John 2:13 It was nearly time for the Jewish Passover celebration, so Jesus went to Jerusalem. 14 In the Temple area he saw merchants selling cattle, sheep, and doves for sacrifices; he also saw dealers at tables exchanging foreign money. 15 Jesus made a whip from some ropes and chased them all out of the Temple. He drove out the sheep and cattle, scattered the money changers’ coins over the floor, and turned over their tables. 16 Then, going over to the people who sold doves, he told them, “Get these things out of here. Stop turning my Father’s house into a marketplace!”
17 Then his disciples remembered this prophecy from the Scriptures: “Passion for God’s house will consume me.”
18 But the Jewish leaders demanded, “What are you doing? If God gave you authority to do this, show us a miraculous sign to prove it.”
19 “All right,” Jesus replied. “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”
20 “What!” they exclaimed. “It has taken forty-six years to build this Temple, and you can rebuild it in three days?” 21 But when Jesus said “this temple,” he meant his own body.
22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered he had said this, and they believed both the Scriptures and what Jesus had said.
23 Because of the miraculous signs Jesus did in Jerusalem at the Passover celebration, many began to trust in him. 24 But Jesus didn’t trust them, because he knew human nature. 25 No one needed to tell him what mankind is really like.
Matthew 21:13 He said to them, “The Scriptures declare, ‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves!”
observation
The annual trip to Jerusalem to observe Passover meant that you had to bring an animal for the sacrifice, if you lived a long distance from Jerusalem and had to bring an animal with you all the way from home, then you were going to have some complications caused by the lack of desire that the sheep and cattle had for traveling.
Honesty and integrity were cast aside for convenience and corruption. What a great idea somebody had, let’s put the animals up for sale right inside the temple courts, that way it is all a lot more convenient than traveling a hundred miles with an uncooperative cow.
One of the problems was that they were selling the animals and exchanging the money in the outer courts of the temple in the area where the Gentiles were allowed to enter for prayer.
Another problem is the religious leaders were probably making a great deal of profit from these sales and from the exchange of foreign currency into the Shekel that the priest accepted.
The religious leaders ask Jesus a fair question, “What are you doing? If God gave you authority to do this, show us a miraculous sign to prove it.” The first proof that Jesus offers to them was his prediction that he would rise from the dead in three days, but it looks as if Jesus gave them other miraculous signs as well.
John 2:23 Because of the miraculous signs Jesus did in Jerusalem at the Passover celebration, many began to trust in him.
There were a lot of people that did look at the signs that Jesus gave to prove himself, too bad the religious leaders would not look at the signs and determine that Jesus did have authority from God and that he would rise from the grave in three days.
application
It is not that difficult to be lead astray, we must examine the proofs for ourselves, the miraculous signs that Jesus gave to prove his identity were so clear and yet those that were blinded by religion could not see what so many others could.
prayer
Thank you Lord for revealing yourself to us, I want to stay in your word daily so that I will know the truth.
