You’ve all heard the saying, “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” The idea has some merit, but I generally disagree. Appearances matter. They say a lot about you; certainly not everything, but a lot. If you see a four-door Mercedes sedan pull into a parking spot you have a pretty good idea of the type of person that will step out – how they’ll be dressed, how they’ll be groomed, how they’ll act, and their social status. Similarly if instead of a Mercedes sedan pulling into a parking spot you see a big jacked up four-wheel-drive pick-up truck with shiny silhouettes of shapely women on the mud flaps you also have a pretty good idea of the type of person that will step out – how they’re dressed, how they’re groomed, how they’ll act, and their social status. Of course you might be totally wrong, but nine times out of ten you’ll be right.
Indeed it is wrong to judge a book
by its cover, but years of experience have taught us how to be good judges of
what we see. It has always been this way
with us humans. It was certainly true in
Jesus’ day. While Jesus criticizes the
religious leaders for their hypocrisy, indeed their outside appearances did not
match the inner state of their hearts, Jesus also uses appearances in an
authentic way to make a point.
Our gospel reading started with an
account of an event you probably know well, Jesus’ triumphal entry into
Jerusalem. Great conquering kings or
military leaders would return home from their conquests to great fanfare. They and their armies would parade in to their
home city being met by cheering crowds.
They’d be riding their great war horses with weapons and armor on
display. They may be displaying the dead
bodies of the losers or dragging prisoners of war as a display of victory.
Now Jesus could have walked into
Jerusalem. He appears to have walked
from place to place for much of his ministry.
He certainly didn’t suddenly become too weak to walk on the day he went
into Jerusalem. But he decides to ride
in on a little colt – not even saddle broken.
Jesus is doing this deliberately as a contrast to the great shows of
pomp and power other conquering leaders would do.
He is surely picking up on the writing
from the Old Testament prophet Zechariah who predicted a Divine Warrior who
would bring peace and stability. And
when he entered Jerusalem it would be said, “Lo, your king comes to you;
triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the
foal of a donkey.” (Zechariah 9:9)
So yes, Jesus is the great and
triumphant Divine Warrior. Unknown to
the crowds at that time, but fully known to us, Jesus’ acts of triumph will be
totally different from what anyone would expect. Then you truly could not judge by appearances.
Let’s not lose sight of one little
detail that we easily overlook. It was
not unusual for armies to requisition whatever they needed from the local
population. If you were a farmer and had
a good horse it could be requisitioned by an army passing through. A soldier would simply say he wanted your
horse and he would take it. And you
might as well kiss your good horse goodbye because it wasn’t coming back. If it survived whatever the army was going to
use it for, and if they didn’t decide to keep it with them when they moved on,
they would probably just abandon it.
What does Jesus promise to do with
the little colt he requisitions? He
promises to return it. That’s more than
just being a nice guy. That’s showing
integrity and appreciation for people’s property. We talk about everything belonging to
God. And yet we need to note that God
values our understanding of personal property – or maybe I should call it
personal responsibility and stewardship.
Anyway, that is an aside because
Jesus goes into the great city of Jerusalem.
It helps if you can imagine the geography a bit. The village of Bethany is a couple miles to
the southeast of Jerusalem. A road ran
from Bethany to the north and then bore west and went across the Mount of Olives. Once across the Mount of Olives the road ran
right up to the city gate named the Golden Gate. And that get went directly into the temple
complex. Every day during what we call
Holy Week Jesus will travel from Bethany across the Mount of Olives and then
through the Golden Gate right into the temple.
At the end of the day he will go back through the Golden Gate, back
across the Mount of Olives and return to spend the night in Bethany. That’s why the religious leaders had such a
hard time getting their hands on him.
Jesus didn’t exactly go wandering through the city streets at dusk where
he could be nabbed. The only way to lay
hand on him was to get inside information, which as you know, came by the way
of Judas.
Jesus’ first entry into Jerusalem
was this humble affair with the donkey.
He probably didn’t draw a lot of attention. Quite likely none of the religious or
political leaders noticed. If they did
they probably scoffed because the whole affair was probably pretty sad looking:
an itinerant preacher, Jesus of Nazareth, from the north comes into down with
the praise of a rag tag bunch of uneducated hicks who spread their coats on the
road. And Jesus rides in on… on what?
