Matthew chapter 21, Matthew's in the New Testament, which is towards the back of your Bible. First book in the New Testament after Malachi before Mark. Matthew chapter 21, we are in a verse by verse study through the book of Matthew. We will continue with the next passage this evening and then for our Christmas Eve celebration next week, same time, we'll take a break and study elsewhere from Matthew. Matthew 21, as we continue in our time of worship through the hearing and the study of the inerrant word of God. Well, have you thought about the question, what makes God angry? Why would you ask that in this holly jolly time of year? What kind of a question and a thought is that? What makes God angry? Why would we even want to think about that? Because there are things that make God angry. Because God is a good God and a holy God, the true God is. Furthering the question, what kind of worship, might there be a kind of worship that does not please God? Even more, a kind of worship that angers God. What kind of worship does God receive and not receive? There is a kind. Do we at Cornerstone, whether in our individual lives or corporately, do we offer God the kind of worship that He receives? Or do we offer Him the kind that He rejects? In your life, do you offer God the kind of worship that he receives? Worship is not just a one hour thing that we do here on a Sunday night when we're finally willing to carve out an hour or so for God, go to church. Worship is the constant mode of the human heart. Whether you are an atheist, a Christian, a Satanist, an I don't know-ist, a something else-ist, you are always in worship mode. Human beings worship because they are worshipers. We can never turn off our worship. Our worship meter is always spinning. So it's just a matter of what we are worshiping. And to understand that, we can ask questions like, what rules my heart in a given moment? What really excites me? What does my day look like? What do I want to fill my free time with? What governs my wants? What do my desires demand? Which is to say, what kind of worship do I offer God throughout the day? The idea here is not to necessarily get overly introspective, but it is necessary at times to examine ourselves, diagnose our worship, because there is a kind of worship that God receives and there's a kind that he rejects. From the outset, it's important to mention that the kind of worship that God receives begins by trusting in the Jesus of the Bible, the God-man. Apart from faith in the Jesus of the Bible, there's no worship that pleases God. And it is by faith, simple faith, childlike faith. But there is a worship that angers God. Even if you're new to the Christian thing tonight, we're so glad you're here. I think it might surprise you when we discover what kind of worship it is that angers God. Let's get into the text. Follow along as I read verse 12 to 15. Matthew chapter 21. Verse 12 through 17. God's word says, verse 12, and Jesus entered the temple and drove out all those who were buying and selling in the temple and overturned the tables of the money changers in the seats of those who were selling doves. And he said to them, it is written, my house shall be called a house of prayer, but you're making it a robber's den. And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple and he healed them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he had done, and the children who were shouting in the temple, Hosanna to the son of David, they became indignant and said to him, do you hear what these children are saying? And Jesus said to them, yes. Have you never read? Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babies, you have prepared praise for yourself. And he left them and went out of the city to Bethany and spent the night there. You might be wondering, why would we study this passage? This isn't a good Christmas passage. Well, it's the next passage in Matthew. That's the main reason. Like I said, we'll pull over and park at a different one next week for Christmas Eve. But God's word puts forth before the human race the greatest endeavor is to know God and to know Him in truth. Not to know some fashional idea that our culture says about Him, but to know Him in truth. That's the highest endeavor of a human being, to know God. And this text helps us to know God more, perhaps a part of God or an attribute of God that we may be less familiar with. We began our study last week in Matthew 21. It's a little bit of History and context is going on here in case you haven't been with us in our study Matthew 21 begins what's called the passion? Week passion comes from a Latin words which describes the the sufferings of Jesus this is the final week of Christ's earthly ministry leading up to his his crucifixion on Good Friday or Passover and his resurrection. This is we're about Monday ish here and And the crucifixion is still five days out. We studied verse one through 11 last week. Jesus comes forward last week in verses one through 11 in no uncertain terms and declares that he is the long awaited Messiah that had been foretold for centuries in the Old Testament. And to say that you're Messiah is to say that you're God. Isaiah 9, 6, and 7. We covered briefly the history of Israel from Abraham, the promise given to him in 2000-ish B.C., then the promise to fill that out given to King David in 1000-ish B.C. There