. As with all of the disciples, the students of Jesus, John had many misunderstandings about Jesus. John had one attribute the other disciples lacked. John had a profound personal loyalty to Jesus.

After the resurrection John also displayed two important virtues. The first virtue was humility. Of all of the disciples in that patriarchal culture only John agreed to accept a woman, holy mother Mary, as his teacher. The second virtue was teachabililty.

As the youngest of the apostles, the leadership team of the church, John was in that rare spiritual state of knowing that he did not know. Where Peter was absolutely convinced that only Jews could be saved and Paul was absolutely convinced that he alone had the correct knowledge and understanding about Jesus, John savored the divine mystery of Jesus.

In the divine mystery we enter into the place of teachability. We make a choice to allow ourselves to be taught. We gaze into the Infinite and say: now I know in part.

The wife of a friend of mine often jokes that her husband is often wrong but never in doubt. The virtue of humility produces the attribute of teachability that walks through life with the attitude: now I know in part.

John waited until the end of his life to write his account of the life of Jesus. Matthew, Mark and Luke relay the eye witness reports of what Jesus said and did. John adds the dimension of who Jesus is. John adds an additional level of understanding to the facts.

As the incarnate logos Jesus is the very pattern of Temple worship. God revealed this pattern to Moses who wrote it down in the Bible. Moses commanded the Levites, the hereditary priesthood of the Old Covenant, to preserve the pattern.

When Jesus entered the Temple that day he experienced a horrible distortion  of the original pattern. Only a few of the hundreds of priestly families controlled the Temple. Those families sub contracted many of their functions to private businessmen. The priests also created what they called “Temple” money and then contracted with private money changers to exchange ordinary money for Temple money. Finally, they declared that only animals sold in the Temple by authorized dealers would be accepted for sacrifice.

None of this aligns with the pattern of worship God revealed to Moses. All of this violates the basic principle of sacrificial worship. The Bible is very clear that worship is the highest form of love a human being is designed to experience.

As worship is the highest form of love people can experience so blasphemy is the most terrible distortion of worship. Jesus had the right to drive out the money changers and animal merchants because they had no right to be conducting their business in the Temple. Their misuse of Temple worship in collusion with the priests resulted in perpetuating human separation from God.

Jesus is the incarnation of the pattern of Creation and he is the incarnation of the pattern of the Temple.  That is why Jesus identifies his own body with the Temple.

The Temple sacrifices were interwoven with the Old testament law. Moses said: these are the laws and when (not if) you break these laws these are the sacrifices you must offer in the context of worship.

The New Covenant Temple is Jesus. Jesus himself is the new Temple of the Real Presence of God with us. Jesus is also the great high priest of a new priesthood. And, as that great high priest he offers the one pure perfect and final sacrifice for sin.

The function of a priest is to offer a sacrifice. Christian priests offer the sacrifice of the New Covenant at the altar of real presence. That sacrifice is Jesus.

Of all the people at the Temple in Jerusalem that day only Jesus had the authority to discipline the merchants and hold the priests accountable for their distortion of God’s perfect plan of salvation and pattern for worship. Jesus used this occasion to teach about the meaning and purpose of his death and resurrection. Over the course of his long life, the beloved apostle John discerned the reality of the pattern in the words, works and person of Jesus Christ.

Jesus is the incarnation of the Logos- the very pattern of all that is. Only Jesus has the right, the authority and the power to define the universe, our species and each of us individually. Jesus is the pattern of worship. Jesus just doesn’t have life- he is life- the very source of life.

Our heavenly Father’s seal of approval on Jesus is the resurrection.

That is why Jesus can and does employ the first person singular when he says: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”