On a foal of a donkey. This would
be a diminutive animal and anything but impressive. But most likely no one of consequence
noticed. It was Passover after all and
the city was swarming with tourists and pilgrims. There may have been any number of charismatic
religious leaders with their followers descending upon Jerusalem.
When
Jesus does reach Jerusalem Mark’s gospel tells us that he just looked around at
everything and then left. There was no
cause for attention; at least not on the first day. But that would change on the second day –
what we call Monday of Holy Week.
As Christians we have a hard time
understanding what the temple meant for the Jews. We think of it as an equivalent to a church
building – a space set aside for holy use.
But it was so much more than that.
As Christians when we want to build a church we find some land we can
afford and we build a building to suit our needs and our budget. Not so for the temple.
For the Jews the temple was built
exactly where God wanted it to be built; not 100 feet to the left or 100 feet
to the right. Not back or forth by a
bit, but exactly where God wanted it to be built. The same is true for today. In Jerusalem the Islamic Dome of the Rock is
built exactly where the temple used to be.
As Christians we don’t really get it.
We think why can’t they just build another temple nearby, or beside
it? Nope. That’s where God said the temple was to be
built and that is where it must be built.
That is divine decree.
Along the same lines was the design
of the temple. When it was first built the
Jews didn’t exactly hire an architect to design it – or at least design the
core building. By Jesus’ day the temple
had become a sprawling complex, but the core building – the temple itself – was
exactly how God had revealed it to be. It
was divine architecture. Read the Old
Testament and you’ll find instructions for the exact size and shape of the
building, the floor plan, the decorations, and all the furniture all laid out
in minute detail.
It was God’s building where God said
it should be built and it was built according to God’s design. Rejecting any part of it by a Jew was
unthinkable.
And so what did we read Jesus did
the next day – Monday of Holy Week? He
goes into the temple and nearly causes a riot.
It’s important to note that this upending the tables of the money
changers and driving out those who sold animals didn’t take place in the temple
proper. The temple itself wasn’t much
bigger than our sanctuary. But all of
this took place in the surrounding courtyards of the temple complex. The message was the same though, Jesus’
actions express that God has actually rejected the temple.
I’ve heard many times people say
that Jesus became so upset because of corruption in the money changers and
price gouging from the merchants. I’m
sure some of that was taking place, but I think that is a misinterpretation of
what Jesus means when he quotes Jeremiah 7 saying, “My house shall be called a
house of prayer for all the nations, but you have made it a den of robbers.”
Jeremiah was complaining about
political and religious corruption. In
his day, centuries before, people believed that God would divinely defend
Jerusalem and the temple from all enemies simply because it was His house. Jeremiah said that was false security. Hear his words in context, “Will you steal,
murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after
other gods that you have not known, and then come and stand before me in this
house, which is called by my name, and say, ‘We are safe!’ – only to go on
doing all these abominations? Has this
house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your sight? You know, I too am watching, says the Lord.”
(Jeremiah 7:9-11)
Jesus meant his words not as a
statement about the limited actions he saw in the temple on that day. Jesus’ words and actions were a symbolic act
to show God rejecting the temple as his dwelling place. The new place of worship will be Jesus
himself – a person, not a place. The
religious leaders who saw what Jesus did certainly saw it as Jesus claiming
that God has rejected the temple. They
are not seeing it as a prophetic act against small scale corruption. It is an act of total rejection. Of course that doesn’t sit well with them. Next week we’ll read their response to it all.
For today let’s see how everything
from Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on a colt, to the fig tree (which we’ll also explore
more when we revisit it next week), to overturning the tables in the temple,
are all rooted in sincerity of faith and purity of heart.
We need traditions, institutions,
rules, regulations, and laws. But none
of these things are ends unto themselves.
All of them can go astray. All of
them can unintentionally cause harm. All
of them can become corrupt. Therefore
rightness is not in following the rules and then calling yourself good because
you’ve followed the rules. Goodness
comes from sincerity, honesty of heart, and the self-gift of love. These are the things Jesus’ shows on the
surface. These are the things we are to
live by. Those are also the words of the
prophet Jeremiah whom Jesus bases his actions upon.
While
Jesus is making a deep theological point – that the temple is no longer the
center of faith; but instead he is.
Jesus is also teaching that the root of God’s presence is sincerity,
honesty of heart, and the self-gift of love.
We
started by talking about appearances and we’ll end with them. Don’t judge a book by its cover, true. And yet our lives – the appearances of them –
the manifestation of them – should reflect the love of God in a way that is
truly visible in the world.
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