So it's John 2, verses 12 to 22, and a sermon I've entitled, Cleaning House in Jerusalem. Let's pick it up in verse 12. It says, After this he went down to Capernaum, he and his mother and his brothers and his disciples, and they stayed there a few days. The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and he found in the temple those who were selling oxen and sheep and doves and the money changers seated at their tables. And he made a scourge of cords and he drove them all out of the temple with the sheep and the oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. And to those who were selling the doves, he said, take these things away. Stop making my father's house a place of business. As disciples remembered that it was written, zeal for your house will consume me. The Jews then said to him, what sign do you show for your authority for doing these things? Jesus answered and said to him, destroy this temple, and in three days I'll raise it up. The Jews then said, it took 46 years to build this temple, and you'll raise it up again in three days? but he was speaking of the temple of his body. So when he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the scriptures and the words which Jesus had spoken. On January 20th, 2025, Donald Trump is going to be sworn in as president, making him only the second person in U.S. history to serve in that office in two non-consecutive terms. The other man was... Grover Cleveland, who served from 1885 to 1889, and then again from 1893 to 1897. Now whether people love him or hate him, everyone has to agree that his is the most remarkable political comeback in American history. I mean, no political pundit took him seriously when he announced back in 2015 that he was running for office. I mean, some thought it was a publicity stunt, but think about Donald Trump was already famous. He didn't need publicity. When he was asked why he was running, he said it was because the country was heading in the wrong direction and he wanted to make America great again. But since there were a crowded field of Republican candidates who had declared for the race, including Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Mike Huckabee, no one gave him much of a chance. And at the time, very few evangelicals backed him because they didn't think that he was conservative enough and there were some real questions about his position on abortion. Well, at first, the press gave him favorable coverage. I think that's because they wanted him to get the nomination. They thought he would be an easy candidate for Hillary Clinton to defeat. And everyone expected her to do just that. She was way ahead in the polls, and the experts were telling us she had a 90% chance of winning the election. I mean, you can find YouTube clips where newscasters, late night comics, and political leaders all laughingly dismiss him, assuring us that Donald Trump will never be President of the United States. But much to their shock and dismay, he was elected. Four years later, when he left office under protest in 2020 after losing to Joe Biden, we were assured again that Trump was finished. There's no way he could make a political comeback. How could he? Well, after being impeached twice and blamed for the January 6 riot at the Capitol, after which even members of his own cabinet were banning him, like rats fleeing from a sinking ship, many resigned before his term was even over. The now former president was a political leper. Everyone wanted to distance themselves as far away from him as they could. But to make sure that the ex-president would not and could not run again, his opponents got to work. They waged a lawfare campaign against him, indicting him in a number of cases. He was charged in Florida with stealing government documents, in Georgia with election interference. He was charged twice in New York, once for a bookkeeping error involving hush money that was paid to Stormy Daniels. Normally, this would be a misdemeanor, and you'd pay a small fine. But in Donald Trump's case, they turned it into a 34-count felony, with the jury coming back with a guilty verdict. The other case in New York involved overstating the value of his Mar-a-Lago property in Florida that he used as collateral to take out a loan. The banks all got their money back and were repaid and they testified on his behalf. But the judge decided before the trial even began that Trump was guilty and so he fined the ex-president $355 million. But then he changed his mind and added $100 million to that. Now, that wasn't the only case where he was ordered to pay money. A woman named Jean Carroll claimed that Donald Trump had sexually molested her. She couldn't remember when it happened, and she didn't have any witnesses. And the statute of limitations had already passed. But the state of New York passed a one-year exception so that she could bring a case against them. She did, and she won, and they awarded her $5 million. But then she sued him again, claiming that he had defamed her when the ex-president said she was crazy and it had never happened. This time, the jury found Trump liable for $18.3 million in compensation for emotional and reputational harm, but then added $65 million in punitive damages, so the total was $83 million. And of course, then there was the assassination attempt. The gunman, who had been pointed out to the Secret Service a half hour before he took a