Jesus and the need to change
Lent 3B | John 2:13-22
Some people really don’t know what to do with this story. And some really do know what to do with this story and they like it!
People say “what would Jesus do?” Well, apparently, driving money-changers out of the Temple is on the list!
Images depicting Jesus with a whip are super meme-able. In part because it plays against type. And part because we do want to find Jesus’s line in the sand. Not just because it looks like ours, but because it makes us feel like we’re on the right track.
Think about it. Jesus eats with tax collectors and drives out the bankers. Make of that what you will…
Really what we’re trying to find is not a Jesus that looks like us. In a way, we’re contending with a Jesus who doesn’t look like us 99% of the time—but does this one time.
Wasn’t it Groucho Marx that said he didn’t want to be a part of a group that would have him as a member? Honestly, the point is to try to make me look more like Jesus. I really don’t want him looking more like me.
This isn’t a violent Jesus.
The way I’ve painted the picture for us is not very accurate. It is based on a popular assumption that gets made here. We often characterize disruption as violence. This is due, in part, because we treat potential property damage like an extension of one’s own body. So flipping tables and brandishing a whip become acts of violence.
This is not an objective truth, however. It comes from our cultural obsession with property, ownership, and the preservation of property rights—even over human rights. It is why we often choose to criminalize homelessness over meeting the needs of people without property. It is why we can have major metropolitan cities and no public restrooms.
We should not read this event like a moment of violence or a departure from Jesus’s ethic of peace. Nor is it an unscripted moment of frustration. Jesus doesn’t get mad and light into people, pop his top, or lose his mind.
But he does disrupt the approved economic system of the Temple in an act of profound civil disobedience.
Which means: yes, it is about money. And yes, it is about the system. And yes, it is about how people are being exploited.
How it works…
is that the good people are required by religious convention to make a pilgrimage to the Temple to offer a sacrifice to God. Obviously, if you live near Jerusalem, it is easier than if you live further away. There’s no bus to come pick you up. No public transportation to utilize. And no subsidy for the cost. This is a burden that falls on most Hebrew people!
The sacrifice itself requires live animals; preferably livestock. So you don’t just have to travel: you have to travel with animals.
Now, this works to the disadvantage of the city-dweller, right? You don’t have access to the land to raise your own livestock.
The problem becomes obvious pretty quickly. We need to figure out how to get animals into the hands of all of the people so they can participate in this public and sacred ritual.
So the solution becomes clear: make it so people can buy livestock.
Of course, there’s one hiccup. You can’t buy things in the Temple.
So they develop a workaround. You change out the secular currency for a special Temple currency which you can then use to buy the livestock. Problem solved, right?
Letter, meet the Purpose (of the Law)
Nobody is really fooled here, right? Trading out one form of currency for another isn’t substantively different. They’re still buying and selling stuff in the Temple. And trying to skirt the Law by saying
Well, we’re not in the Temple actually, we’re out on the porch…
Like God’s out there going: Oh, you got me! Gotta love those technicalities!
And yet, everybody is pretending this is all just fine.
And I want to reiterate just how obvious this all is. The people know it isn’t right. But,
- It’s what they’ve got.
- And they don’t know what else to do.
That’s it. They feel spiritually, emotionally, politically, and technically trapped in a giant game of “well, it could be worse.” And to participate in it is what they’ve got.
Sounds like economics, doesn’t it?
Which is why it is telling that Jesus doesn’t go with the flow on this one. Because there is something dehumanizing about the flow itself. Something corrupting. And something very much mismatched with God’s values.
Now, Jesus draws the people’s attention in two distinct directions. And we tend to pick one or the other. But He draws us to both. And connects them.
First he draws us to the defiling of the Temple.
And here, he doesn’t just name the problem, but tells them to stop the behavior.
We must not overlook this part of the story. Jesus tells them to change this. Why? Because this practice, which makes it easier for everyone, goes against the fundamental character of the Temple itself.
Just because we have a system, tradition, and agreed to a process, doesn’t mean it is actually the right thing to do!
And here, I think it is wise to recognize a lot of the stuff in our world that is unjust that we simply tolerate.
And then dig another layer deeper and recognize what our passive acceptance itself allows. Not just the injustice, but to place our attention away from the substance.
Given all of this thinking about systems, sacrifices, and civil disobedience, are we giving any attention at all to what sacrifices are actually for?
Much of what we argue about is how to maintain systems that are built to deliver a purpose that they frequently don’t ensure. Punishment, for instance, doesn’t ensure understanding or reconciling.
The second focus is on Jesus as the new Temple
For many, the shift to the spiritual helps us avoid thinking about economics and injustice. And for others, the focus on economics and injustice helps us avoid thinking about Jesus.
We’re not supposed to avoid one or the other. Jesus directs us to see what is problematic about the Temple’s sacrificial system and how God is offering them a new way of being together.
In this season of Lent, when we’re more introspective and concerned with connecting with the will of God, Jesus invites us to wrestle with our assumptions. With our devotions. And with our convictions.
We’re invited to think about things we take for granted; things we cannot change; and relationships which feel irrevocably broken. To think about this and see, instead, resurrection in Jesus. New life. New opportunity. Hope. Love.
To remove injustice from patterns we accept. And to see that Jesus is the engine of new patterns and practices.
This isn’t easy, friends. Jesus never said it would be. But he promised it is much easier with him than without. And we can trust in that.