is this covenant made with David, or promise, called the Davidic Covenant, where God basically says, Israel, you're gonna have this king one day, and he will never die, he'll be an eternal king, an immortal king, which was to say, in addition, that Israel is going to have a place of prominence in the world, unequaled and forever. Of course, that hasn't happened yet, but this king would be the Messiah, the eternal king. In the meantime, fast forward a little bit in history, Israel experiences severe national tragedies, exiles, in part due to their Unacceptable worship to God over the centuries. Even so, in the grace of God, Jesus comes, the Messiah comes. And so Matthew writes this inerrant biography, mid-50s-ish A.D. as an apostle who witnessed all these things. He writes to, in brief, say, this is the Messiah. This guy, Jesus. that saved me as a wretched tax collector and as an outcast of Jewish society, He saved me, and He's this Messiah that is fulfilling all the prophecies. And we looked at some of these incredible prophecies last week. One of them, Daniel 9.25, and this one is enough for everybody, the whole globe to fall down and worship Jesus, that in Daniel 9.25, 5th century BC, it says this, 483 years, From the time it is decreed for Jerusalem to be rebuilt, from that time, the decree, the Messiah will be made known. And that decree was made by Artaxerxes, the Persian king recorded in Nehemiah chapter two, 483 years to the day is when Jesus in Matthew 21 comes into the temple and reveals himself to be the Messiah and the King of Kings. Also fulfilling another prophecy in Zechariah 9.9, it's incredible. The other spiritual and religious gurus and philosophers of the centuries can't do that. They can't say this is gonna happen 483 years to the day and make it happen, but God did. And Christ came in in the triumphal entry and that's what happened last week. Now, when he showed himself to be God and Messiah, it was in a very humbled way. He's on this donkey. This little donkey, he had to probably lift his feet up so they didn't drag on the cement there. But this week in verse 12 to 17, he'll demonstrate that he is God and Messiah in his wrath and his holiness, which are perfect attributes of God and necessary attributes of God. The big idea of the text that's in your bulletin is this, sort of a flyover of what we're seeing in verse 12 to 17, that there is worship which God receives and there's worship which he rejects. There's worship which God receives and worship which he rejects. For our outline, just some hooks to hang our thoughts on, we'll ask a question tonight. What kind of worship does God receive? What kind does he reject? What kind does he receive and what kind does he reject? Number one. God rejects proud, man-centered worship. God rejects proud, man-centered worship. And it's His kindness to tell us this so that we would know how to properly think about God and worship Him and know Him and respond to His grace and what He's done for us throughout history. It doesn't matter what we claim, what spiritual persuasion we may or may not claim, if it is proud, if it is man-centered, it's unacceptable to God. Look at verse 12, we got a lot of interesting historical things to cover here. Verse 12, and Jesus entered the temple, so. Recall from last week, we mentioned, at this time in the first century in Israel, there was lots of national hope, nationalistic hope, surrounding the Messiah. That is, they were wanting the Messiah to come just, covered in armor, sword in hand, soldiers behind him, and ready to take out the Roman Empire who was ruling over them at the time. The Jews at this time were more interested in placing their sandals on the neck of a Roman than they were in confessing their sins to God and receiving forgiveness. They were more eager to make war with Gentiles than they were eager to make war with their indwelling imperfection, which is what separated them and God, Isaiah 59. And so because of that, as Jesus is coming in on this day of Passion Week, he comes down the Mount of Olives, and the Bible says he weeps over the city. He weeps over it and says, oh, if only you guys, if only you knew, you Jews, what makes for peace. because it was their lack of humility, that they wouldn't confess their sin and repent, that's what kept them from having peace with God. It wasn't Romans, it wasn't taxes, it wasn't pagans, it was their own pagan heart. And so the Jews are at a apex of apostasy here as they reject their Messiah, they're gonna nail him to a cross in a few days. And the Jews, by the way, continue in apostasy to this day. They are in utter apostasy, except for those who have turned and received their Messiah, and they will one day. You can be sure of that. They will. God will turn their hearts, because they can't turn their own hearts, as Gentiles can't either. And when Christ returns, Isaiah 53 and passages like Ezekiel 36 say that there'll be this tidal wave of repentance among the Jews as they receive their Messiah. Well, Matthew 21, as mentioned, occurs before the major holiday of Passover, which celebrated, again, God's miracle of bringing the Jews, probably a couple million of them, out of Egypt, 1500-ish BC. The stunning miracle. as they were to offer the sacrificial lamb. And so here, historians estimate at this time, first century, the population of Jerusalem is about 