Gospel Reflection for Sunday March 7th 2021 The Third Sunday of Lent
Jesus disturbs the peace
If you ‘Google’ the name Jesus and search images, there are countless pictures and paintings of Jesus; some old, some very modern. He is often presented as the kind and peaceful Messiah. A popular image of Jesus is him as the Good Shepherd carrying a sheep on his shoulders. These are all very helpful for us, but they don’t convey nor capture the fullness of who Jesus is and neither can they. The gospel today offers us an image of Jesus that we might find difficult to understand. Jesus is in the Temple and he is angry, even violent. He walks forcibly into the Temple, makes a whip from some rope, overturns tables, throws the moneychangers money on the ground and drives the animals out. Then he turns his attention to those who had turned the Sacred Temple into a marketplace. He doesn’t hold back; he condemns them for violating and desecrating The Temple; ‘Take all this out of here and stop turning my Father’s house into a market.’ What are we to make of this today?
For Jesus this is both a moment of protest and prophecy. The Temple was the most sacred place of prayer for the Jewish People; it was the very place where God ‘lived’. Sadly it had become a place of commerce, cheating and injustice. Those who came to pray had to buy animals to sacrifice. They had to buy these with the Temple’s own currency, which they also had to buy. The moneychangers cheated those who came to the Temple. Jesus protests against this; his anger and apparent violence are righteous and justified. He is protecting and defending the poor and the Temple. This angers both the Roman and Jewish authorities.
This is also a very radical and explicit prophesy. Those present want a sign from Jesus to explain what he was done. Jesus says in reply; ‘Destroy this Temple and in three days, I will raise it up.’ As Jesus cleanses the Temple, he also reclaims it for its original sacred purpose; the worship of God. We know now the Jesus was not talking literally about the Temple, but of his own resurrection. As the gospel says, ‘he was speaking about the sanctuary that was his body.’ Jesus will be the new the temple and sanctuary through whom people will encounter and experience God.
In the Temple, Jesus not only upsets the tables, he upsets and disturbs the people who were there. He challenges their idea of who and what the Messiah of God is. The message he brings is challenging and radical. Does Jesus and the gospel challenge or disturb us today? It is worth remembering that the word of God Mary heard disturbed her and she wondered what the message meant. The events of Holy Week will challenge and even disturb us today; if we let them. When Jesus washed his friend’s feet, they too wondered what this gesture meant. The pain and apparent tragedy of Good Friday challenges not only our image of Jesus, but perhaps also of God. There is always that danger that we make Jesus and God in our own image. Through the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus we are asked to broaden our vision and open our hearts to experience a Jesus who will do and say things ‘which no eye has seen and no ear has heard, what the mind cannot perceive; all that God has prepared for those who love him.’(1. Cor. 2.9).
As we take another step on our Lenten journey, may we open our hearts and daily lives to the radical message that Jesus brings offers us – which may challenge and disturb us.
– Br Michael Moore OMI
Destroy this sanctuary and in three days I will raise it upJust before the Jewish Passover Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and in the Temple he found people selling cattle and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting at their counters there. Making a whip out of some cord, he drove them all out of the Temple, cattle and sheep as well, scattered the money-changers’ coins, knocked their tables over and said to the pigeon-sellers, ‘Take all this out of here and stop turning my Father’s house into a market.’ Then his disciples remembered the words of scripture: Zeal for your house will devour me. The Jews intervened and said, ‘What sign can you show us to justify what you have done?’ Jesus answered, ‘Destroy this sanctuary, and in three days I will raise it up.’ The Jews replied, ‘It has taken forty-six years to build this sanctuary: are you going to raise it up in three days?’ But he was speaking of the sanctuary that was his body, and when Jesus rose from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the scripture and the words he had said.
During his stay in Jerusalem for the Passover many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he gave, but Jesus knew them all and did not trust himself to them; he never needed evidence about any man; he could tell what a man had in him.
|
|---|
Each day, we email out a short video for the day based on a piece of scripture from the day’s mass.
Our community also streams daily mass and rosary. Sign up to our email list to stay connected.
Each Sunday, we send the Sunday Gospel Reflection direct to your email inbox.
During the season of Lent, the Partners in Mission team send out a thought for the day, reflecting on a line of scripture, an image and an action point for each day during these seasons to help us in our daily lives.
Sign up here:
