A NEW TEMPLE OF GOD

SERMON PREACHED BY FR. TONY NOBLE ON MARCH 15^th, 2009

John 2:20 "It has taken 46 years to build this temple, and you will raise it up in 3 days?   But he spoke of the temple of his body."

As a teenager I rather liked the story of Jesus cleansing the temple.   I liked the idea of Jesus upsetting the authorities and overturning the tables in the temple precincts. It was almost an overturning of religion, it seemed to me.   No doubt it appealed to that part of me which was a typical rebellious teenager.   Could Jesus have been the same, I wondered?

Some exponents of liberation theology love this particular part of the Gospel, and would see particularly in the whip of cords a justification for radical political action as Christians.   But a reading of Saint John's account will interpret it rather differently.   In fact what Jesus is protesting about is the politicisation of the temple - the bringing of politics into worship.

The special coins that needed to be brought by the worshippers were minted by the council because they would not allow coins with Caesar's head on them. So special coins had to be brought, and with the buying of the coins the dealer got a cut. This led to the necessity of buying the animals for sacrifice right there in the temple, and all the enterprise of money-changers and selling that accompanied this.

So our Lord was right to be angry, because it was righteous anger.   It was not just a profanity against the holy place of worship, but also exploitation of the people - as everyone took their cut in the buying and selling.  

So Jesus comes to purge the temple - just as surely as he comes to purge our hearts and our minds from similar dealings, ambitions, and anxieties. The cleansing of the temple is an image and parable of the cleansing Jesus wishes to do with all of us.  

This explanation alone could be sufficient for any satisfactory understanding of this incident, except Saint John has several differences from the record we have of this incident in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke.

Firstly, in the other three Gospels the cleansing of the temple occurs in Holy Week.   It is part of the conflict between Jesus and the authorities which leads to his trial, his passion, and his death.   In fact what he did in the temple becomes one of the charges they accused Jesus of.   Saint Mark records: "We heard him say: 'I will destroy this temple made with hands, and in 3 days I will build another not made with hands'".

That's not what Jesus said of course. Referring to himself he said to them: "Destroy this temple and in 3 days I will raise it up"/   they assumed he was talking of their temple - naturally.   Like the twelve apostles, they had yet to understand that Jesus would suffer and die on the cross - and then rise again. It is the continuing theme we have heard over these past few weeks.  

The other Gospels do not record this conversation - for them it is part of Holy Week and leads to Jesus' trial.  

Saint John, on the other hand, places the cleansing of the temple at the beginning of Jesus' ministry.   Why is this?

Perhaps Saint John wants Jesus to set out his agenda at the beginning?   He comes not only to purge, but to replace the temple worship and what it signifies - the Old Covenant.   The old order is to be replaced by the new order, no longer focused on the temple, but on Christ.

"Destroy this temple", he says "and in 3 days I will raise it up again".   That's exactly what he did!

But to the authorities it can only mean the temple in Jerusalem. And to the apostles it would only be after the Resurrection that they understood.   Furthermore, in Jesus' referring to "My Father's house" we can go back 20 years to that day when he stayed in the temple, conversing with the scribes and teachers of the Law.  When Mary and Joseph found him and expressed typical parental exasperation, the boy Jesus said: "Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"

The temple was the house of God - God's habitation amongst his people.   Now before them stands the new habitation - the Son of God himself.   His body is the new temple.  

Saint Paul extends this to the Church. Not only does Saint Paul declare: "You are the body of Christ, and individually members of it" - but in Ephesians 2: 20-21 he says: "You are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord".  

The body of Christ is the temple of the Holy Spirit.

Now our eyes turn toward that body of Christ on the cross. "Destroy this temple" Jesus said. And they did.   Now we see that through his passion and death there is victory - for now we see that the body of Christ on the cross is the temple of the living God.

Now all the nations will stream to this living temple - for it is both his glorified body and also his body, the Church, through whom he was inaugurated a new dispensation, a new worship.

In Lent the Old Testament readings focus on Israel's salvation history - Noah, Abraham, and Moses.   Now we can see that history as both a preparation and a prophecy of the final act of redemption by Christ.

No wonder Saint Paul could say at the end of an anguished assessment of his failings: "Who will deliver me…thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord".