And found in the temple those that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting:
Early in His ministry at Passover time Jesus came into the outer court of the temple and found it occupied as a cattle market with sellers of oxen and sheep and doves and money changers seated with their tables. What was meant to accommodate distant worshipers had become noisy traffic and extortion, with priests and rulers sharing the dealers' gain and selling at exorbitant prices while greed displaced prayer and profaned worship. The animals sold for offerings were meant to point to the one great Sacrifice, yet Christ the founder of that system stood unrecognized among them and the meaning of blood sacrifice was nearly lost. In zeal for God's house He drove men and beasts beyond the portals with a scourge of cords and overthrew the tables, not by human force but by divine majesty that struck panic and guilt into even the hardened leaders. That cleansing announced His mission to cleanse the human heart and His church from sin and selfish gain, and with His second cleansing at the close of ministry it foreshadows the final warning call and purification before His return.
Temple Market at Passover
What Jesus found was inside the temple, in its outer court, where sellers of oxen and sheep and doves and changers of money were seated, so that buying and selling of sacrificial animals and exchanging of money had taken possession of the sacred place. The commerce itself was unholy and desecrated the courts, turning them into a place of merchandise where greed and avarice flourished.
It was early in the morning at Passover at the start of His ministry, when Jerusalem was crowded with people come from a distance and large crowds with His disciples mingled in the throng were already going to the temple. The court had been arranged as a cattle market and place of general traffic, with stalls for beasts and tables set out for business. On any ordinary day it was like a common market, full of noisy clamor and the exchange of produce with buying and selling going on and no sacredness remaining.
The money changing exchanged foreign coins and different denominations brought by strangers for temple currency, for the sanctuary shekel and the yearly half-shekel regarded as a ransom for each person and supporting the temple, while other money was brought as freewill offerings. Roman coins were exchanged for money used in the temple, and the priests themselves acted as money-brokers and exchangers at the tables. What began as accommodation had grown into a disgraceful traffic and a source of great profit to the priests, becoming a fraudulent trade that brought them revenue.
Under plea of accommodating visitors who had come too far to bring their sacrificial offerings, cattle, sheep, doves and sparrows were sold in the court. The arrangement served worshipers who could not bring sacrifices from home, since pilgrims brought coins to pay the temple offering and needed animals for sacrifice. Because vast numbers of beasts were sacrificed yearly at Passover the sales were immense.
Sharp bargaining, buying and selling, the lowing of cattle, the bleating of sheep, the cooing of doves, the chinking and clinking of coin, the shouts of drivers and angry disputation made a babel of confusion like a noisy cattle market rather than the sacred temple of God. The uproar disturbed the worshipers just without the sacred precincts, until words addressed to the Most High were drowned in the confusion invading the temple erected to His glory, and the sight stirred Jesus to indignation.
Extortion and Desecration
The traffic in the courts was marked by exorbitant prices, fraud, extortion and false dealing. Changing foreign coins and different denominations for temple currency had grown into a disgraceful, fraudulent trade that brought revenue and immense profit to the priests. Dealers realized large gain that was shared with the avaricious priesthood and men of authority, who under cover of holy profession practiced extortion and made sacred office a source of personal revenue. Leaders endeavored to keep the business in their own hands, realizing immense profits while failing to realize the solemn sacred work of their office.
Priests and rulers had bought cattle and other animals at very low cost and were selling them at exorbitant prices to those who had come from a long distance and were compelled to buy animals for sacrifice. This exploited travelers from afar and people who had been taught they needed to buy offerings to receive God's blessing on their families and lands. The trade in the courts thus dishonored God and oppressed the people, including the poor who struggled to afford offerings for their sins. The poor were distressed because they believed there would be no remission of sins without shedding of blood, and the harm reached even those unable to afford a humble offering or food.
Greed and concern for money, power and gain had displaced the sacred purpose of the temple service. The temple, meant for worship, prayer and thanksgiving, had become a marketplace and a den of thieves. That trade brought distraction and profanation into the courts, disturbing worship and drowning out prayers. The crowd of buyers and sellers there was comparatively innocent, while the great sin of desecration lay upon the chief authorities who had arranged the trade by their own arrangement. The guilt rested on the priests, elders, dignitaries and chief priests who perverted and disgraced their sacred office, themselves taking part in the buying, selling and exchange of money until greed overcame religious scruples and their dealings made them thieves in God's sight.
The scene exposed a religion made of forms and ceremonies, with rigorous exactions but no reverence for the true requirements of God, which were daily trampled underfoot. Those engaged kept only an external appearance of righteousness and holiness while neglecting inward and heart holiness. They were sticklers for the letter of the law while grossly transgressing and violating its spirit daily. Beneath that outward righteousness lay selfishness and avarice, and not one who fled that day was fitted by the grace of God to be connected with the sacred services of the temple.
Sacrifices Pointing to Christ
The oxen and sheep and doves offered for sale in the courts were provided as offerings for sacrifice, and those innocent victims were appointed to typify the one great Sacrifice. They were symbols of Christ Himself, standing as signs of His own offering.
He was the originator and founder of the whole Jewish economy, and every sacrifice was a type of Himself as the great Offering. At that Passover season He stood in His own temple among the worshipers unrecognized, while very large sales were driven by the multitude of sacrifices required and the bargaining, lowing of cattle, bleating of sheep, cooing of doves, clinking of coin and angry disputation filled the outer court turned to unholy traffic.