100,000, but it would swell to about a million during the Passover, during these festivals. Jesus is approaching Jerusalem for the last time, to be crucified as He and His Father had lovingly planned. Huge crowds are following him. So you have all these people in Jerusalem for the Passover, huge crowds following Jesus. He had just a little bit before this, maybe a few weeks, had just raised Lazarus from the dead. And so you have people coming to see Lazarus in Bethany, which is a couple miles east of Jerusalem. So you have all those people, it is a chaotic scene. And there's these piles of people descending upon Jerusalem. Now let's ask ourselves, just to kind of understand and appreciate what's happening here, Matthew assumes we know the 39 books of the Old Testament and we know them well, as he writes this and records what happened. Why was the temple so important in Jerusalem? Let's ask ourselves that question. Why was it such a big deal? Very simply because Old Testament worship understood God to be there. God to make his presence known there. And so it became the center of worship for those who truly loved God. A little bit more detail. When God's people came out of Egypt, Exodus 25a, it'll put it up here. God in his grace says this, let them make me a sanctuary or like a temporary temple. Purpose, why God? That I may dwell in their midst. So God in His kindness decides once again to come dwell with His people. And that hasn't happened since the Garden of Eden. And so the temple lovingly shows that God is making a way for sinful humanity to safely dwell in His presence. And the privilege would be all ours as humanity. The temple requires these elaborate instructions as laid out in Exodus, and if you ever get lost in some of those details, as I do sometimes, from Exodus 25 to the end of Exodus 20, just keep two things in mind as you're reading those sections. Number one, that God in his kindness, again, is making a way for people to safely dwell with him. And number two, that God doesn't leave it up for man to determine what it is to worship him. that God has never asked man, how do you wanna worship me? God, the true God dictates in this book how true worship is to go. So that's what's happening there. So then at the end of constructing the tabernacle, Exodus 40, God blesses it. The cloud covers the tent of meeting, Exodus 40 verse 34. And the glory of Yahweh fills the tabernacle. So God would make himself known in this, what was called a Shekinah cloud, this bright, intimidating cloud. One writer says that the glory of Yahweh, this cloud, it's the visible manifestation of the divine presence as an overwhelming cloud that signifies God's approval. So the cloud comes, God approves. Keep that in mind. Fast forward, 500, 600 years, Solomon, David's son, builds a temple, an incredible masterpiece of architecture. 900-ish BC, 2 Chronicles says this, as soon as Solomon finishes his prayer, So this is a different one than the wilderness. This is a permanent one in Jerusalem. As Solomon finishes his prayer, fire came down from heaven, consumes the offerings. The glory of Yahweh fills the temple. The priests, they can't even enter the house or the temple because notice the glory is there again. This bright cloud that you wouldn't even want to get near it. It's not like a cute, puffy cloud that you drew a picture of in kindergarten with a smiley face in it. It was an intimidating presence. You wanted to run from it. But it signified, as notice it says there, they bowed down with their faces to the ground on the pavement and worshiped and gave thanks to Yahweh saying, for he is good. Steadfast love endures forever. Critical to understand this stuff when we read the New Testament. Now, fast forward a little bit more. Israel's worship becomes profane, man-centered. It was all about self-actualization, self-esteem, and self-worship. And so over the centuries, God says, that's enough. Ezekiel 8 here, just to give a little context. This is 600-ish BC, 300 years after Solomon's temple. And Ezekiel is, is speaking on behalf of God. God is showing him worship in the temple. God brought me to the entrance of the north gate of the house of the Lord, this is the temple. And behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz. Tammuz, who was she? A pagan god worshiped by some of the Sumerians, others in the area, a god of fertility. And as summer came and some of the flowers would wilt, it symbolized that she was going away and descending and would come back in the spring. Then he said to me, God says to Ezekiel, you'll see greater abominations than these. And he brought me into the inner court of the house of Yahweh. And behold, at the entrance of the temple of the Lord were about 25 men. These are like the leaders, the priests. Their backs to the temple, their faces toward the east, worshiping the son. To the east, he said to me, have you seen this, O son of man? To Ezekiel, is it too light a thing for the house of Judah to commit the abominations that they commit here that they should fill the land with violence and provoke me still further to anger? Behold, they put the branch to their nose. A Hebrew saying of proud man-centeredness, of mockery of God, putting themselves over God. So God's glory. is not being guarded by the people, and when God's glory is not upheld by people, and is not protected by the people, he