Cleansing of the Temple

3rd Sunday of Lent @ SFX church, Petaling Jaya
Gospel Reading JOHN 2:13-25

Since the Passover of the Jews was near, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. He found in the temple area those who sold oxen, sheep, and doves, as well as the moneychangers seated there. He made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area, with the sheep and oxen, and spilled the coins of the moneychangers and overturned their tables, and to those who sold doves he said, "Take these out of here, and stop making my Father's house a marketplace." His disciples recalled the words of Scripture, Zeal for your house will consume me.

At this theJews answered and said to him, "What sign can you show us for doing this?" Jesus answered and said to them, "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up." The Jews said, "This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and you will raise it up in three days?" But he was speaking about the temple of his body.Therefore, when he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they came to believe the Scripture and the word Jesus had spoken. While he was in Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, many began to believe in his name when they saw the signs he was doing. But Jesus would not trust himself to them because he knew them all, and did not need anyone to testify about human nature. He himself understood it well.

Today's homily elaborates further on what took place when Jesus came to visit the Holy Temple. The temple was built during King Solomon's time (as depicted in 2 Chronicles) and is the most sacred of all places, for it is a House of God.

However, as the years passes by, it became less of a sacred place, but more of a marketplace. Traders set up their stalls selling animals meant for sacrifice with cut-neck prices catered visiting pilgrams. There were the moneychanges, whom will cut a steep profit while exchanging foreign currency for the ones only used in the Temple. There was a lot of bargaining that took place between the traders and the pilgrams. In the midst of all this trading and bargaining, Jesus came to visit.

He saw what has became of the sacred Temple of his Father, and was enraged. What he did next was shocking. He drove away the sheep traders, overturned the moneychangers' tables and threatened the dove sellers. This passage is important as it signifies Jesus cleansing the Holy Temple.

As we approached the 3rd week of Lent, are we in the midst of cleansing our Holy Temple - Our Hearts? The Heart is like the Temple, sometimes it can be like a marketplace, where we bargain with God to compromise with our failed promises to Him, our materialistic desires etc. We should be focusing of cleansing out our own Temple, flush out the unnecessary worries, doubts, longings, and focus on the promises of God to us. It's time to allow our personal Temple a holy place again, and allow God to dwell in again. All this is possible if we ask for God's guidance and mercy.

Note : this was an intepretation of Father Michael's homily. Of course his homily sounds much more meaningful then what I have summarised here.