Year by year vast numbers of beasts were brought for Passover and the Feast of Tabernacles, with thousands of cattle slain and their blood caught by priests and poured upon the altar. Those great convocations had thus become scenes of bloodshed and cruelty that in large measure destroyed the solemnity of the institution of sacrifice. The priests and rulers, grown familiar with blood as a purifier from guilt, had almost lost sight that sin is what made necessary all this shedding of beasts' blood.
By the offering of sacrifices men were to be directed to a crucified Redeemer and to the blood of God's dear Son soon to be shed for the life of the world. But the Jews had nearly lost that meaning, had misunderstood their offerings, and spiritual worship was disappearing. They would as little appreciate His blood soon to be shed for the sins of the world as they appreciated the blood of beasts they kept incessantly flowing.
At the close of His ministry the same traffic was found again, three years after it had first been driven out, now spread through the outer court. Temple dignitaries themselves took part in buying and selling and exchanging money for greed, turning the sacred place and the sacrificial service into means of gain. In this way the sacrifices were obscured in their purpose of pointing people to Christ, the Lamb of God, while extortion and robbery and disturbing noise corrupted the offering of sacrifices for sins.
Cleansing With Divine Authority
The unholy traffic had desecrated the sacred place, so in lofty zeal and unwonted severity Jesus commanded the bargaining company to leave its sacred limits. With a scourge of small cords gathered on entering the enclosure in His hand, seeming to guilty eyes like a kingly scepter and like gleaming angry swords and terrible as a flaming sword, He drove men and beasts and birds, traders with their sheep and oxen and cattle, beyond the portals. He overthrew the tables of the money-changers so that coin fell ringing sharply on the marble pavement, yet He struck no man with the whip. Divinity overwhelmed the vast throng with panic and guilt and confusion, so even the hardened obeyed and fled without stopping to gather ill-gotten gain, until the courts were free and deep solemnity settled and His presence made the temple sacred. The sounds of traffic that had mingled with praise and prayer were cleansed away, and His power in driving out those who profaned it by buying and selling was shown.
The purging was not exhibition of human power but working of divine authority and majesty that lifted Him above humanity. When He arose in the majesty of His sacred mission they were stricken with sudden fear and condemnation, and felt and realized a power that should have brought them as worshipers at His feet. Even the hardened fled and obeyed His command, showing He could enforce justice in the temple. When they slowly drifted back with irresolution and timidity they hesitated and did not dare at once to resume their former occupation and sacrilegious trade.
The youthful Jesus caused officers of the temple, speculating priests, brokers and cattle traders, and dignitaries of the temple to flee precipitously in unquestioning obedience to a single humble man, with the one thought of escaping the condemnation of His presence, none questioning His authority. That flight afterward shamed them, they wondered at their own fears and obedience, and in hardness of heart wondered why they had fled from a single youthful Galilean and questioned His right to interfere. They felt such surrender could not be repeated and resolved from fear and hatred not to repeat it, looking for a king who would come with great pomp to subdue nations and raise them higher, yet at the second cleansing they fled more terrified and in greater haste.
This was the first driving of unholy traffickers at the commencement of ministry at Passover time, three years before He came again at the close of His earthly mission to find it still desecrated by the same abominable practices and the same defilers. The defilement then existed in much greater degree, with the same corruption returned, though reforming the corrupt priesthood would be futile. The act then still gave unbelieving people evidence of His divine mission after the people had proclaimed Him King of Israel in fulfillment of ancient prophecy.
After cleansing the courts Jesus spent the entire day in the temple healing the sick and relieving the afflicted with pitying compassion, receiving the poor and oppressed and working with a loving father's demeanor so no suppliant was sent unrelieved. He healed the poor, sick, blind, mute, lame and demon-afflicted and blessed dying infants, turning the cleansed temple into a place of mercy and healing. All that day He also instructed the restless curious people, reasoning with the scribes and silencing the caviling of haughty rulers by the wisdom of His words.
The act was a purging that condemned sacrilegious practices and reproved hypocritical lives, exposing misuse, abuse, arrogance, greed and extortion and threatening leaders' control over the people. Their flight exposed their guilt as hypocrites and robbers who had extorted the people and were unfit by grace for sacred service, and showed He rebukes selfish dealings and will remove those who persist in them. It stirred their bitter hatred and scorn instead of repentance.
His appearance, the tones of His voice, and the irresistible power He exercised over the multitude led many to believe He was the long-expected Messiah. Many lamented the abuse and hoped His power to drive out the rulers made Him the promised Deliverer who could drive these rulers out. Reports of the act spread and helped prepare the way for His reception in Galilee, strengthening the nobleman's belief that He had power great enough to heal his son. Some who witnessed His authority in expelling traders hoped He was the Messiah.
The disciples quaked at His terrible majesty so unlike His usual meekness, and later remembered this display of power, hoping He would again disperse His enemies and prove Himself King of Israel. The sudden change He brought to the scene was like the sudden quiet that followed Paul's gesture to the crowd. The cleansing displayed His divinity and proclaimed His Sonship to the Eternal, announcing Him as Messiah and the beginning of His work. That driving out stood together with changing water into wine as an act of miraculous power, showing power great enough to raise a dying child to health even from the brink of the grave.
Prophecy of Final Warning
The finding of sellers and money-changers in the temple belongs to the cleansing at the beginning of public ministry, which is the first of two cleansings, the second coming almost as the last act of ministry. Together the two cleansings foreshadow the last work for the warning of the world, in which two distinct calls are made to the churches. The first cleansing corresponds to the second angel's message, and the second cleansing corresponds to the voice from heaven, Come out of her, my people, for her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities, calling God's people out of Babylon.
