Passion Week Devotions, Day 2

Jesus Cleanses the Temple  

Today is Tuesday, Nissan 11. – According to the Gospel of Mark, Jesus rode in triumphantly on Nissan 10 where He was inspected by the congregation of the children of Israel for 4 days ending in His crucifixion on Nissan 14, or Passover to you and me.  ON this day on the Biblical Calendar, Mark tells us that Jesus went into the Temple after spending the night in Bethany.  As He went into the Temple He found money changers and people selling animals for sacrifice.  The problem was that the Scriptures call the Temple a “House of Prayer to all Nations” (Isaiah 56.7), however, the Jewish leaders of that day had made it a “Den of Thieves”. 

Apart from the fact that the people were changing money and selling defective animals, Jesus’ anger was aroused because the selling and trading was taking place in the “Gentile Courts” of the Temple.  This was the place that God had always allowed the Gentiles to come and be a part of God’s love and what God was doing here on Earth.

The scripture tells us that Salvation is of the Jews and they are called to be a light to all nations (Isaiah 49.6).  However, they had not done what God called them to do.  It was then that Jesus removes the sinfulness of keeping all people from coming to salvation (the Hebrew word for Salvation is YESHUA, which is Jesus’ actual name)…So the Jews of that day were preventing the nations of the world from ultimately coming to Jesus, which was the Jews job in the first place.

What we ultimately see in the “Cleansing of the Temple” was Jesus coming to His Father’s house and removing the leavened from His Father’s House.  You see in Jewish homes throughout the Old Testament, the parents would send their children around the house to search for leavened as it was a Biblical command that no leavened be in the house at all during the feast of unleavened bread. – Jesus as God’s Son was removing the leavened from His Father’s house just like He was called to do as a good son, but As the Good Shepherd, He was clearing the way for a new sheep of His pasture…YOU AND ME! --- Praise God for His love that sent His only begotten Son, that whoever shall believe, shall live forever!!