has to leave. Ezekiel 10 says this, this is what happened. Ezekiel's watching, and the glory, this cloud of the Lord departed from the threshold of the temple, stood over the cherubim, these massive angelic statues, and then Ezekiel 11, notice the glory of Yahweh went up from the midst of the city. This is Jerusalem, 600-ish BC. So this cloud lifts. This has never happened before. And stood over the mountain, which is to the east of the city. So the glory comes up, and as the crow flies, the mountain, what mountain is that to the east of the city? Study the last week. Mount of Olives. It's about a half a mile as the crow flies, Mount of Olives. The glory cloud comes up and leaves the temple. What is God saying there? by His glory leaving the temple. Your worship is profane. And this wasn't just after a day, this is after centuries. This is the last time the glory of God would dwell among His people in blessing in Old Testament days. The exiles would come back in about 515 BC, build a second temple. The glory of God does not come to dwell there. That temple is, was there for a bit, it's destroyed, and then Herod, just before Jesus comes and starts in his earthly ministry, builds a third temple. And really, it was just to pacify the Jews. It was a massive structure. But the glory of God did not come to that temple either. This cloud did not come there to bless it. And the glory of God was not in the land as before, that is. Until as we read in John 1.14 tonight, John 1.14, the word, speaking of Jesus before he was born a man, when he's in heaven, the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we saw his glory. The Greek word there that's translated dwelt, it means tabernacled or templed among us. The glory of God is back in the land, but not in a bright cloud as before, but in this humble man. God became a little baby and then grows. That's the glory of God now. We saw him, John says. Merry Christmas. Now, 600 years earlier, remember in Ezekiel 11.23, it said that the glory of God departed and went over the Mount of Olives, and here in Matthew 21, where does Jesus come from when he enters the city? The Mount of Olives. That's on purpose. By the way, when he returns a second time, hasn't happened yet, but when he comes back, Zechariah 14.4 says he will land where? The Mount of Olives. All that to say, the temple was central to worship in the Old Testament, but the glory had left and the glory came back in the person of Christ. So, moving on a little bit, temple stuff. A few things were to happen in the temple. A few things were to go down there. First, sacrifices were to be offered out of reverence for God, sorrow over sin. There would have been a sacrifice to make atonement for personal sin. God in His grace provided that, a way to be forgiven. And he's not obligated to do that. Second, it was a place where the word of God was to be correctly taught to feed the people for blessing. Third, in the temple, as Isaiah 56.7 says, it was to be a place of prayer. where you could go and pour your heart out to God, praise God for His grace after you offered a sacrifice, praise Him that He would actually be willing to forgive sins, and thank Him for His goodness for providing you bread and olive oil for another year in the land, and pour out your heart to God in reverence and in joy and in brokenness. That was what the temple was for, true worship. Now, what did it become in the first century? As you were to walk up to the temple in Jesus' day in Matthew 21, there were thriving shops surrounding the place outside of it. And you would walk up to the structure and it was massive. It was the largest structure in the Roman world. It was about 1,600 feet on a side, which is over a quarter mile. On the west and the east, on the north and the south, it was 1,000 feet. which is to say you could fit 35 football fields inside of it. And so as you walked into the temple, you would typically enter into what was called the area of the court of the Gentiles. The court of the Gentiles inside the temple was 25 acres, massive. And it would be packed at this time of Passover. There'd be thousands upon thousands, dozens of thousands. And the high priest at that time in Jesus' day, his name was Annas. And he had made this Court of the Gentiles a marketplace, so much so that it was called the Bazaar of Annas. And what would happen is they would sell spots to traders and merchants, and they could have a concession spot, you know, your square here, your booth here, your booth there. And they would sell things for worship, like sacrificial animals, and oil, and salt, and wine, and these kind of things that was essential for worship. And everyone was there to offer a sacrifice, ideally to God, of course. Typical sacrifice required a lamb if you were too poor, Leviticus 12, you could offer Dove? Now, here's the trick here, where they really were gouging people. The sacrifices had to be approved by the priests. And so what they did in this time in Jesus's day, the priests were in cahoots with the merchants who had bought these squares for their booths. And they would reject people's offerings and say, well, you gotta buy ours because ours are more perfect. And so they would come in and say, sorry, you know, go to booth one or, you know, go to Ezra over here and buy his. And they'd make a killing. They'd take a cut from the vendors. And