Commentary on Mark 11 -- How is Jesus driving the money-changers out of the Jerusalem Temple related to world evangelism?
Rarely does the story of Jesus driving merchants and money-changers out of the Temple prompt reflections about world evangelism. That is lamentable given that Jesus quoted Isaiah 56:7 as the reason for His actions: "My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations."
Conversations on the cleansing of the Temple almost never mention Isaiah's "for all nations" phrase. One reason may be that only Mark records the entire verse from Isaiah. However, by ignoring those last three words of Isaiah 56:7, we may well miss what was really going on that day.
The core issue that day in Jerusalem may not have been just corrupt and abusive commerce, as bad as that was. The central issue may have been that the Court of the Gentiles had been taken over by such activity. That essentially evicted non-Jews from the Temple. It meant that the Temple could no longer be "a house of prayer for all nations."
Matthew, Mark, and Luke all place Jesus' purifying of the Temple on Monday of Holy Week. On Friday of that same week, Jesus died as a sacrifice "for the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2:2). Thus, as Jesus entered the Temple at the beginning of Passover Week, a concern for all peoples on earth was likely weighing heavily on Him. Maybe He was already formulating in His mind the exhortation He would give His followers about preaching the gospel "to all creation" (Mark 16:15) and being witnesses "to the ends of the earth" (Acts 1:8).
Given what Jesus was going to face later in the week, isn't it logical that His heart would have been focused that Monday on "all nations"? That would have made Him especially sensitive to the Court of the Gentiles being occupied by money-changers and sellers of animals and birds. The price-gouging and currency-exchange fraud certainly desecrated God's holy Temple. However, what may have pushed Jesus to the boiling point was seeing the Gentile area usurped and turned into "a den of thieves" (a phrase from Jeremiah 7:11). With the Gentiles effectively squeezed out, the Temple could no longer serve as "a house of prayer for all nations." Their place to worship had been stolen from them.
Jesus' life on earth begins in Bethlehem with a plaintive "no room in the end" story. Isn't it ironic that at the end of his earthly life, Jesus faced another "no room" sign?
The "No Room for Gentiles" sign put up in the Court of the Gentiles not long before Jesus' arrest and crucifixion barred the way to the Temple for many of those for whom He was about to die! Is it any wonder that our Savior's emotions boiled over that day? Shouldn't ours do the same when something hinders "all nations" from hearing the call to worship their Creator?
1In the Bible, the word "nations" does not mean the political entities like China, India and the USA. Rather, it means people groups or societies in which people speak the same language, have the same culture and live in or have originated the same area. "Nations" is synonymous with the plural word "peoples." In other words, nations in the Bible means all of the people groups of the world other than the people of Israel.
-- Howard Culbertson,
This mini-essay on a world missions Bible passage is one of more than three dozen articles in the "Heart of God" series published in Engage, a monthly online magazine.
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