The trade that turned the sacred Passover service into profit and profaned the temple warns that sacrilegious work will face judgment, for the same kind of profanation is repeated in the last days. At the first advent commercial work had been brought into the temple and God had been forgotten amid hurry here and there that left no time to think of heaven, and Christ rejected the use of sacred institutions for commercial purposes that displace attention from God. The same work will be done again prior to the second advent, when Christ will cleanse and purify His temple in displeasure. That cleansing presents the principles of God's law and tests obedience by how much of the law has been obeyed, and claiming to be the temple of the Lord gives no authority to do what the Word of God forbids.
The flight of the temple leaders when ordered out exposed their guilt as hypocrites and robbers who had extorted the people. It also symbolized the dispersion of the Jewish nation because of its wickedness and refusal to repent. Three years after the first cleansing the same corruption had returned in much greater degree, and though reforming the corrupt priesthood would be futile it was cleansed again. This second cleansing took place after the people had proclaimed Him King of Israel, fulfilling ancient prophecy, when He accepted their homage and the offices of king and priest, and the act gave unbelieving people evidence of His divine mission.
Temple Heart and Church
The temple was designed as the dwelling place of God's presence and as an object lesson for Israel and the world, and humanity was likewise intended to be a temple for God, but sin defiled the human heart so that it no longer revealed His glory, while through the incarnation God dwells in humanity and by saving grace the heart becomes His temple again. The driving out of the sellers announces the Messiah and the beginning of His work, and at the same time announces His mission to cleanse the human heart, which is meant to be a dwelling place for God, from sin, earthly desires, selfish lusts and evil habits. The corrupt courts crowded with unholy buying and selling represented a heart defiled by sensual passion and unholy thoughts, and His cleansing points to His work of cleansing the soul from sin and making His people a holy temple to the Lord.
The act struck directly at a selfish, avaricious spirit that kept only an external appearance of righteousness and an outward holiness while neglecting inward holiness and holiness of heart, keeping the letter of the law while grossly transgressing and violating its spirit daily. Those who fled that day were thereby revealed as not fitted by grace for connection with sacred service, and by declaring they had made His Father's house a den of thieves He exposed the people's great necessity. That necessity is a new moral birth, a removal of the sins that polluted them and cleansing from sin, and a renewal in knowledge and holiness through the transforming work of the Holy Spirit, illustrating the inward work of grace that must be accomplished in everyone who would secure eternal life.
As the courts were occupied by buyers and sellers and crowded with things that did not belong there so that access was obstructed and Christ had no room, so the heart can become defiled and crowded by continual business, worldly cares, burdens, desires, pride, vanities and worldliness that profane the soul temple where Christ should dwell and leave no room for Jesus or the truth. As the temple courts needed to be cleared, the soul must be freed from these things and worldliness must be removed, keeping God's entrusted goods apart from worldly business, so the truth can renew and transform it. Religious profession and sacred responsibilities do not protect a person whose life lacks a living connection with God when the heart is thus crowded.
Worship must not be mingled with worldly business or outward show at the cost of inward purity, for the defilement by commerce and the spirit of gain teaches that believers as God's temple need Jesus to occupy and cleanse the human heart from defilement every day. The soul as God's temple must likewise be cleansed and opened for the indwelling of the Spirit, and this cleansing involves the heart as well as the understanding, since intellectual knowledge of truth alone is not enough. In this time of test and trial the buyers and sellers must be driven out of heart and mind so the Spirit of God can take possession, revealing the true condition of many, with heart as well as understanding enlarged by heartwork. This is not accomplished by eloquence or ready speech, but the selfish and unbelieving are to look to Jesus in faith and claim Him as Saviour, for every worker needs a personal Saviour and true conversion, since God cannot use the unconverted worker, and character must be formed after the divine pattern by working with Christ into the divine likeness.
The purifying of the temple at the beginning of ministry and again at its close illustrates that God purifies His church for its present and eternal good, and the church as God's temple must be cleansed of defilement and its members purified. Trials that come upon the church are essential to that purification, for God exercises unceasing care for His heritage and allows no affliction except what is essential, and every test and trial He brings purifies from earthliness, deepens piety and gives greater strength to carry forward the triumphs of the cross and to carry the gospel throughout the world. The cleansing likewise illustrates the need for the course of clergy and rulers to be regulated, purified and cleansed. The same scene provides the pattern for condemning the use of sacred worship for commerce, with tables set beside altars and indulgences sold for money, including to fund the building of St. Peter's church.
Reform in Institutions Life
God's temple must not be defiled, so the finding of sellers of oxen and sheep and doves and money changers within it calls for living in harmony with the laws of health and practicing true temperance in all things. Unless true temperance is practiced there can be no susceptibility to the sanctifying influence of truth, and the duty extends to teaching others the better way by precept and by quiet consistent example. Ministers are to give instruction upon health and temperance at large gatherings to arouse intellect and conscience, and to follow up the work with publications and with educate, educate, educate. The temple setting is thus joined to care for the body and to preserving physical powers for service to God.
As Christ banished defiling things from the temple He would elevate righteousness in schools with instruction after God's order. Many of the books the youth study would be expelled and their places filled with others that inculcate substantial knowledge and abound in sentiments to be treasured in the heart and in precepts that can safely govern conduct. The cleansing applies to removing books and teachings that misrepresent God and influence young people toward false principles and defile the minds of the young.