above that, as verse 12 says, there's these money changers in there. What are these guys? Most people were from the surrounding areas of the Mediterranean world and from Africa. And so they have foreign currency. They don't have the currency of this little tiny area of Judah. And furthermore, they have this currency that would have like a pagan inscription on it. Some pagan king or whatever it might be. And so this had to be exchanged to buy a sacrifice. We do not accept your pagan currency here. And they would have to exchange it to get the exact right amount in the local currency. And the money changers in this time of the first century, how much do you think they're charging? You know, you go, when you travel abroad, you exchange money, you know, a couple of percent. At this time in the first century, they're charging 25%. So you wanna change a hundred bucks? Cool, we're gonna keep 25 of it. So here you have, picture this, close to a million people in Jerusalem offering sacrifices, passing through the court of the Gentiles, being denied, nope, your sacrifice, you gotta change money. I mean, this is a cash cow, a cash herd. In the name of worshiping God. Verse 12, look there. Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who were buying and selling in the temple and overturned the tables, the money changers, and the seats of those who were selling doves. There's one word in Greek translated drove out, has the idea of to just expel, to shove something out, to throw it out. Verse 12, going on, he overturns the tables of money changer. Overturned means to throw upside down, to make something upside down. And with the court of the Gentiles being that huge, that many people, who knows? I mean, imagine how many tables of these money changers there were and dove merchants, more than a few, to gouge the one million. So I mean, picture this with me for a moment. You have these vendors set up all over the place, booth to booth in the court of the Gentiles, foreign currency exchange tables with their cash registers and their coin buckets, other booths full of animals to offer for sacrifice, lambs making noises and doves and all this thing. And the gracious God-man, Jesus, who is full of grace. He walks in, he walks up to these booths and he picks up their tables and just starts tossing them. Flipping tables, coin boxes flying in the air, crashing on the ground, going up to the dove merchants and chucking their chairs in the air. That's what it says in the text. And it says, at the beginning of verse 12, he drove out all, all those buying and selling. That's a lot, which means he's physically forcing them out, forces them out of the temple, throwing their overpriced doves in oil. And when tables and chairs are chucked like that, people get hit, because people are standing next to them. And Jesus isn't saying, oh, could you please move so I could turn this table over? There's tables hitting chins. Thousands of people standing there in the court. Coins clanging around on the stone ground. Chairs sliding across the temple court. Upside down tables peppering the market. Booths thrown. Doves flying in every direction, hitting you in the head. The cloppity-clop of sheep and lamb and cows just stomping on the stone, slamming into people and tables. Bewildered merchants shoved into the streets. And Jesus in the middle of it. Full of grace and truth. The glory of the only begotten of the Father. The God-man. Breathing, heart beating, fully God, fully man, in total control, the sinless Son of God, the creator of you and of the universe and the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Psalm 69.9, zeal for your house will consume me. What a chaotic scene. What a holy scene. This is holy. God never sins. Hebrews 4.15 says Jesus is without sin. Don't try to use this for yourself. You and I can't do this. Why does this happen? Why does Jesus do this? Answer, God is holy. And you need to think of him as holy. He's not your homie, he's holy. God is a holy God and is to be worshiped. He's to be revered. You're to be scared of him actually. You're to fear him because the fear of the Lord, Proverbs 1 7, is the beginning of wisdom. Some of you young people here, people under 40, you want to be wise, Start by being scared of this God. You will succeed in life. More than getting A's and pleasing your boss, be scared of God and intimidated by Him. You'll do well in life, I promise you. This is God. And doing this in the temple is another self-declaration that he is God and everybody knew it. Why is that? Because Jesus is showing authority in the temple. And the only one who has more authority than the temple itself is the God of the temple, so it's God, he's God. Trashing the corrupt worship in the temple was just as much as a declaration of God as Jesus fulfilling those prophecies last week. Now, why doesn't anyone stop him? Because He's sovereign. Because when God wants to unleash His wrath, no man is going to effectively lift a hand against it. He's sovereign. He would let them crucify Him a few days later to fulfill the prophecy, and out of love for you, to die for your sin. Do you know God? At this point, the religious leaders want to kill him, but Jesus won't let it be today. Now, Matthew doesn't mention this, but Mark does. 11, Mark 11, put it up here real quick. This is the day before in the triumphal entry. He entered Jerusalem and went into the temple, and when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany. So he rides upon the donkey, nine, nine, Zechariah nine, nine. He goes into the temple the day before, again, the day before what's happening in verse 12 here. He looks around, does nothing, and leaves. What's he doing? He's holy. He goes in and he sizes the place up. He takes some inventory in his pristine, omniscient mind. He takes inventory for the display of his wrath for the next day. And something we can notice about that is God's wrath is calculated. He's not like, He's not like me where, you know, I just, I'll flip out at the dumbest thing. God's wrath is perfectly dialed in according to His holiness. There's never anything wrong or unloving or sinful in it. It's perfectly in control and it is never excessive. That's true whether we're talking about trashing a false temple or when Jesus comes back, which he's gonna do on a future day and annihilate hordes of the human race. The wrath of God is a very important attribute. It's no less important than any of his other attributes because it's part of his essential nature who God is. And God hasn't asked us to, well, do you like this attribute and you don't like that attribute, that's nice. To disapprove of one of God's attributes is to totally disapprove of God. But God is to be worshiped for all who he is, because he's God. If you've been like me at times, I've needed my understanding of Jesus upgraded, adjusted. Because in the religious bookstores, those little plastic or ceramic figurines of Jesus, they don't fill out all the attributes of Jesus. They don't communicate the best message of who Jesus really is. It's possible we idealize Jesus to our own making. We fashion him into nothing more than what we want to think and what is comfortable for us in whatever particular mood we're in that week. But He's the infinite God. And the whole world needs to repent and worship Him. He's Almighty God. He's the only God, there's no other God. And He is worthy of worship and praise and affection. I wonder how Jesus might approach some of the worship that goes on in His name in our day in this nation. I think pulpits and pews would go flying. We shouldn't suppose that simply because warm bodies fill a room, fill a building, churches are packed, that people seem happy that God is approving of that. That's exactly what was happening in the temple. Lots of people were happy about what was going on. Lots of people were there and God hated it. He goes in and he cases the place. Temple was to be a place where people could be fed the word of God and worship Him in humility and truth and in love and thankfulness. Let's not spend so much time angry at the priests and money changers that we don't apply this to our own hearts though. How is our worship? We might not be gouging people in the temple, but how are our hearts and our thoughts before God? Outside of this time, this time too, but in our private lives, as we're walking around throughout the week. Notice that Jesus here gets angry about incorrect worship among those who claim to know God. It's not like these are people worshiping some statues in Southeast Asia somewhere. These people knew the Bible and read the Bible. If Jesus came over to some of your houses, to the privacy of some of your lives, and to the thoughts of our hearts, would chairs and tables be flying? Be careful of flattering yourself and giving yourself an A plus here. God is holy. He's not like us. And much of what's wrong with like me and you and the world is we don't think about God as holy as he really is. Beloved big brother in the faith, R.C. Sproul, who was promoted to glory, wrote a book called The Holiness of God. It's probably one of the most important books ever written in our time. How is the worship of your heart throughout the day? What absolutely makes it into our schedules? What doesn't? What consumes our thoughts? Do we quietly praise ourselves when we do things in God's name, like when we give, when we read scripture, when we go to church and pray? Sometimes we might be worshiping ourselves for our worship. If you've been like me at times, there would be tables and chairs chucked in the proverbial house of your thoughts and attitudes. God, there's a good chance God hates what some of you do and think and say. Hates it. I know it's been like that with me at times. And thankfully this God in a couple days will go die for stuff and people that he hates. He's so merciful. He'll go die for what he hates. so that we could be forgiven. It's interesting to note here that this is the only recorded situation of this kind of anger in Jesus's earthly ministry, which is fascinating to me because Jesus is always around political wrongs, corrupt politicians. He's around social injustice. He's around isms, all kinds of isms. Poverty, income inequality, poor use of the environment. He's around all that. And he never gets animated about that stuff like he does here when it comes to worshiping him. God rejects man-centered worship, number two. But God receives humble, Christ-centered worship. He receives humble, broken, Christ-centered worship. God receives humble, Christ-centered worship. Look at verse 13. Excuse me, I forgot to cover verse 13 in the last point. Jesus says to them, it's written, my house shall be called a house of