Zealous in the wilderness

Sunday Worship ● March 3, 2024

Rev. Alexis Lillie © 2024

You can view the full worship video recording at:

https://youtu.be/De4k-_ljPlo?si=ApTScOl2b9aEMUnq

Scripture Readings:

John 2:13-22 (Inclusive Bible)

John 2:13-22

2:13 The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

2:14 In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables.

2:15 Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables.

2:16 He told those who were selling the doves, "Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father's house a marketplace!"

2:17 His disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for your house will consume me."

2:18 The Jews then said to him, "What sign can you show us for doing this?"

2:19 Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up."

2:20 The Jews then said, "This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?"

2:21 But he was speaking of the temple of his body.

2:22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

In justice-oriented faith circles we tend to love this story. We've been taught to interpret it as merchants and money changers = bad (selling things in the Temple, extorting folks, etc.) and Jesus = good. And I like the stories where Jesus gets riled up, honestly! It makes him feel human and relatable. In this particular case there's a resonance that someone's finally doing something about this! Plus, he's every character from every movie who ever swiped stuff off their desk in anger (which I've always wanted to do!) Maybe something like this. At least, that's how I imagine the cleansing of the temple went down. Which may or may not be historically accurate ☺.

Something else that may not be super historically accurate are our assumptions about this text. So we're going to look at these assumptions to hopefully better understand what's going on here, and how this fits with the systems today that we find ourselves zealous against. To better understand the system and what's going on, I’m going to rely heavily on the work of scholar AJ Levine. Her premise is –o based on her research – most of what we've come to think about this text in progressive circles isn't quite right. 

First: She says, this is not a commentary against the Temple. Certainly, there's a lot of nuance with the religious leaders of the time not treating their people well, or being in league with the empire. But, Jesus in his life and teachings didn't reject the temple out of hand. He and his followers continued to worship there, he calls it his "Father's house, "something that is to be cherished. Reformed perhaps, but not whole-sale rejected. So an interpretation that has Jesus turning the Temple system on its head, has some nuanced truth to it, but isn't quite it. 

Second: This isn't necessarily Jesus railing against exploitation of the poor, or money-changing, which is another common interpretation. In his diatribe, Jesus says nothing about the Temple exploiting the population. And, though we often conflate money-lending and money-changing, this is an instance of money-changing, which was a necessary practice. These money changers exchanged the various currencies of the Roman Empire into shekels, the type of silver coin that the Temple accepted. So that's not quite it either.

Third, this is not exclusion of Gentiles or foreigners. The Temple was huge! There were places where a whole host of people could gather and worship. AJ Levine explains it this way: People were not prohibited from entering the Temple, then or now! Sure, they do not have the same responsibilities, or perhaps don't worship in the same way as do Jews, but that makes sense as well. She says when she, as a Jewish woman, visits a church, there are certain things she may not participate in, but that doesn't mean she's not welcome. So, inferring that Jesus was railing against exclusionary practices isn't quite right.

ISo, if these frequently-relied-upon modes of interpretation don't exactly fit the historical context, how are we to make sense of this passage? When it's said that "zeal for God's house will consume him," that's a reference to the prophetic book, Jeremiah. In that passage, the prophet is concerned because God's people aren't living the way they're supposed to. They're committing injustices – stealing, lying, straying from their faith – and then showing up to worship like nothing is wrong, assuming they'll be safe in the Temple even as they continue to live into the ways of the world around them. 

Think about it - what is a den? Not a place people go to do the robbing or exploitation. A den of robbers is where people go after they have taken what does not belong to them, where they don't feel the least bit of conviction. So if the Temple is the den, then the Temple becomes place where people who are perpetrating injustice gather, and don't feel compelled toward repentance, and  thus nothing changes. It becomes a safe place for those who are not truly repentant

This is what enrages Jesus, that he is facing more of the status quo, and in a place that should be holy and set-aside as a place of worship and different type of refuge. According to this interpretation, the merchants are living their lives, trying to survive inside the Temple just as they would outside the Temple. They're not seeking to grow in love and justice, they're finding ways to exist inside the system without rocking the boat too much. 

And at first as I say that, I'm like – YUCK. But then I realize, I can actually identify with this. I think we all can. I don't always live a life that is resonant with love and justice. I am far from behaving in ways that consistently set me apart from the world around me. And I take this reality with me, into worshipful spaces. I think to be human, and to be awake, and to be living in reality, means we are often caught between two poles. We both live in and resist patriarchal structures, capitalistic structures, heteronormative structures, just to name a few! 

I want to live in solidarity with others, seeking justice and love. And there are times when I make great strides in support of these values. Then, there are times when I lazily order too much on Amazon; or take a spur-of-the moment trip even though I know jet fuel is bad for the environment; or run myself ragged with side gigs and hustles because rent is due and my child needs to go to school!  There are times when I certainly chose to live like the proverbial "everyone else," and times when I feel like I have no choice. When I’m caught up in the system and just doing what I can to get by. 

The wilderness of this push and pull is real. I think many of us sense it, struggle with it, work to find some balance within it that mostly or somewhat aligns with our values. I see myself as both merchants and Jesus: Caught in a system trying to make something of it, sometimes accommodating it and really not looking that different from everyone else, and sometimes zealous against it

If we go a little bit deeper, what we get from Jesus' reaction in this story tell us this is all ok. The push and pull is ok. Not the exploitation and a lack of love and justice, and hiding out in a "den of robbers" unrepentently! But the push and pull as we struggle between survival in a system and zeal against that system. 

Jesus is certainly zealous against complacency and accommodation in this story. But he's not always resisting. Jesus returns to the temple time and again and doesn't always behave this way. We can assume the merchants didn't change their behavior over night and yet we don’t get other stories of Jesus "cleansing" things again. It’s not paradigmatic of what Jesus did every time

This is important to our understanding and interpretation of Jesus' actions, of the Gospels, and really all of the bible. We have to take the stories of scriptures with each other to faithfully learn what we can from individual passages, yes, and hold them in concert with one another. We live in that push and pull, in that tension. There's not a sanctioned policy or stance or story interpretation that works for every scenario. It's much more nuanced! 

Sometimes we act with zeal, sometimes we're in a different place and we're doing what we need to do to exist within a system. Perhaps what this story teaches us about zeal is not that we act from that place all the time, but rather that it is an important part of our lives as we seek to live in the way of justice and love.