He would likewise drive desecrators from churches where feasting and unholy trade are conducted in the name of religion. Commerce with sellers offering animals for sacrifice and money changers sitting inside the temple represents desecration of a house of worship by buying and selling. The same comparison condemns using churches for fairs, theatrical plays, and merchandise. Turning a sacred place to commerce and gain diverts worshipers from its purpose as a house of prayer and brings sacred things down to the level of common business. The same principle applies when ministers or others introduce merchandise into religious meetings, distracting people from the message and weakening its effect, and worship focused on display rather than Christ dishonors a place of worship and invites the same driving out.
His holy wrath confronted pollution of the temple by dishonest practices, cleansing it and fearlessly exposing the hypocrisy and intrigue of religious leaders. That cleansing illustrates His desire to cleanse hearts of anything resembling fraud. The temple courts occupied by buyers and sellers left Christ no room, and the heart can likewise become defiled and crowded by continual business. Religious profession and sacred responsibilities do not protect one whose life lacks a living connection with God, and religious status does not excuse unfair dealings, for those who disregard God's commands face the consequences of transgression.
The cleansing is the pattern for cleansing publishing houses, the Echo Office, the Review and Herald Office and the Battle Creek office from corrupt practices, control harming God's work, moral pollution, injustice and fraudulent dealings that deprive people of rights and turn them from rights. The Echo Office should be cleared of publications that dishonor Christ and undermine faith, and the same kind of cleansing would be needed wherever hidden wrongdoing was present, including a publishing office. The same need for cleansing that belonged to the temple in Christ's day applies to the office of publication in Battle Creek. God's temple must not become a place ruled by dishonest gain, and His servants must be pious and devoted to holy work, for schemes that deprive people of their rights are contrary to Christ's order.
That defilement includes putting commercial work first, some of it of most objectionable character, and printing matter that should never be placed in the hands of workers in God's institution. It includes accepting and handling commercial work displeasing to God and bringing in and printing matter containing principles that lead to false doctrine, which shows blindness and lack of spiritual discernment. Such defilement of God's publishing house is worse and tenfold more disastrous in result than the defilement of the temple, whose precincts were defiled by selling oxen and sheep and doves and by moneychanging until Christ overturned the tables and drove out sheep and cattle as cleansing judgment because God's house shall be called the house of prayer but had been made a den of thieves.
Sacred work corrupted by commercial business, unsanctified judgment in the work received and handled, a low standard of spirituality, and perverted principles rooted in selfishness and covetousness will not be left alone but will be purged by Christ to restore the institution to the results for which it was established. Unfair, selfish schemes are defilement that God reproves and will judge, and worldly, money-making practices in the Review and Herald office must give place to self-sacrifice. When leading men are not worked upon by the Holy Spirit, do not take time to talk with God, and are not led by justice, integrity, and the love of God but show unsanctified individuality, perversity, and failure to follow a straightforward upright course, the Lord will soon cleanse the publishing house. Delay makes cleansing more necessary because the longer men practice iniquity the harder and more unimpressible their hearts become.
The same cleansing will surely fall on His temple today, which is His institutions with representative workers standing in high places manipulating the various lines of work and appropriating to themselves their own estimate of their labor while ministers and missionaries are cut down in wages. Grasping for higher wages and greater authority and power to do as they please is a branch of selfishness devised by Satan to ruin souls, and judgment and equity cannot enter such arrangements. God will not work with that selfishness; it must be cut off or the whole plant will be uprooted and destroyed, because unequal distribution leaves no means to advance the work where truth has never entered.
The cleansing of fraud and injustice from the temple is the work needed to remove evils from God's institutions before His favor can be restored. The judgments upon the two largest institutions declare that there is to be a reformation among workers in them and in all other institutions, requiring the converting power of God to remove selfishness and sinful influence. Unless ideas of right and wrong are entirely changed there is cause to tremble for the future. The Lord will remove Board members unfit to serve because dishonest, harsh, unchristian conduct makes their work an offense to God.
If workers handling sacred truth remain unconsecrated, not under God's control, and without change, Jesus Himself will just as surely cleanse the Review and Herald Office from its defilement as He cleansed the temple when on earth. Corrupting a place devoted to God's service is shown as serious, for sellers of animals and money changers conducting business defiled the temple until Christ drove out the animals and overturned the tables.
Nicodemus witnessed Jesus drive out the traders and saw in the event a manifestation of divine power that stirred the priests' hatred. During the entire day after that cleansing He healed the sick and relieved the afflicted, receiving the poor and oppressed with pitying compassion and working with a father's demeanor toward suffering children so no suppliant was sent unrelieved, while instructing the restless curious people, reasoning with scribes and silencing haughty rulers by wisdom. Nicodemus saw this compassion and heard this teaching, and together with searching prophecies pointing to Jesus as the looked-for Messiah it moved him to seek Jesus for conference by night on the Mount of Olives. The act that commenced His work by driving sellers and money changers from courts degraded to traffic and extortion struck directly at the selfish avaricious spirit of those professing to be children of Abraham while keeping only external righteousness, neglecting inward holiness, and keeping the letter while transgressing the spirit daily. Not one who fled that day was fitted by grace to be connected with sacred temple service, and by declaring they had made His Father's house a den of thieves He exposed their great necessity of a new moral birth and removal of polluting sins, illustrating the inward work of grace needed by everyone who would secure eternal life.
