John 2 – Moment to Moment (Bible blog)

Jesus’ zeal for his temple

Well, for those who have been praying for my computer, thank you. It’s finally back up and running after hours of futile troubleshooting. All of it actually sparked a thought for today’s blog.

In this passage, Jesus comes to the temple and finds that it’s invaded by a bunch of merchants and money changers.

They had set up their business in the temple courts, namely, the court of the Gentiles. People who were not Jews and wanted to come to worship God were only allowed in up to that point.

But when Jesus arrived at that outer courtyard, he saw utter chaos. Sheep, cattle, and birds were all making a ruckus, hardly conducive to an atmosphere of worship.

And if that weren’t bad enough, many people who had to change their money to pay for their temple taxes were getting horrific exchange rates.

Others, meanwhile, were being told that the animals they had brought to sacrifice weren’t good enough and were being forced to buy new ones at premium prices.

Little wonder that Jesus was a bit, shall we say, perturbed?

So for one of the few times in the gospels, we see Jesus go on a rampage, driving all the money changers and animals out of the courtyard, and bellowing out,

Get these out of here! How dare you turn my Father’s house into a market! (John 2:16)

The Jewish leaders then demanded him to show what right he had to do such a thing; what miraculous sign he could do to show that he was truly doing God’s will, to which Jesus replied,

Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days. (John 2:19)

The Jews thought he meant Herod’s temple, that was still not fully completed even after 46 years. (It was finally completed in 63 A.D).

But John tells us that Jesus was talking about his body. That though they may destroy it on the cross, yet he would raise it up in three days.

By the way, this totally destroys the idea that Jesus rose from the dead as a spirit as some, like the Jehovah’s Witnesses, like to claim. Here Jesus specifically tells us that he would raise his actual body.

But just as Jesus referred to his body as a temple, so Paul refers to our bodies as the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19).

And just as Jesus was zealous for the temple in Jerusalem, and keeping it pure for the worship of God, so he is zealous for the temple of our bodies, that we keep it holy and set apart for God.

Yet so often, we clutter it up not only with sin, but with other things as well that would keep us from a pure worship of God.

Which brings me back to my computer. When it went down, my hardware was fine, I just had my Windows software go down, such that it would not boot up. As a result, I still had access to all my files. I just had to go through DOS (does anyone still remember DOS) to get at it.

I tried desperately to find a way to not have to reinstall everything. But in the end, I simply had to back everything up, format the disk (in other words, wipe everything out), and then reinstall everything.

I had a lot of things on the disk that were not bad at all. There were many good things there. But because of the corruption that was there, it made it impossible for the system to go.

How about you? Is there anything in your heart that is distracting you from your worship of God?

Or is there anything in your heart that is keeping others from seeing God in you, just as all the sheep, goats, and money-changers kept the Gentiles from seeing God in the temple?

There may be sin. Or there may be things that are not bad in themselves, but are still causing harm in your temple.

Let Jesus purge it from your life and make you the temple he desires you to be.

What’s in your temple?

Wine or grape juice?

A long time ago, as a teenager I think, I glanced through a book called “Wine or Grape Juice?” or some such title.

I can’t really remember all it said, but I got the impression through the book that when Jesus created “wine” in Cana, he really created grape juice.

The author no doubt went through a lot of word studies and other things to prove his point.

I kind of carried that opinion for a long time until someone pointed out to me the context. What was the context?

Very simply, verse 10 where the master of the banquet tasted the wine Jesus created and proclaimed for all to hear,

Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now. (John 2:10)

Now stop a moment, and substitute the word grape juice in there and ask yourself, “Does this make sense?”

“Everyone brings out the choice grape juice first, and then the cheaper grape juice after the guests have had too much grape juice to drink; but you have saved the best grape juice till now.”

This makes no sense at all. If it was simply grape juice, there would be no alcoholic content in it. And if there was no alcoholic content in it, why would a host wait for everyone to drink too much of the best grape juice before serving the cheap stuff?

Answer: They wouldn’t.

This completely shoots down this theory in my opinion, unless someone can explain logically the meaning of this passage using grape juice.

Does Jesus then teach that it’s okay to get drunk? Of course not. Scripture clearly teaches against that.

But it doesn’t say anything about never drinking alcohol. Rather, it makes it clear that alcohol is not to control us. (Ephesians 5:18).

By the way, just to make one point clear, I don’t drink at all for two reasons. First, I don’t like the taste. Even more importantly, I don’t know what my limits are, and I have no desire to find out.

But the point I want to make here above all else is to be careful how we interpret God’s word.

The reason that many people want to believe Jesus made grape juice instead of wine is that they’re dead set against drinking of any kind.

But in trying to explain away John 2, they resort to word studies that completely ignore the context of scripture.

There are four points we should remember whenever we read scripture or hear anyone preach about it.

1. Pay attention to context. Too often, people get into trouble because they don’t. A lot of cults like the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons get into trouble because of this.

2. Let the scripture speak for itself. And if it happens to contradict what you think, you should change your thinking in order to match scripture, not the reverse.

3. Understand the role of culture in scripture. Some people get a little put off by Jesus addressing his mother as “Woman” in verse 4.

(The NIV softens it to “Dear woman,” but the “Dear” is not there in the original manuscripts of scripture.)

In our culture, it’s very disrespectful. In theirs, it was very respectful.

4. Do as Mary said in this chapter.

Do whatever [Jesus] tells you. (John 2:5)

Don’t just read scripture. Don’t just listen to it. But obey it. For it is the very words of God.

If you do these things, it’ll not only save you a lot of trouble as you interpret scripture, but also as you live your life.