“When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple courts, He found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So He made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; He scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves He said, ‘Get these out of here! Stop turning My Father’s house into a market!’ His disciples remembered that it is written: ‘Zeal for Your house will consume me.’”
JOHN 2:13-17 NIV
To some, it was a place of worship. To others, it was a place of business to make a living by any means necessary. But to the Son, it was His Father’s House–sacred ground and a place of prayer for the salvation, healing and deliverance of the nations. So, out came the whip against the money changers, the thieves and abusers, making the Pharisees fume with rage and risking His very life. But with the honor of His Father at stake and the deliverance of nations hanging in the balance, He laughed at death because it was all worth it. To the cross He would go, if He must. Oh, what a passion!
IN HUMAN EXPERIENCE, GOD’S FIRE TRANSLATES INTO passion—the type of passion we saw in Jesus. Perhaps He wasn’t only passionate in His words. When Jesus was going to Jerusalem for the last time, we read that He was walking ahead of His disciples. They saw how He urged Himself onward. “Now they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was going before them; and they were amazed. And as they followed they were afraid” (Mark 10:32). Why? Somehow, the fire in His soul was evident in the way He walked.
When they arrived, Jesus saw the desecration of the temple. The disciples then had further evidence of His passionate feelings. His reaction turned Him into an awesome figure. The disciples were reminded of the words of Psalm 69:9: “For zeal for Your house has consumed me . . . ” But it was an anger born out of love, not a cold fury. Jesus was not a frenzied fanatic. He loved His Father’s house, that’s all. It was His desire to see people in the temple, worshipping with freedom and happiness. But commercialism in the temple had spoiled all that. His heart overflowed like a volcano. The fire of the Holy Spirit in His soul made Him cleanse the temple. His actions were frightening, and many fled from the scene because of them.
The children, the blind and the lame stayed though, and He healed them (Matthew 21:14-16). That was what He had wanted to do anyway, and that was the reason His anger achieved furnace-like heat. His indignation aimed for joy. He succeeded—the children ended up singing, “Hosanna!” This was the only occasion in Scripture where excitement about God was rebuked, the only time a hush was demanded in the courts of the Lord. The silence was demanded by the Pharisees—the praise of the Lord was drowning the tinkling of their commercial tills. Money music was muted! This was all part of the picture of the fire of the Lord—His consuming fire was designed to make way for exuberant praise.