Early in His ministry at Passover time Jesus came into the outer court of the temple and found it occupied as a cattle market with sellers of oxen and sheep and doves and money changers seated with their tables. What was meant to accommodate distant worshipers had become noisy traffic and extortion, with priests and rulers sharing the dealers' gain and selling at exorbitant prices while greed displaced prayer and profaned worship. The animals sold for offerings were meant to point to the one great Sacrifice, yet Christ the founder of that system stood unrecognized among them and the meaning of blood sacrifice was nearly lost. In zeal for God's house He drove men and beasts beyond the portals with a scourge of cords and overthrew the tables, not by human force but by divine majesty that struck panic and guilt into even the hardened leaders. That cleansing announced His mission to cleanse the human heart and His church from sin and selfish gain, and with His second cleansing at the close of ministry it foreshadows the final warning call and purification before His return.
Temple Market at Passover
What Jesus found was inside the temple, in its outer court, where sellers of oxen and sheep and doves and changers of money were seated, so that buying and selling of sacrificial animals and exchanging of money had taken possession of the sacred place. The commerce itself was unholy and desecrated the courts, turning them into a place of merchandise where greed and avarice flourished.
It was early in the morning at Passover at the start of His ministry, when Jerusalem was crowded with people come from a distance and large crowds with His disciples mingled in the throng were already going to the temple. The court had been arranged as a cattle market and place of general traffic, with stalls for beasts and tables set out for business. On any ordinary day it was like a common market, full of noisy clamor and the exchange of produce with buying and selling going on and no sacredness remaining.
The money changing exchanged foreign coins and different denominations brought by strangers for temple currency, for the sanctuary shekel and the yearly half-shekel regarded as a ransom for each person and supporting the temple, while other money was brought as freewill offerings. Roman coins were exchanged for money used in the temple, and the priests themselves acted as money-brokers and exchangers at the tables. What began as accommodation had grown into a disgraceful traffic and a source of great profit to the priests, becoming a fraudulent trade that brought them revenue.
Under plea of accommodating visitors who had come too far to bring their sacrificial offerings, cattle, sheep, doves and sparrows were sold in the court. The arrangement served worshipers who could not bring sacrifices from home, since pilgrims brought coins to pay the temple offering and needed animals for sacrifice. Because vast numbers of beasts were sacrificed yearly at Passover the sales were immense.
Sharp bargaining, buying and selling, the lowing of cattle, the bleating of sheep, the cooing of doves, the chinking and clinking of coin, the shouts of drivers and angry disputation made a babel of confusion like a noisy cattle market rather than the sacred temple of God. The uproar disturbed the worshipers just without the sacred precincts, until words addressed to the Most High were drowned in the confusion invading the temple erected to His glory, and the sight stirred Jesus to indignation.
Extortion and Desecration
The traffic in the courts was marked by exorbitant prices, fraud, extortion and false dealing. Changing foreign coins and different denominations for temple currency had grown into a disgraceful, fraudulent trade that brought revenue and immense profit to the priests. Dealers realized large gain that was shared with the avaricious priesthood and men of authority, who under cover of holy profession practiced extortion and made sacred office a source of personal revenue. Leaders endeavored to keep the business in their own hands, realizing immense profits while failing to realize the solemn sacred work of their office.
Priests and rulers had bought cattle and other animals at very low cost and were selling them at exorbitant prices to those who had come from a long distance and were compelled to buy animals for sacrifice. This exploited travelers from afar and people who had been taught they needed to buy offerings to receive God's blessing on their families and lands. The trade in the courts thus dishonored God and oppressed the people, including the poor who struggled to afford offerings for their sins. The poor were distressed because they believed there would be no remission of sins without shedding of blood, and the harm reached even those unable to afford a humble offering or food.
Greed and concern for money, power and gain had displaced the sacred purpose of the temple service. The temple, meant for worship, prayer and thanksgiving, had become a marketplace and a den of thieves. That trade brought distraction and profanation into the courts, disturbing worship and drowning out prayers. The crowd of buyers and sellers there was comparatively innocent, while the great sin of desecration lay upon the chief authorities who had arranged the trade by their own arrangement. The guilt rested on the priests, elders, dignitaries and chief priests who perverted and disgraced their sacred office, themselves taking part in the buying, selling and exchange of money until greed overcame religious scruples and their dealings made them thieves in God's sight.
The scene exposed a religion made of forms and ceremonies, with rigorous exactions but no reverence for the true requirements of God, which were daily trampled underfoot. Those engaged kept only an external appearance of righteousness and holiness while neglecting inward and heart holiness. They were sticklers for the letter of the law while grossly transgressing and violating its spirit daily. Beneath that outward righteousness lay selfishness and avarice, and not one who fled that day was fitted by the grace of God to be connected with the sacred services of the temple.
Sacrifices Pointing to Christ
The oxen and sheep and doves offered for sale in the courts were provided as offerings for sacrifice, and those innocent victims were appointed to typify the one great Sacrifice. They were symbols of Christ Himself, standing as signs of His own offering.
He was the originator and founder of the whole Jewish economy, and every sacrifice was a type of Himself as the great Offering. At that Passover season He stood in His own temple among the worshipers unrecognized, while very large sales were driven by the multitude of sacrifices required and the bargaining, lowing of cattle, bleating of sheep, cooing of doves, clinking of coin and angry disputation filled the outer court turned to unholy traffic.
