John 2:13-25
When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, 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! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” 17 His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.”[c]
18 The Jews then responded to him, “What 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 They 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.
23 Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, many people saw the signs he was performing and believed in his name.[d] 24 But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all people. 25 He did not need any testimony about mankind, for he knew what was in each person.
Footnotes
The stories of Jesus driving the merchants out of the Temple and Him not entrusting Himself to people are really one and the same story. Jesus links the two when He says He is the Temple.
Let’s break it down.
The Temple was supposed to be a place where people worshiped and honored God. Instead, the merchants were using the Temple to get what they wanted – in this case, money. They were in the Temple, outwardly serving the Lord by helping people to make their sacrifices, but they weren’t there for the right reasons. The Temple was the place people met with God, and they were treating it as a market instead of the Holy of Holies.
When Jesus began performing miracles, crowds believed in Him, but after seeing how people treated the Temple, He wasn’t going to entrust Himself to anyone. Just like the merchants were misusing the Temple, those of us who believe in Jesus can be tempted to misuse Him. We get into the mindset of thinking about what we can get out of Jesus vs. how we can serve Him. We come to Christ, our Temple, the means by which we can meet with God, and forget all about His Holiness in the midst of trying to get our needs met.
There’s NOTHING WRONG with asking Jesus to help us, but we first must remember He is the Lord. He is holy, mighty, so far above us that we can’t grasp how awesome He is. He isn’t our tool but our Master.
Okay, I said Two Temples, but we know the Bible refers to a third temple where God dwells, and that’s the Temple of the Holy Spirit, you and me (1 Corinthians 6:19). Because of the forgiveness God the Father gives us through God the Son, we have been made to be a clean and suitable place for God the Holy Spirit to dwell.
With the Apostle Paul, can I tell you not to defile the temple of your body? It’s supposed to be the place where you and God’s Spirit meet together. Don’t use it for anything unholy. Don’t fill it with anything unholy. Don’t watch or listen to something that doesn’t belong in the Temple! Don’t use your bodily existence to get what you want but concentrate on loving and serving the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.
God’s Temple was holy because He is holy. Jesus is holy. If His Spirit lives in you, you are holy. Let’s not be like the Israelites, who “do not distinguish between the holy and the common and teach that there is no difference between the unclean and the clean” (Ezekiel 22:26).
Take a minute to let the Holy Spirit speak to you about how you can better treat the things of God as being holy.
1 Kings 8 tells us the story of Solomon dedicating the first Temple in Israel. Here are some excerpts.
Jesus is the Priest of His Temple
1 Kings 8:10-11 - When the priests withdrew from the Holy Place, the cloud filled the temple of the Lord. And the priests could not perform their service because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled his temple.
The Apostle Paul tells us, “God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 2:19-20).
Just as the glory of the Lord filled the Temple in cloud, God’s Presence filled Jesus. In the first Temple, the Presence of God was so overwhelming, the priests couldn’t perform their duties. As the God-Man, Jesus became our High Priest, so that we no longer need the priests to perform their duties.
Jesus is the Eternal Temple
1 Kings 8:13 – Solomon said, “I have indeed built a magnificent temple for you, a place for you to dwell forever.”
Solomon intended his Temple to last forever. It didn’t, but Jesus will. As God, He cannot die and so will endure forever as our Temple.
Jesus is God’s Name
1 Kings 8:16 – God said, “Since the day I brought my people Israel out of Egypt, I have not chosen a city in any tribe of Israel to have a temple built so that my Name might be there, but I have chosen David to rule my people Israel.”
Ultimately, God didn’t choose a city or a physical location to place His Temple. He chose Jesus, the earthly descendant of David. Normally, we think of God’s Name as being Yahweh, translated into English as I Am. This is how God introduced Himself to Moses in the burning bush. But God gave Himself another name when He named His Son Jesus, which means “God Saves.” Our Temple bears the personal name of God the Son.
Jesus Builds His Temple as the Son of David
1 Kings 8:19 – God said to David, “You are not the one to build the temple, but your son, your own flesh and blood—he is the one who will build the temple for my Name.”
Solomon was David’s son who built the first Temple. But Jesus is also referred to as the Son of David, being a descendant of David. He is David’s “own flesh and blood.” And as the Creator, God the Son literally built His own Temple when He formed Jesus in Mary’s womb.
God Dwelt on Earth in His Temple
1 Kings 8:27 – Solomon prayed, “But will God really dwell on earth? The heavens, even the highest heaven, cannot contain you. How much less this temple I have built!”
Solomon was amazed that God’s Presence would come and fill the Temple he had built. But in the Temple, God’s Presence rested over the Ark of the Covenant in the back room, the Holy of Holies. God couldn’t be seen except by the high priest once a year. God’s Presence never left the Temple. In Jesus, God dwelt on earth and walked among the people. He was accessible to everyone. He showed God’s grace in that He went to the people instead of requiring the people to come to the Temple.
Solomon built the 1st Temple. It was destroyed and plundered by the Babylonians at the time of the Exile.
Approximately 70 years later, Persia conquered Babylon, and the Israelites were freed to return to Judah. Nehemiah rebuilt the wall around Jerusalem, and Ezra the priest rebuilt the Temple.
This is the Temple Jesus visited. This 2nd Temple was destroyed about 40 years after Jesus died when Israel rebelled against Rome.
There is no Temple in Jerusalem now. In fact, the place a Temple is supposed to be is occupied by the Muslim's Dome of the Rock.
And yet, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-4 reads, "Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers and sisters, not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by the teaching allegedly from us—whether by a prophecy or by word of mouth or by letter—asserting that the day of the Lord has already come. Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God."
Paul is referring to prophecies of the Anti-Christ from the Book of Daniel. What we want to note here is that the man of lawlessness "sets himself up in God's temple," showing there will be a 3rd Temple before the end.
2 Thessalonians 2:8 - "And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming."
Lord Jesus, You are our Temple. You are the entrance, the door by which we enter into God’s Presence. Help us to never come to You nonchalantly, acting as if, “It’s just another day in the Temple, let’s see what we can get out of it.” But when we come to You on a daily basis, remind us that we are on holy ground. Fill us with awe and the fear of the Lord. Move our spirits to worship every time Your Name is mentioned.
And when we come into Your Presence, into Your Temple, and our spirits commune with Your Holy Spirit, search us and chase out of us anything that defiles. As we dwell in You, we want to be a holy place for You to dwell in us.
And all those who have placed their faith in You say, “Amen.”
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