shot at Mr. Trump, failed to kill him because the ex-president turned his head slightly to the side when the shot was fired. There are two more plots against him that have been foiled. Now, added to all of that is the fact that he's been repeatedly labeled as a fascist, a dictator, a threat to democracy. He's been repeatedly compared to Adolf Hitler, who liquidated six million Jews. I mean, there's just no way Americans are dumb enough to elect this guy again. But then again, Americans, who are known to be racist, transphobic, misogynist, basket of deplorables, put him back in office again. Not only did he win the electoral college, but he actually won the popular vote. The pundits were wrong again. As Peter, Paul, and Mary sang, when will they ever learn? When will they ever learn? Now, every new administration that comes in talks about how they're going to drain the swamp in Washington. But when the newly elected President Trump comes into office, I think the better way to describe it would be cleaning house, clearing out the deep state operatives, removing military leaders who push the woke agenda, securing our borders and reclaiming our national heritage. Well, long before Donald Trump decided to clean house in Washington, Jesus determined to clean God's house in Jerusalem. Jesus' cleansing of the temple, that's what we want to consider and think about this morning. So let's pray and get into the text. Father in God, we pray for grace and mercy. Help us to see why this matters, why Jesus was so enraged, and what it tells us about the way we should approach you. Bless us now to that end. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen. But this passage takes place in and focuses on the temple. So I think we can outline the sermon by writing down these four phrases related to the temple. The first is this. It's history and significance. The temple's history and significance. Secondly, it's corruption and defilement. Corruption and defilement. Third, the cleansing and the challenge. And fourth, the response and the result. It's history and significant. Before they had a temple, they had what for worship? A tabernacle. A tabernacle was like a portable temple that could be moved from place to place. The tent housed the Ark of the Covenant, and the articles and the surrounding enclosure had to be able to be taken down and reassembled as the people of Israel moved from place to place in the wilderness. Now, as a church, we know what that's like. We don't own a building, and right now we're meeting here in the Grantsburg Middle School, but we've had to meet in other places over the last number of years, especially when we weren't allowed to be in the school because of COVID. Our sound system is portable so that we can pick it up and pack it off to the next place. After Israel settled in the land, they still had a tabernacle for a number of years, but they parked in one location rather than moving it from place to place. But then eventually David got into his mind that he should build a permanent structure to house the Ark of the Covenant. Now, when he proposed this idea to Nathan the prophet, Nathan said, sounds good to me, go for it. But then the Lord spoke to Nathan and told him to go back to David and tell him that it wasn't for him to build a house for the Lord, but rather, it says this in 2 Samuel 7, 12-16, when your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers, meaning when you die, I will raise up your descendant after you who will come forth from you. and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him, and he will be a son to me. And when he commits an iniquity, I will correct him with the rod of men and strokes of the sons of men. But my lovingkindness shall not depart from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed before you. Your house and your kingdom shall endure before me forever, and your throne shall be established forever." Now, that prophecy, which ultimately looks to Jesus, the Messiah, found its immediate fulfillment with Solomon, who built the first temple, a beautiful house, to the God of Israel. Now, you remember, though, when the Lord warned Solomon and the people at that time that they consecrated the temple, that though it was a dwelling place for his glorious presence, if they sinned and went away from him, he would turn that temple into a pile of ruins. And, of course, that happened in Jeremiah's day. And since it was a special dwelling place for the Lord, the amount of care and respect they showed for the temple was a good barometer of the spiritual health of the people. I mean, when the people were in bad spiritual health and their kings were chasing after worldly concerns, the temple was often neglected and it fell into disrepair. I mean, with really evil kings, like in the days of Ezekiel, they even set up pagan idols within the temple itself. You can see that in chapter 8 of that book. But then you would have a godly king like Josiah, who would clean out the pagan idols and repair the temple and restore it to its proper use. Now, I have to say, we don't have anything equivalent to a temple for the church today. As a matter of fact, the church is not the building, the church is the people in the building. But it's still the case that the spiritual health of a congregation can be measured by the concern they show and the involvement they have in the mission of the church. I