Year by year vast numbers of beasts were brought for Passover and the Feast of Tabernacles, with thousands of cattle slain and their blood caught by priests and poured upon the altar. Those great convocations had thus become scenes of bloodshed and cruelty that in large measure destroyed the solemnity of the institution of sacrifice. The priests and rulers, grown familiar with blood as a purifier from guilt, had almost lost sight that sin is what made necessary all this shedding of beasts' blood.
By the offering of sacrifices men were to be directed to a crucified Redeemer and to the blood of God's dear Son soon to be shed for the life of the world. But the Jews had nearly lost that meaning, had misunderstood their offerings, and spiritual worship was disappearing. They would as little appreciate His blood soon to be shed for the sins of the world as they appreciated the blood of beasts they kept incessantly flowing.
At the close of His ministry the same traffic was found again, three years after it had first been driven out, now spread through the outer court. Temple dignitaries themselves took part in buying and selling and exchanging money for greed, turning the sacred place and the sacrificial service into means of gain. In this way the sacrifices were obscured in their purpose of pointing people to Christ, the Lamb of God, while extortion and robbery and disturbing noise corrupted the offering of sacrifices for sins.
Cleansing With Divine Authority
The unholy traffic had desecrated the sacred place, so in lofty zeal and unwonted severity Jesus commanded the bargaining company to leave its sacred limits. With a scourge of small cords gathered on entering the enclosure in His hand, seeming to guilty eyes like a kingly scepter and like gleaming angry swords and terrible as a flaming sword, He drove men and beasts and birds, traders with their sheep and oxen and cattle, beyond the portals. He overthrew the tables of the money-changers so that coin fell ringing sharply on the marble pavement, yet He struck no man with the whip. Divinity overwhelmed the vast throng with panic and guilt and confusion, so even the hardened obeyed and fled without stopping to gather ill-gotten gain, until the courts were free and deep solemnity settled and His presence made the temple sacred. The sounds of traffic that had mingled with praise and prayer were cleansed away, and His power in driving out those who profaned it by buying and selling was shown.
The purging was not exhibition of human power but working of divine authority and majesty that lifted Him above humanity. When He arose in the majesty of His sacred mission they were stricken with sudden fear and condemnation, and felt and realized a power that should have brought them as worshipers at His feet. Even the hardened fled and obeyed His command, showing He could enforce justice in the temple. When they slowly drifted back with irresolution and timidity they hesitated and did not dare at once to resume their former occupation and sacrilegious trade.
The youthful Jesus caused officers of the temple, speculating priests, brokers and cattle traders, and dignitaries of the temple to flee precipitously in unquestioning obedience to a single humble man, with the one thought of escaping the condemnation of His presence, none questioning His authority. That flight afterward shamed them, they wondered at their own fears and obedience, and in hardness of heart wondered why they had fled from a single youthful Galilean and questioned His right to interfere. They felt such surrender could not be repeated and resolved from fear and hatred not to repeat it, looking for a king who would come with great pomp to subdue nations and raise them higher, yet at the second cleansing they fled more terrified and in greater haste.
This was the first driving of unholy traffickers at the commencement of ministry at Passover time, three years before He came again at the close of His earthly mission to find it still desecrated by the same abominable practices and the same defilers. The defilement then existed in much greater degree, with the same corruption returned, though reforming the corrupt priesthood would be futile. The act then still gave unbelieving people evidence of His divine mission after the people had proclaimed Him King of Israel in fulfillment of ancient prophecy.
After cleansing the courts Jesus spent the entire day in the temple healing the sick and relieving the afflicted with pitying compassion, receiving the poor and oppressed and working with a loving father's demeanor so no suppliant was sent unrelieved. He healed the poor, sick, blind, mute, lame and demon-afflicted and blessed dying infants, turning the cleansed temple into a place of mercy and healing. All that day He also instructed the restless curious people, reasoning with the scribes and silencing the caviling of haughty rulers by the wisdom of His words.
The act was a purging that condemned sacrilegious practices and reproved hypocritical lives, exposing misuse, abuse, arrogance, greed and extortion and threatening leaders' control over the people. Their flight exposed their guilt as hypocrites and robbers who had extorted the people and were unfit by grace for sacred service, and showed He rebukes selfish dealings and will remove those who persist in them. It stirred their bitter hatred and scorn instead of repentance.
His appearance, the tones of His voice, and the irresistible power He exercised over the multitude led many to believe He was the long-expected Messiah. Many lamented the abuse and hoped His power to drive out the rulers made Him the promised Deliverer who could drive these rulers out. Reports of the act spread and helped prepare the way for His reception in Galilee, strengthening the nobleman's belief that He had power great enough to heal his son. Some who witnessed His authority in expelling traders hoped He was the Messiah.
The disciples quaked at His terrible majesty so unlike His usual meekness, and later remembered this display of power, hoping He would again disperse His enemies and prove Himself King of Israel. The sudden change He brought to the scene was like the sudden quiet that followed Paul's gesture to the crowd. The cleansing displayed His divinity and proclaimed His Sonship to the Eternal, announcing Him as Messiah and the beginning of His work. That driving out stood together with changing water into wine as an act of miraculous power, showing power great enough to raise a dying child to health even from the brink of the grave.
Prophecy of Final Warning
The finding of sellers and money-changers in the temple belongs to the cleansing at the beginning of public ministry, which is the first of two cleansings, the second coming almost as the last act of ministry. Together the two cleansings foreshadow the last work for the warning of the world, in which two distinct calls are made to the churches. The first cleansing corresponds to the second angel's message, and the second cleansing corresponds to the voice from heaven, Come out of her, my people, for her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities, calling God's people out of Babylon.