prayer. You're making it a robber's den. Quoting Isaiah 56. Catastrophe. Those who are to be leading the people in proper worship, the priests are making it a hideout for these merchants. Verse 14, and the blind and the lame came to him in the temple and he healed them. I mean, this is, This is remarkable that this happens here. Why? Because Jesus just leveled the place. And he just trashed it in holy rage. I'm not sure if you would want to get near him after that. And yet notice the text, the blind and the lame came to him. They came to him. What a contrast. This is the same God. Behold the kindness and the severity of the Lord. He is enraged at corrupt worship, but to the broken. To the broken who know they have nothing to offer God, but their own neediness, their own sin, they need help. They come with nothing in their hands. To them, Jesus is gentle and compassionate. This is incredible. The hands that just launched and through these corrupt worshipers out of the temple, those same hands are the hands that gently heal the broken. And he healed them, of course he did, amen. And don't forget this, if you find yourself thinking, worshiping in a way that God hates, living in a way that God hates, corrupt worship, you can always come to him and just confess it and just be honest. And he forgives and he'll receive that as worship through Jesus Christ. Verse 15, his compassion continues, look at verse 15. But when the chief priests and the scribes, the guys who were running the place, the religious leaders, when they saw the wonderful things, that he had done, I wonder if that includes verse 12. I think it does. When they saw the wonderful things that he'd done, and the children who were shouting in the temple, Hosanna to the son of David, they became indignant. So here's a bunch of young people, like kids, younger, we don't know exactly, they see the healing miracles and they can't help but just burst forth in praise. And it is a sincere praise and sincere worship which acknowledges Jesus for who he is, namely God. Messiah. The religious leaders can't stand it, so look at verse 16. Do you hear what they're saying, Jesus? As if to say, make them be quiet, and how Jesus responds to this is critical, because they're saying it's God, praise God, as it were. They want him to be quiet. He says, no, I'm not gonna quiet down, actually. Jesus won't silence them, and he says, have you never read, out of the mouth of infants and nursing babies, you have prepared praise for yourself. Fascinating that he quotes Psalm 8-2 here. He quotes Psalm 8-2, very strategic, because what Jesus says in following the Pharisees and their rebuke is very important. He is saying that the God of Psalm 8, Psalm 8 is about praising God for making everything, for making stars, and making the heavens, making everything. So Jesus said, I'm gonna pick from that Psalm and say that that praise is my praise, which is to say I'm the creator. And I receive praise from little kids, but not you, you wicked, profane worshipers. Jesus is saying, in effect, I am the creator. And I'm God of everything. And I accept that humble, simple, Christ-centered worship that's just broken and knows that I might be a triple PhD doctorate Nobel Prize winner, but before God, I'm nothing. Which crowd would you be in here? With these children and these outcasts? Or with those who have a scar on their chin? God is so gracious to receive just humble, unassuming worship. And he delays his wrath as we've seen here. Isn't that kind of Him? I mean, God could just unleash like this day after day 10,000 times over. Perhaps He's delaying His wrath for some of us here tonight. Because you haven't bowed the knee to Jesus yet. And He's showing you who He is. You've heard His word. You're hearing His word right now. You've heard His word in other situations. He sees, He knows, and He delays His wrath like He did that day because He's so kind. Because the kindness of God is to lead us to repentance. Please, dear friend, do not presume upon His delay. There will be a day when His wrath comes. No one thought Jesus would do something like this in the temple. So let the kindness of God move you to repentance and to believe in Him and just to receive Him and say, forgive me, oh God, forgive me. I believe in Christ. I've been a profane worshiper. I've sinned. And my only hope is Jesus' death on the cross and His resurrection. That's it. Because I'm like those corrupt merchants that day. Oh, would you cry out for God to God this evening, dear friend? He delays his wrath another day because he loves you, because he's so kind to you. But there will be a day when his patience ends. And because of the holiness of God, he'll have to preserve that. And if you trample his kindness, he'll have to throw you into hell. He loves you. Cry out to him. Cry out to the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved. Father in heaven, thank you for your kindness to us, your great mercy. Help us to think rightly about you, oh God, that you are holy. May your kindness move us all to repentance, whether we haven't yet bowed the knee to Jesus, or whether we have, and whether we've been a believer for a day or a century, would you upgrade our thoughts about you and sanctify our worship of you? And may we all be saved and sanctified this Christmas season. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.