mean, think about it. If you were to compare a church to a sporting event, some people are never really part of the team. They're just satisfied to sit in the stands and clap when they see a great play. They're not part of the action. Of course, the reason that the temple was so significant for Israel is not only because it was a place of worship, but it was also the place where the sacrifice was made for the sins of the people. But as we learn in the book of Hebrews, those Old Testament sacrifices could never actually remove the sins of the people. They simply covered them up, pushed them forward until the day when Jesus, the Lamb of God, would take away the sins of the world. He's the true sacrifice that can cleanse you from your sin. Well, we're told in verse 12 that after this, he, meaning Jesus, went down to Capernaum, he and his mother and his brothers and his disciples, and they stayed there a few days. The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. As a faithful Jew, Jesus participated in the rituals of the Jewish religion. That brings us to our second point, though, corruption and defilement. It says this in verse 13. He found in the temple those who were selling oxen and sheep and doves and money changers seated at their tables. Now the defilement is obvious and stated. They were selling animals within the temple compound. But the corruption is implied and behind the scenes. But it's certainly evident to Jesus when he saw the merchants and the money changers. You see, this is the way it worked. The Sadducees, which was the class of the priests, were in charge of the temple sacrifice system. And like a mafia in New York, they exercised control and influence in its various industries. So also, the Sadducees acted as a religious mafia who did business when it came to the temple and the sacrifices. So the law required that Jews go up to Jerusalem and make sacrifices occasionally, especially on holy days like Passover. But it couldn't be just any old goat that you have or sheep in your flock. It had to be one that was spotless, one that was unblemished. And the reason was that was pointing to the sinlessness of Jesus, who was the Lamb of God. And now think about it. It wouldn't have been very convenient if you're coming from outside of Jerusalem, maybe even from the remote parts of the empire, to bring a sheep with you. So what you would do is you would go there and you would buy one that was pre-approved and pre-inspected in the area of Jerusalem. Those are the ones they were selling. in the temple compound. Of course, if you didn't do that, you risked having it rejected at the time. So that was convenient, but the problem was that the high priest and his cohorts had a monopoly on the temple sacrifice. And when you have a monopoly, you can charge outrageous prices. How much is a hot dog at the U.S. Bank Stadium during a Vikings game? It's about $8. Would you pay $8 if you went into your local cub and they were serving them there? Or how about when you go to the state fair, the last time I was there I was stunned, stunned I say, because the corndogs were six bucks each. I could only bring myself to buy two of them. I knew a guy I worked with, he was my boss at the dairy. He had a friend who owned one of the corndog stands at the Minnesota State Fair. He did 10 days of work there. He'd hire an old lady who would put the sticks into the hot dogs, and then they would dip them at a time. For that 10 days and one week at another fair, he made $165,000 a year. And that was 20 years ago. Wow. So the merchants selling the animals for the sacrifice jacked the prices way up, and the priests took a cut from every sale. Added to that, you had a temple tax, which had to be paid in a certain kind of coin, and that's why you had money changers there. And of course, they charged a fee for doing the coin exchange, and then the high priest and his cronies got a kickback on that as well. Think about it. In the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church, the office of bishop, do you know they would often sell it to whoever the highest bidder was? The bishop controlled the funds that came in from the people in the parishes so you could make a nice living, live a luxurious life by obtaining an office that your rich father purchased for you. And talk about being poor as a church mice. Well, there were some fat cats running the church at the time. Religion can be big money making enterprise. I mean, think about the televangelists and the money they bring in. There was certainly a racket at the time with the temple. There was corruption involved, but there was also defilement because they had set up the sales for the animals within the inner court, or the outer court of the temple complex, which is what set Jesus off. And that brings us to our next point, though, the cleansing and the challenge. This is started in verse 15. It says, and he made a scourge, this is Jesus, of cords, and he drove them out of the temple, the sheep and the oxen. And then he poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. And to them who were selling the doves, he said, take these things away and stop making my father's house a place of business. Now, honestly, most people, if they ever think of Jesus at all, think about him in terms of being meek and mild. And he certainly was that. You remember the PBS children's program, Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. Fred Rogers, the man who hosted that program, was certainly meek and mild. He'd come in to his house, take off his coat, put on his sweater and sing, it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood, a neighborly day, a beautiful day for a neighbor. Would you be mine? Could you be mine? It's a neighborly day in this beauty wood, a neighborly day for a beauty. Would you be mine? Could you be mine? I've always wanted to have a neighbor just like you. I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you. So let's make the most of this beautiful day. Since we're together, we might as well say, would you be mine? Could you be mine? Won't you be my neighbor? Now, Jesus was meek and mild, but he was also tough and terrifying, stern and scary. And that day when they saw the fire blazing in his eyes as he was going through the temple, the people scrambled to get away. Can you imagine the scene? His anger begins to rise as he enters into the temple court and the Gentiles, and he hears the lowing of cows and the bleeding of sheep. Merchants haggling with customers, dickering over price. What? Ten shekels for a sheep? Two for a dove? That's outrageous! I'll give you five shekels for the sheep, no more. Over in the corner, there's a Gentile. He's trying to pray, but he has to step over some cow pies to get where he's going. Jesus takes a whip fashioned from the cords, and he begins to drive out the animals. All those sound effects I'm keeping in my sermon, by the way. And as he overturns the tables of the money changers, the coins are rolling everywhere, and the people are scrambling to get away. He says, take these things away. Stop making my father's house a place of merchandise. You see, the temple was supposed to be a place of worship for the true God, not a Turkish bazaar or a flea market. And even if they were justified in selling animals for the convenience of the worshippers, did they have to do it within the temple complex itself? I mean, is the house of the Lord, or is it a stockyard barn sale? Doesn't it make you wonder, though, what Jesus might say if He were to come to some megachurches today? The building looks and feels more like a shopping mall than a sanctuary. Rather than music being reverential, it's raucous. The lyrics might be insipid and even irrelevant, but hey, it's got a backbeat you can groove to. They removed the cross from the center, put it off to the side. I know of a church where they painted the whole back of the church black and then put in all kinds of strobe lighting. And what's the point of having a fog machine in a church? How does that add to worship? What is worship? Well, it comes from the two old English words, worth-ship. So to worship God is to acknowledge and give verbal expression to his worth, his value, his greatness. William Temple described true worship as involving this, and listen carefully. It's a little longer. Worship is the submission of all of our nature to God. It's the quickening of our conscience by his holiness, the nourishment of our minds by his truth, the purifying of our imaginations by His beauty, the opening of our hearts to His love, the surrender of our will to His purpose, all this gathered up in adoration is the most selfless emotion which our nature is capable of, and therefore the chief remedy for that self-centeredness which is our original sin and the source of all of our actual sins." Let me ask you a question. When you come to the church on Sunday morning, why are you here? What's your focus? Is it simply to spend time with family and friends? Or is it to spend time with God, learning to love and honor and cherish your Creator, thrilling in the salvation that He's brought to us through Jesus Christ? I heard one well-known pastor who shut down his church for over a year for the pandemic. But he was convinced that it was the right move because their giving game kept going up during that time. I guess your cash flow, if it can be maintained, can justify anything. The question we have to ask when we come together on Sunday morning is, first of all, why are we here? And secondly, is everything we're doing designed to facilitate and express our adoration, our admiration, and appreciation for who God is and what he's done for us through Jesus Christ? What Jesus did that day was shocking, and it didn't go unnoticed. Look what it says in verse 17. His disciples remembered that it was written, "...zeal for your house will consume me." Now, that's a line from Psalm 69, where David is being persecuted. It speaks ultimately, though, not of his own experience, but that of the Messiah. And we know that because elsewhere in that psalm he says this, And of course, that's what happened with Jesus when he was hanging on the cross. So Jesus was zealous and jealous for the proper worship of God in the temple, but the caretakers of the temple, they had no such concerns. They simply saw a challenge to their authority. And so we read in verse 18, the Jews said to him, What sign do you show for your authority to do these things? That brings us to our last point, the response and the results. Jesus answered, verse 19 it says, and said, Destroy this temple, and in three days I'll raise it up again. The Jews answered and said to him, it took 46 years to build this temple, and you're going to raise it up in three days? Now Herod the Great was the king who tried to kill the baby Jesus. He liked to build things. And he spent a lot of money and time expanding and enhancing the temple in Jerusalem. The project was still ongoing at this point. By the way, it was destroyed two years after they actually finished it. So the idea that Jesus would be able to rebuild this temple in three days if they tore it down was absurd. I mean, even with modern equipment today, they couldn't do that. It says in verse 21, but he was speaking of the temple of his body. So his critics didn't understand Jesus' cryptic words in his response to them, but neither did his disciples at the time. For we read in verse 22, So when he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the scripture and the words which Jesus had spoken. What was the sign that Jesus was going to give to prove his authority to cleanse the temple? It was his resurrection. Jesus gave many evidences that He was who He claimed to be, the very Son of God. But no greater sign was ever given than when God raised Him from the dead. Up from the grave He arose with a mighty triumph over His foes. He arose the victor from the dark domain, and He lives forever with His saints to reign. He arose, He arose. Hallelujah, He arose. Romans 4.25 says this, He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, meaning Jesus, was raised because of our justifications. You see, on the cross, Jesus offered up His life as a sacrifice to pay for the sins of those who had trust Him. When He hung on that cross, God the Father placed all our sins on Him and punished Him in our stead. But how do we know that the sacrifice for our sins was acceptable to God? because God raised him from the dead to show that our guilt had been removed and that we are indeed justified, that is declared righteous in his sight, not based on what we've done, but based on what Christ has done for us. The resurrection of Jesus Christ vindicates all of his claims, and it's by believing that Jesus is who he claims to be and did what he said he would do, die and rose on our behalf, that we are saved and granted eternal life. Now at this point, Jesus' words were puzzling, but afterwards his disciples would come to see how these puzzle pieces all fit together. Remember what Jesus told his first disciples? Come, and you will see. Okay, you've come here this morning. Do you see? Do you see who Jesus is, the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, who took on human nature so as to become the God-man? Do you understand that what He accomplished on the cross is what you need, being the Lamb of God who paid the penalty for our sins? Have you responded to this truth by turning away from your sins and trusting in Christ alone for your forgiveness so that you can be reconciled to God? John's point is always the same. Have you believed? Let me give you four megatruths that come out of this passage as we close up. Here's the first one. It's not us, but God who decides what is acceptable worship when we come before him. It's not us, it's God. The church is not an entertainment business, and the people attending are not customers, despite all the books about marketing the church. The congregation is not an audience. We are worshipers, performing for an audience of one, God. The Bible tells us what God wants in a worship service. Songs and hymns of praise. Reading and preaching and teaching of his word. Prayers offered up for ourselves and for others. And the focus in the service should always be on who God is and what he's done for us through Jesus Christ. There's a second mega-truth that comes out of this. Jesus is very concerned that what we do in our worship service is truly honoring to God, his Father. It says zeal for his house consumed him. For the temple then and for the church now, God cares how we worship. Remember Aaron's two sons who thought they'd try a little innovation in their sacrifice and God struck them dead on the spot? Much of what passes for worship in churches today is cheap entertainment and tomfoolery. There's a third thing we need to say, though. Jesus not only has authority to challenge our worship, but also to order your lives through his word. Ever heard one little kid say to another, you're not the boss of me? Nobody can say that about Jesus, and especially those of us who belong to him, because we're the ones who call him Lord and Master. And here's the last thing I think we need to say. If we're honest, There are things in our own lives that need to be cleaned out as well, isn't there? Paul tells us that we, as Christ followers, are the temple of God. He said, therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, because this is your true and proper worship. What is it that Jesus needs to clean out of your life, even now? I hope Donald Trump has success in what he does. I don't know that he will. I'm certain Jesus will have success in what he does. work with them in cleaning out those things. Let's pray. Oh, Father God, I do pray for grace and mercy. I thank you for the Word of God. I pray for its penetrating power to reach our hearts, even this morning, Lord, that we might be transformed by the truth and come to worship you aright. Because that's why we were created. We were created to find our joy and our happiness in you and to worship you forever. So bless us to that end. For we ask now in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, it's gonna be 282.