IN HIS FATHER'S HOUSE.
The feeling that Jesus had when a boy, that He must be about His
Father's business was now satisfied. He had begun the work of His
ministry, though He had been doing all those silent years the
tremendous work of overcoming evil for us. He met it in His own human
nature, and overcame it step by step without yielding to sin. He was
to do this work until it should be finished upon the cross, but for
three years He was to teach the people the truths of the new kingdom,
and show by His life, and at last by the laying down of His life, that
love had come into the world to fill the old forms of the law full of
the new Spirit of Life. He was to take away the sins of the world, and
in place of them give to the world eternal life.
It was time for the Passover Feast again, and Jesus with his disciples
joined the Capernaum company and started on the pleasant journey to
Jerusalem. They sang the songs of Zion, and rejoiced when the towers
of Jerusalem and the Golden Temple came into view, and as they came
down the road over Olivet they probably made their camp there where
they could look across the valley to the Temple. Everything was
moving. Flocks of sheep and herds of oxen were being driven toward the
Temple, and crowds of people from near and far were filling the
streets, and also moving toward the Holy House.
When Jesus came into the Temple Court He saw something that stirred his
whole soul with sorrow and wrath. The sellers of sheep, and oxen, and
doves, and the money-changers had brought their things into the great
court inside the marble pillars, and on the pavement of many-colored
marbles, and were buying and selling noisily, and turning the courts of
the Lord into a market. The voices of men and animals must have
disturbed those who worshipped in the inner courts. The priests
allowed it, perhaps they were paid for doing so, and Jesus, as a Son in
His Father's house where the servants had been unfaithful, began
clearing the court of all these things, and finding some cord on the
pavement He folded it into a short scourge of many strands and used it
to drive the cattle and sheep and their keepers out of court. The
money-changers would not easily yield, but he poured out their money
and overturned their tables, and to those who sold doves he said,
"Take these things hence; make not my Father's house a house of
merchandise."
And the people wondered why they should obey this strange young man,
but they did.
It was the Divine light in the face of Jesus, and not the bit of cord
that drove them out. They saw that He had a right to clear the Temple
courts.
Then the Jews wondered who had given Him this right, and they said to
Him,
"What sign showest Thou unto us, seeing Thou doest these things?"
And this was the sign He gave them: "Destroy this Temple, and in three
days I will raise it up."
He knew that they would not understand this, but they would remember it
after they had crucified Him and He had risen from the dead, for He
spoke of His body.
The Jews turned scornfully away. The Temple had been forty-six years
in building, and they thought His promise an idle boast, but they did
not forget it. Three years after they helped to bring Him to the
cross, accusing Him in the High priests palace of saying these things.