Homily – Sunday, the 3rd March 2024, Third Sunday of Lent

Reading: John 2: 13-25

We are on the third Sunday of Lent and we meditate today on the cleansing of the temple! This incident is narrated in all the four gospels. Matthew 21:12-17; Mark 11:15-19, Luke 19:45-48 and John 2:13-25. I would want to draw your attention to three words in the passage today for our Lenten meditation and reflections.

The Overturning

Imagine our body is the temple of God- the abode where God lives. Imagine we are told a cleaning up would be a good idea so that God would more happily live in there. What would be those elements we would clean up in our lives.

The gospel lesson we read painted a vivid picture of the incident. The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!”.

What are the characteristics of the market place you find in the church today?

The watch word of the market is “Profit” and in simple terms it asks- what will we get out of it? They ask- Is it worth keeping the church going with a few people in the pews or close it down and put the property in real estate and earn your millions. In this age where you get an AI enabled robot to do the service why do you want a priest and care for them?

The market place is governed by performance. Perform or be fired. In this quest we find even worship services are becoming mere performances. It is no more about faith but about skills to attract the generation Z. Mission is no longer in the edges but prudently fishing is from the fishing net. They come to our church and invite our people to another church telling them “it is more attractive there”.

The market place- finances govern and not faith. We hear of exclusive membership privileges, manipulative fund raising through guilt tripping and co-ersion. We talk of growth matrices and look at every loop hole to earn a buck. See the animals for sacrifice. They would insist that they be blemish less, discard the animals people bring, buy them for a small price and sell the same animal for a higher price to another. They insisted on temple currency and money changes made money.

When life becomes too mechanical, when we cease to enjoy the beauty of the spring, when the smell of the flowers and the chirping of the birds fail to help us see the marvel of the Lord, when you become too busy that you do not even have time for yourself leave alone others.

Its time to allow Jesus to overturn the tables

When our priorities go wrong, when we become like the priest and the scribe who walked by despite seeing the man on the road of Jericho crying out for help.

Its time to allow Jesus to overturn the tables

When some of our habits become addictions, when we know in our inner self what we are doing is neither morally right or ethically good, when we are yet forced to keep doing what we really do not like doing.

Its time to allow Jesus to overturn the tables

When personal prayer times disappear from our lives and family prayer is no longer a daily routine in our homes

Its time to allow Jesus to overturn the tables

Yes

Jesus overturnes the tables.

The Zeal

When the disciples saw the enthusiasm with which Jesus engaged with the people who marred the image of the temple, they were reminded of the Psalmist David who said in Psalm 69:9- The zeal for your house consumes me.

What does the word Zeal mean. It is a great dedication or enthusiasm for a cause. It makes you willing, energized and motivated to actively engage. Zeal is used in the religious sense to mean devotion to God, to something that is identified with God’s presence or God’s mission. The zeal for the house of the Lord is a great and passionate attachment to where God’s presence is identified and in this particular case- the temple of Jerusalem.

Zeal is not about the string of activities we engage in. We came together for Men’s Breakfast yesterday, for the Word Day of prayer on Friday. We will go on today for the AGM after the service, tomorrow would be the excitements of the Alpha, Tuesday would be the joint Council, Wednesday would be Men’s prayer, the Lenten Bible Study led by Bishop Antonio, the Compline. Thursday some of us go to the CAECG in Berlin, the home groups would meet, prayer group would meet. Friday the Wise Ones would come together for tea, On Saturday the Young Adults with meet with the Home Group, On Sunday we will have combined service with Old Catholics, Nesting Sunday, Shared lunch. Zeal is not just about activities but the heart you give to the same. The ownership, the passion, the commitment, the purposefulness.

When we think of the great de-churching in the continent of Europe, the number of churches which are being declared unviable and the number of people leaving the church or turning their back at faith related matters- a pertinent question would be what is happening to the zeal for the house of God around us today or rather- in our lives today.

Churches across Europe are being abandoned or converted into entertainment venues as Christianity continues to decline on the continent. “That is painful. I will not hide it. there is no return to the past possible,” Monsignor Johan Bonny, the Bishop of Antwerp, Belgium, told The Associated Press in June last year. While on the other hand there are several people who think a great revival, a re-awakening would happen and people would come back to the pews. All we need would be a few people who have the zeal for the Lord, who has faith in the possibilities in God and who are willing to adapt the nature of the church to cater to the needs of the people.

It was John Wesley who said about Christian living thus Do all the good you can, in all the ways you can, to all the souls you can, in every place you can, at all the times you can, with all the zeal you can, as long as ever you can.

The Zeal of Christ is what we need today.

The Third Day

The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking of the temple of his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

Through the season of Lent we had been consistently looking at this phrase- the third day and its significance in our lives. The context of the incident is set on the preparation to Passover- where a miraculous new beginning was made possible to the ancestors. They refused to forget and here the great Passover is being prepared. The walking up to Jerusalem was already in the shadow of the cross. But the ebb point of the cross is not the end of the story, it is the beginning of a new story.

What ever be lives challenges we live through- always remember- the third day cannot be too far away.

In the darkness of the tomb or the numbness outside the tombstone remember the third day cannot be too far away.

In the agony of the way to the cross and in the excruciating pain of the cross remember the third day cannot be too far away

In the destruction of the temple- the body- do not lose hope remember the promise- In three days I will raise it up.

In retrospection after resurrection the disciples sees this incident and the conversation in new light, through new eyes. They believed the word that Jesus had spoken.

When there is the negative language that pulls you down all around us- all you need is the positive affirmation within you- the third day cannot be too far away.

What is that one word that we would carry home today?

Overturning?

Zeal?

The Third Day?

Vinod Victor

March 3, 2024