Cleansing the temple: The third Sunday of Lent

“Take all of this out of here and stop

making my Father’s house a market…”

–John 2:16

“Jews demand signs and Greeks look for

wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified…”
--I Corinthians 1:22-25

Lent has been a hard season for me for a few years now.  I often have the sense that there is enough sacrifice and suffering around me these days (year-round) that I find it hard to imagine giving up anything or taking on any new hardships.  Because of that, often the season is over before I realize it is here. Health of children, anxieties about work, struggles with family, with budgets, with plumbing and roof-leaks, my aging joints, all the day-to-day worries keep me so distracted and busy that I feel overwhelmed and incapable of anything more.  But what if that’s exactly when we need Lent? When we are overwhelmed by life and troubles, that’s precisely when we need to walk into that temple and make a cord of rope and drive out all those distractions –because what we need isn’t more money, or more time in the day, or more options, more exercise (or more vegetables even), not even more distractions;  what we need is less.

Growing up at the end of the ‘60s and into the ‘70s I always heard the story of Jesus cleansing the temple as a condemnation of greed and corrupt business practices; a metaphorical and metaphysical condemnation of profit and the marketplace.  And yes, there may be some elements of that here. Certainly there is a sense in the synoptic gospels of the merchants misbehaving. In all three, Jesus speaks of them turning His father’s house into a “den of thieves.” But, here in John he says only: “a marketplace.”

For context, I was reading Ben Witherington’s The Gospel of Mark: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary.  In it, he says these sellers had only recently moved their work into the temple (around 30CE), possibly during the time of Caiaphas. He notes that the sellers were allowed into the temple either to allow temple authorities control over the activities, or to allow them to claim a cut of the profit (Worthington 315).

 Whatever the reason, the money changers and animal sellers were providing an actual and (for some) a very important service.  They provided Jews with the ability to change Roman (or foreign) coins in order to pay their temple tax. Coins with pagan mottos or an image of Caesar being unacceptable as an offering. They also provided animals (for a price) for those who couldn’t bring their own. They were providing a valuable service; and doing it in an approved way and in an approved place.  So, what was the objection?

            And on this particular Sunday in Lent, I find a possible clue in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians.  He tells us that some people will look for signs and others will seek wisdom, but all he has to offer them is this: Christ crucified. It will be a stumbling block to some, and foolishness to others, but that’s it.  The one essential thing; and everything else --the power and wisdom of God-- are found in it!  And as I contemplate Paul’s words, the story of the temple and the money changers seems to open up a little and reveal something more. Yes, there is a lesson here about corruption and church raffles, but there is something else. Something even more central, I think. A lesson about focus. Keep your eye on the ball.  Don’t de distracted by the non-essential.  There is one necessary thing. Stay focused. 

            Whether the sellers in the temple were corrupt or not, they were extraneous; they were not essential to the purpose of the temple. And I would imagine that they and their doves and sheep and even cows, were becoming a distraction. A distraction from the real sacrifice God seeks: our hearts. For me, these readings speak about many things, but the one thing, the essential thing I hear this third Sunday of Lent is this: Get rid of your distractions, drive them out of your heart, out of your mind, out of your temple. Make a place in your life for God. Even if it is just for an hour, just for ten minutes before work or 5 minutes before sleep. Make a place in your room, in your day, in your heart where you can go and be with God.  Let go of your worries about family and work and life and health and money and leaky roofs and broken plumbing and just be with God. Pray a rosary, meditate, read the gospels. But whatever you do, really do it. Don’t let the distractions of the day or the week or the year get in the way. Leave them behind –all of them—and give yourself to the Lord completely –even if it’s only for ten minutes. Who needs a pigeon? Give yourself to God.

            It’s not that the roof doesn’t matter. It’s not that your family doesn’t matter.  But we have to realize there is only one essential thing. And we better not let the marketplace (or the weight of the world) distract us from it.