The trade that turned the sacred Passover service into profit and profaned the temple warns that sacrilegious work will face judgment, for the same kind of profanation is repeated in the last days. At the first advent commercial work had been brought into the temple and God had been forgotten amid hurry here and there that left no time to think of heaven, and Christ rejected the use of sacred institutions for commercial purposes that displace attention from God. The same work will be done again prior to the second advent, when Christ will cleanse and purify His temple in displeasure. That cleansing presents the principles of God's law and tests obedience by how much of the law has been obeyed, and claiming to be the temple of the Lord gives no authority to do what the Word of God forbids.
The flight of the temple leaders when ordered out exposed their guilt as hypocrites and robbers who had extorted the people. It also symbolized the dispersion of the Jewish nation because of its wickedness and refusal to repent. Three years after the first cleansing the same corruption had returned in much greater degree, and though reforming the corrupt priesthood would be futile it was cleansed again. This second cleansing took place after the people had proclaimed Him King of Israel, fulfilling ancient prophecy, when He accepted their homage and the offices of king and priest, and the act gave unbelieving people evidence of His divine mission.
Temple Heart and Church
The temple was designed as the dwelling place of God's presence and as an object lesson for Israel and the world, and humanity was likewise intended to be a temple for God, but sin defiled the human heart so that it no longer revealed His glory, while through the incarnation God dwells in humanity and by saving grace the heart becomes His temple again. The driving out of the sellers announces the Messiah and the beginning of His work, and at the same time announces His mission to cleanse the human heart, which is meant to be a dwelling place for God, from sin, earthly desires, selfish lusts and evil habits. The corrupt courts crowded with unholy buying and selling represented a heart defiled by sensual passion and unholy thoughts, and His cleansing points to His work of cleansing the soul from sin and making His people a holy temple to the Lord.
The act struck directly at a selfish, avaricious spirit that kept only an external appearance of righteousness and an outward holiness while neglecting inward holiness and holiness of heart, keeping the letter of the law while grossly transgressing and violating its spirit daily. Those who fled that day were thereby revealed as not fitted by grace for connection with sacred service, and by declaring they had made His Father's house a den of thieves He exposed the people's great necessity. That necessity is a new moral birth, a removal of the sins that polluted them and cleansing from sin, and a renewal in knowledge and holiness through the transforming work of the Holy Spirit, illustrating the inward work of grace that must be accomplished in everyone who would secure eternal life.
As the courts were occupied by buyers and sellers and crowded with things that did not belong there so that access was obstructed and Christ had no room, so the heart can become defiled and crowded by continual business, worldly cares, burdens, desires, pride, vanities and worldliness that profane the soul temple where Christ should dwell and leave no room for Jesus or the truth. As the temple courts needed to be cleared, the soul must be freed from these things and worldliness must be removed, keeping God's entrusted goods apart from worldly business, so the truth can renew and transform it. Religious profession and sacred responsibilities do not protect a person whose life lacks a living connection with God when the heart is thus crowded.
Worship must not be mingled with worldly business or outward show at the cost of inward purity, for the defilement by commerce and the spirit of gain teaches that believers as God's temple need Jesus to occupy and cleanse the human heart from defilement every day. The soul as God's temple must likewise be cleansed and opened for the indwelling of the Spirit, and this cleansing involves the heart as well as the understanding, since intellectual knowledge of truth alone is not enough. In this time of test and trial the buyers and sellers must be driven out of heart and mind so the Spirit of God can take possession, revealing the true condition of many, with heart as well as understanding enlarged by heartwork. This is not accomplished by eloquence or ready speech, but the selfish and unbelieving are to look to Jesus in faith and claim Him as Saviour, for every worker needs a personal Saviour and true conversion, since God cannot use the unconverted worker, and character must be formed after the divine pattern by working with Christ into the divine likeness.
The purifying of the temple at the beginning of ministry and again at its close illustrates that God purifies His church for its present and eternal good, and the church as God's temple must be cleansed of defilement and its members purified. Trials that come upon the church are essential to that purification, for God exercises unceasing care for His heritage and allows no affliction except what is essential, and every test and trial He brings purifies from earthliness, deepens piety and gives greater strength to carry forward the triumphs of the cross and to carry the gospel throughout the world. The cleansing likewise illustrates the need for the course of clergy and rulers to be regulated, purified and cleansed. The same scene provides the pattern for condemning the use of sacred worship for commerce, with tables set beside altars and indulgences sold for money, including to fund the building of St. Peter's church.
Reform in Institutions Life
God's temple must not be defiled, so the finding of sellers of oxen and sheep and doves and money changers within it calls for living in harmony with the laws of health and practicing true temperance in all things. Unless true temperance is practiced there can be no susceptibility to the sanctifying influence of truth, and the duty extends to teaching others the better way by precept and by quiet consistent example. Ministers are to give instruction upon health and temperance at large gatherings to arouse intellect and conscience, and to follow up the work with publications and with educate, educate, educate. The temple setting is thus joined to care for the body and to preserving physical powers for service to God.
As Christ banished defiling things from the temple He would elevate righteousness in schools with instruction after God's order. Many of the books the youth study would be expelled and their places filled with others that inculcate substantial knowledge and abound in sentiments to be treasured in the heart and in precepts that can safely govern conduct. The cleansing applies to removing books and teachings that misrepresent God and influence young people toward false principles and defile the minds of the young.
