For What Do We Have Zeal?

March 26, 2000, Lent 3 John 2:13-22

A sermon by Rev. Dr. John K. Luoma

It is dangerous to be around Jesus. The disciples learn that quickly in one of his very first acts of ministry. They learn it when Jesus confronts the authorities at the Temple. Why is it so dangerous? It is dangerous because Jerusalem was the chief commercial center of the whole area of Judah, i.e. the whole of southern Israel. Joachim Jeremias in his book, Jerusalem in The Time of Jesus, says that Jerusalem was a city built to serve a Temple. Almost all the commerce of the area depended on meeting the needs of those who came to worship and sacrifice at the Temple. So, to attack the Temple was to attack the livelihood of a lot of people. How upset do we get today when our jobs are threatened? People got no less upset in Jesus' day.

Why was it so dangerous to attack the Temple? It was dangerous because the highest court of Israel, the Sanhedrin, was located there. Therefore, to attack the Temple was to attack the supreme court and the people in charge.

Why was it so dangerous to attack the Temple? It was dangerous because the Temple was at the center of the Jewish faith. They believed that the Temple was the dwelling place of God. They believed that through the sacrifices offered there God forgave their sin and healed them. To attack the Temple was to attack this belief.

In other words, an attack on the Temple was like a simultaneous attack on Wall Street, the Supreme Court and the Vatican. And, as if all these things aren't dangerous enough, Jesus chooses to attack the Temple during the highest and holiest of feasts-the Passover. Jeremias says that during this time the city swelled to three to five times its normal size, and religious fervor was at its highest.

So, in this highly charged atmosphere, Jesus enters the Temple, makes a whip of cords, drives out the animals and overturns the tables of the moneychangers. How did he dare to do this? How did he dare to expose himself to such danger? How did he dare to attack the most sacred institutions of his society? The answer is that he had a single-minded devotion to the will of God. He didn't care about anything else. He didn't even care about endangering his own life. As the disciples watch his action an Old Testament phrase comes to mind, "Zeal for your house will consume me." (John 2:17)

Such action could have gotten him killed on the spot, and eventually it did. Some say the reason he wasn't killed on the spot is that the whole episode took place so quickly and his reply when challenged was so cryptic. In defending his action he says, "Destroy this Temple, and in three days I will raise it up." (John 2:19) Thinking that he is referring to the Temple at Jerusalem, the authorities reply as if he is crazy. How is he going to destroy and reconstruct the Temple, one of the seven wonders of the world, a structure that took forty-six years to build. Of course, Jesus is talking about his own death and resurrection, a truth that his own disciples did not know at the time. He is declaring that his death and resurrection will put an end to the need for a Temple. Through his sacrifice the need for sacrifice will come to an end. Because of his sacrifice, eternal life will be given as a gift.

As Lutherans we know this truth quite well. We say that we are saved by grace through faith. We find favor with God because of what God has done for us in Jesus. By trusting in what God has done for us in Jesus, we are his beloved children. We also say that the great love that God has expressed for us should be expressed in acts of love on our part. For this reason we hold the Ten Commandments in high esteem because they express some of the ways in which we should express our zeal for God.

The very first commandment asks us: do we have other gods? It asks us: what is the driving force and passion of our lives? Luther says that to which we look for security in times of trouble, that is our God. What is the driving force and passion in our lives? Are we zealous for God?

An unnamed writer describes people who have zeal for God in this way: They are people who will one thing. Whether they live or die, whether they have health or whether they have sickness, whether they are rich or poor, for all these things zealous people care nothing at all. Zealous people burn for one thing and that one thing is to please God and to advance God's glory. If they are consumed by their zeal, they do not care. They see themselves as a lamp, and lamps are made to burn; and if they are consumed in their burning, they simply see themselves as having done the work that God has given them.

People of zeal will always find a sphere in which to express it. If they cannot preach, work or give money, they will sigh, cry and pray. If they cannot fight in the valley as did Joshua, they will do what Aaron did and hold up the arms of Moses. If they are not able to do the Lord's work themselves, they will give the Lord no rest until he raises up others so that the work of the Lord can be done.

And the second and third commandments tell us that the zeal that the Lord has for us we return in our zeal for prayer and worship. In the March issue of Christianity Today Dorothy Buss writes about how the world is infringing more and more on the sabbath, and how Christians are going to have to become more and more zealous in order to preserve it. She says that when we honor the sabbath, we are practicing our independence from all the forces that would like to assume the role of god. Taking time out to worship is becoming a witness to the world that there is something more important than work and worrying about our work.

She also asserts that when we worship we need to give up bondage to the clock. She tells the story of a moment in which one pastor learned how bound we are to the clock even in church. He received a phone call that someone had left a pair of gloves in church. As he looked for them in the pews, he found someone's bulletin. Each part of the worship was meticulously timed. Opening hymn 3 minutes and 38 seconds. Old Testament reading 2 minutes and 32 seconds and so on. She raises the question of whether this should be the way it is among people who have given themselves over to God. Should we be so slavishly bound to the clock? How much would worship change if we left our watches at home or took them off during worship? How much would it influence our worship if we decided we were going to give ourselves totally and forget about the time?

Sincerely praying and worshipping is one way we express our zeal to God who has shown so much zeal for us in Jesus. Another is encompassed in what we call the Second Table of the Law, which asks us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Two months before his death a great man of zeal, Martin Luther King, Jr., once talked about neighbor love in this way. He remarks that every now and then he would think about his death and he would ask himself, "What is it that I would want said? I leave this word with you this morning."

"I would tell people not to give me a long eulogy. I would tell them not to mention that I won the Nobel Peace Prize, and I would ask them to leave out mention of the many awards I have won. I would tell them not to mention the school I went to."

"What I want said is that Martin Luther King tried to serve others, that he tried to love somebody, that he tried to be a peacemaker, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit those in prison. I want them to say that I was a drum major for justice, peace and righteousness."

He says that he wants to be remembered as a person who inspired people to live by these words, "If I can help somebody as I pass along, if I can cheer somebody with a word or song, if I can show somebody he's traveling wrong, then my life will not be in vain. If I can do my duty as a Christian ought, if I can bring salvation to a world overwrought, if I can spread the message as the Master sought, then my life will not be in vain."

What about us? How would we like to be remembered? Are we showing any zeal for the God who has shown so much zeal for us?

Copyright 2000 by Rev. Dr. John K. Luoma

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