1.18.26 – Sermon written and preached by Pastor Leigh Rachal at FPC Abbeville, LA

John tells this story with intention. 

It is early in his Gospel.

We had the great opening hymn telling us that Jesus is God and has been since before time began,

we were introduced briefly to John the Baptist,

Jesus performs his first sign of turning water into wine and then for his second act, he starts flipping tables…..

This story of Jesus standing up to the injustice happening within the temple comes much later in Matthew and Mark’s Gospel.

But let’s back up.

The Passover is near. 

Jerusalem is crowded. 

The Temple is full of sound and movement and bodies - all trying to do what faith requires of them. 

Pilgrims have traveled long distances. 

They have come to worship, 

to offer sacrifice,

to  draw near to God.

And into that sacred space, Jesus walks and does something no one expects.

He disrupts it.

Tables are overturned.

Coins scatter. 

Animals are driven out. 

This is NOT a gentle moment, and John does not try to make it one. 

But neither is it chaos for chaos’ sake. 

John presents this as a deliberate, embodied act, 

a prophetic interruption meant to reveal something deeper than what can be seen on the surface.

Jesus is always more than we expected. 

More generous than we imagined. 

More challenging than we would prefer. 

More disruptive of systems that no longer serve life.

To understand what Jesus is responding to, we need some context. 

The Temple was the center of Jewish religious life, 

and Passover was one of the great pilgrimage festivals. 

People came from all over the region, often from far away. 

Temple law required sacrifices to be made with animals that met certain standards, 

and the Temple tax had to be paid in a specific currency. 

That made money changers and animal sellers necessary. 

In theory, they were there to help worship happen.

So the action of these money changers doesn’t begin as corruption. 

It began as accommodation.

But over time, accommodation turned into exploitation. 

As people realized that power and profit was possible…

Exchange rates became exploitative. 

Prices went up beyond what the poor could afford. 

Until the outer courts, especially the Court of the Gentiles, 

became crowded with commerce, 

leaving little room for prayer for those already on the margins. 

Access to God was being sold.

Worship had become transactional.

Faith had become regulated.

Holiness had become managed.

In some ways, the money changers had already destroyed the Temple.

Not by tearing down stones, 

but by hollowing out its purpose. 

A building can remain standing long after its soul has been compromised. 

The rituals continued. 

The system functioned. 

But what the Temple was meant to embody:

welcome, mercy, access to God, 

was already slipping away.

Jesus steps into that space and refuses to let the exploitation stand.

John tells us that Jesus makes a whip of cords and drives all of them out of the Temple, with the sheep and the cattle. 

The details matter here. 

The whip is associated with moving animals, not beating people. 

None of the Gospel writers describe Jesus as injuring anyone in this act.

There is no bloodshed here, 

no call to arms, 

no attempt to seize or hold power for himself.

But he does act in ways that are forceful and decisive. 

He is confrontational. 

And he stops a system in motion.

But it is not violence – not just because he does not harm bodies.

We can be violent in ways that don’t harm bodies.

But not only does Jesus not harm bodies. 

He also does not dominate people or even seek to

He does not pass the risk downward to those unable to defend themselves. 

Instead, he very decisively places himself in danger, instead of those who were being exploted.

Already, this is more than we expected, or at least very different from what we (and the people of the time) might have expected from a Savior….

This is not a Jesus who preserves the peace at all costs, 

but a Jesus who refuses to let injustice hide behind the illusion of holiness. 

This is not a Jesus who takes power for himself and his kingdom

but one who exposes the false-ness of a kingdom built on exploitative power.

When those in authority demand to know by what right he does this, they ask for a sign.

They want Proof. Authorization. 

Something to justify such disruption.

Jesus gives them a strange answer. “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”

I imagine they hear that statement as completely absurd. 

Jibberish. Nonsense. Impossible bravado. 

Maybe even as a threat….

But John tells us, the readers, his secret - the part his disciples cannot yet understand. 

Jesus is speaking about his body.

This is the sign. The second sign of the Gospel.

Another way to see how God pours out God’s love for God’s people – refusing to allow people to be exploited or exploitative – knowing the harm that comes from both.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus’ signs are not about proving power or winning arguments. 

Signs point beyond themselves. 

They reveal who Jesus is and what God is doing, 

often in ways that only make sense later.

Jesus is not saying, “Look what I can tear down.”

He is saying, “Watch what God will raise up.”

The disruption in the Temple is not the end of the story. 

It is a sign pointing forward, 

toward the cross and toward resurrection. 

Toward a God who does not preserve life by force, 

but brings abundant life through his own acts of self-giving love.

The danger comes when people read this story and imagine themselves as Jesus,

wielding a force of power against others “for God,” 

rather than recognizing themselves as those whose own tables might need overturning.

Jesus’ disruption always moves toward mercy, toward access, toward life.

He overturns tables that are bringing economic harm.

He disrupts exploitation that are ruining the lives of both those being exploited and those doing the exploitation.

He clears space for prayer, not for domination.

And later, when violence does enters the story, 

it does not come from Jesus. 

It comes toward Jesus.

Everywhere in John’s Gospel, Jesus refuses violence, 

even when it could serve his cause. 

He rebukes the sword. 

He stands unarmed before empire. 

He absorbs harm rather than inflicting it. 

We have to be careful when we read this and focus on the flipping tables.

Because we cannot take up the whip and leave out the wounded body. 

We cannot take the disruption and discard the cross.

If an action moves toward fear, exploitation, domination, or harm to others,

John’s Gospel is clear:

That is not the way of Christ, 

no matter how much scripture is quoted along the way.

This weekend, as we remember the life and witness of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we see that Dr. King understood something Jesus embodied long before him. 

The ends and means cannot be separated.

Violence cannot produce the peace God promises. 

Force cannot build the beloved community. 

Justice cannot be born from tools that deny human dignity.

Here is where this text presses us, gently but firmly.

If this moment in the Temple is a sign,

then it is not necessarily asking us to repeat Jesus’ actions. 

It is asking us to recognize his way.

Jesus does not ask his disciples to follow him from synagogue to synagogue flipping tables. 

He is not training them in outrage or spectacle. 

He is showing them what God’s love poured out looks like in the real world:

It looks like disrupting injustice, 

Even or perhaps especially when the acts of disruption come at great personal cost. 

It looks like refusing to let God’s name be used to burden the vulnerable

or protect the powerful – or even ourselves. 

It looks like absorbing risk rather than passing it on.

From this moment on, Jesus becomes the focus of attention. 

The combined powers of religious authority and empire begin to close in on him. 

The risk shifts toward him. 

This sign places his own body in the path of what is coming.

And still, he does not turn away.

This is more than we expected…..

More courage than we anticipated.

More cost than we imagined.

More love than we thought possible.

To follow Jesus, then, is not just to reenact the disruption. 

It is to embody the love it reveals. 

It is to learn how to discern where injustice needs interrupting 

and to ask who will bear the cost when that happens. 

It is to choose presence over power, 

mercy over fear, 

trust over control.

If this sign teaches us anything, it is that God’s love does not avoid conflict, 

but it does not preserve itself by force. 

God’s love pours itself out for the sake of the world.

I think this is what the Psalmist meant by “Unless the Lord builds the house.”

When the Lord builds, what rises is not a fortress, 

but a people shaped by mercy. 

Not a system secured by fear, 

but a community formed by courage. 

Not a religion that must be defended, 

but a life that can be given away.

This way of Christ may feel slower. 

It may feel less impressive. 

And it may feel far more costly.

But it is the way that leads to abundant life.

And that, is more than we could have ever dreamed or expected. Amen.