He would likewise drive desecrators from churches where feasting and unholy trade are conducted in the name of religion. Commerce with sellers offering animals for sacrifice and money changers sitting inside the temple represents desecration of a house of worship by buying and selling. The same comparison condemns using churches for fairs, theatrical plays, and merchandise. Turning a sacred place to commerce and gain diverts worshipers from its purpose as a house of prayer and brings sacred things down to the level of common business. The same principle applies when ministers or others introduce merchandise into religious meetings, distracting people from the message and weakening its effect, and worship focused on display rather than Christ dishonors a place of worship and invites the same driving out.
His holy wrath confronted pollution of the temple by dishonest practices, cleansing it and fearlessly exposing the hypocrisy and intrigue of religious leaders. That cleansing illustrates His desire to cleanse hearts of anything resembling fraud. The temple courts occupied by buyers and sellers left Christ no room, and the heart can likewise become defiled and crowded by continual business. Religious profession and sacred responsibilities do not protect one whose life lacks a living connection with God, and religious status does not excuse unfair dealings, for those who disregard God's commands face the consequences of transgression.
The cleansing is the pattern for cleansing publishing houses, the Echo Office, the Review and Herald Office and the Battle Creek office from corrupt practices, control harming God's work, moral pollution, injustice and fraudulent dealings that deprive people of rights and turn them from rights. The Echo Office should be cleared of publications that dishonor Christ and undermine faith, and the same kind of cleansing would be needed wherever hidden wrongdoing was present, including a publishing office. The same need for cleansing that belonged to the temple in Christ's day applies to the office of publication in Battle Creek. God's temple must not become a place ruled by dishonest gain, and His servants must be pious and devoted to holy work, for schemes that deprive people of their rights are contrary to Christ's order.
That defilement includes putting commercial work first, some of it of most objectionable character, and printing matter that should never be placed in the hands of workers in God's institution. It includes accepting and handling commercial work displeasing to God and bringing in and printing matter containing principles that lead to false doctrine, which shows blindness and lack of spiritual discernment. Such defilement of God's publishing house is worse and tenfold more disastrous in result than the defilement of the temple, whose precincts were defiled by selling oxen and sheep and doves and by moneychanging until Christ overturned the tables and drove out sheep and cattle as cleansing judgment because God's house shall be called the house of prayer but had been made a den of thieves.
Sacred work corrupted by commercial business, unsanctified judgment in the work received and handled, a low standard of spirituality, and perverted principles rooted in selfishness and covetousness will not be left alone but will be purged by Christ to restore the institution to the results for which it was established. Unfair, selfish schemes are defilement that God reproves and will judge, and worldly, money-making practices in the Review and Herald office must give place to self-sacrifice. When leading men are not worked upon by the Holy Spirit, do not take time to talk with God, and are not led by justice, integrity, and the love of God but show unsanctified individuality, perversity, and failure to follow a straightforward upright course, the Lord will soon cleanse the publishing house. Delay makes cleansing more necessary because the longer men practice iniquity the harder and more unimpressible their hearts become.
The same cleansing will surely fall on His temple today, which is His institutions with representative workers standing in high places manipulating the various lines of work and appropriating to themselves their own estimate of their labor while ministers and missionaries are cut down in wages. Grasping for higher wages and greater authority and power to do as they please is a branch of selfishness devised by Satan to ruin souls, and judgment and equity cannot enter such arrangements. God will not work with that selfishness; it must be cut off or the whole plant will be uprooted and destroyed, because unequal distribution leaves no means to advance the work where truth has never entered.
The cleansing of fraud and injustice from the temple is the work needed to remove evils from God's institutions before His favor can be restored. The judgments upon the two largest institutions declare that there is to be a reformation among workers in them and in all other institutions, requiring the converting power of God to remove selfishness and sinful influence. Unless ideas of right and wrong are entirely changed there is cause to tremble for the future. The Lord will remove Board members unfit to serve because dishonest, harsh, unchristian conduct makes their work an offense to God.
If workers handling sacred truth remain unconsecrated, not under God's control, and without change, Jesus Himself will just as surely cleanse the Review and Herald Office from its defilement as He cleansed the temple when on earth. Corrupting a place devoted to God's service is shown as serious, for sellers of animals and money changers conducting business defiled the temple until Christ drove out the animals and overturned the tables.
Nicodemus witnessed Jesus drive out the traders and saw in the event a manifestation of divine power that stirred the priests' hatred. During the entire day after that cleansing He healed the sick and relieved the afflicted, receiving the poor and oppressed with pitying compassion and working with a father's demeanor toward suffering children so no suppliant was sent unrelieved, while instructing the restless curious people, reasoning with scribes and silencing haughty rulers by wisdom. Nicodemus saw this compassion and heard this teaching, and together with searching prophecies pointing to Jesus as the looked-for Messiah it moved him to seek Jesus for conference by night on the Mount of Olives. The act that commenced His work by driving sellers and money changers from courts degraded to traffic and extortion struck directly at the selfish avaricious spirit of those professing to be children of Abraham while keeping only external righteousness, neglecting inward holiness, and keeping the letter while transgressing the spirit daily. Not one who fled that day was fitted by grace to be connected with sacred temple service, and by declaring they had made His Father's house a den of thieves He exposed their great necessity of a new moral birth and removal of polluting sins, illustrating the inward work of grace needed by everyone who would secure eternal life.