Zealous For His House

[Intermediate Teaching]

Take your Bibles tonight please and go to the gospel of John. I have a very simple little message for you tonight that I think will bless you. As I think most of the messages are simple that are taught from the greatness of the Word from this location.

There’s a record in the gospel of John that changed many things in my life and I thought tonight I’d share that with you. Again, my background, my life is just like a lot of people’s, like yours, you can’t go beyond what you’re taught. And we have pictures in our minds, things we have seen that have been pictured to us. We had a major discussion this week, this past week. It centered around the symbol of the Holy Spirit because we just finished Pentecost and I have been teaching this for years and I thought everybody understood it. And then Mrs. Wierwille came to see me for breakfast one morning and we got to talking about it and she didn’t understand it. And I thought, oh my God, I live with that woman, you know, and I’d teach in every class, you know, how in Acts 2, there are tongues as of fire and it sat upon each one of them.

And then when we got to talking about it, she had just never seen the greatness of the tongues of fire. And I got to thinking, well my goodness, we’re so conditioned by pictures. You see, every time you see Pentecost, is the flame going up? But in the Word of God, it’s the flame coming down. That fire, like as of fire, it says in Acts, sat upon each of them, right? How many each were there? Twelve, so it’s a splitting. It’s a cloven tongue like as a fire. It came down this way (top, down), didn’t go up that way (bottom to top). It came down this way, and it split out into 12: 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12. All the front row. There it is coming down splitting out, cloven tongues like as a fire. That’s Pentecost.

And of course when you tie this all back together with the greatness of the Word, you go back in the Old Testament where, oh my goodness, you know. God covered Israel with a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by what? Night. Okay. And that pillar of fire, Moses saw the day of Christ as the rock.

And yet this all ties together even back with the days of Jacob when Jacob got his name changed. The morning afterwards he set up a pillar, it says. The word pillar is rock. It isn’t a pillar like us in America have - southern colonial houses that have pillars on the outside. But this is a pillar, he set it up. He poured oil on it and so forth it says, I think it’s Genesis. Well, Jesus Christ is the rock, Moses saw his day. He believed in that rock. And when the children of Israel I think crossed the Red Sea, that they sang about tonight, they set up a place of worship with 12 stones, I think it was. Well, the cloud by day is the covering. The pillar of fire was the light of God, the warmth, the heat of God, the light of God and on the day of Pentecost when they were born again, the thing that happened was the cloven tongues was their clue that when it would be completely available, then they would see this and it, the cloven tongues like as of fire, sat upon each one of them, all 12 and it’s this way (pointing up) down. It’s God coming to man meeting man’s needs. So that record of course in Acts changed a lot of my life. But the one in John did also because the pictures I had always seen, and they’re still available today, is that when Jesus Christ came into the Temple, there were these moneychangers and everybody else there. So Jesus Christ made himself a whip with thongs at the end of it and the pictures shows Jesus Christ driving the men out of the temple by laying the whip on them. And of course those who are highly in favor of Christian’s killing everybody else who do not agree with them. They like that story because it gives you the privilege to beat up on everybody. And that took me many years to get out of my mind because I hadn’t seen the greatness of the Word in the college or seminaries. Because only after I got into the Word and worked the Word that again I saw these great truths that changed the picture in my mind. And it’s that or those truths that I want to share with you tonight from John chapter two, verse 13.

And the Jews passover was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And found in the temple those that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting: -- John 2: 13, 14

And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, And that’s usually where the pictures stops. That is what they show driving them all, the people and then the oxen and everything else running ahead of them. But it’s the people they laid the whip on. And the people move out, then the oxen move out ahead of them. But the word and following temple is in the same verse and it must be read - the word is both, b o t h instead of and. Drove them all out of the temple, both the sheep and the what? The animals and he drove the animals, sheep, and oxen out of the temple and (this AND is absolutely accurate here) and poured out the changers’ money and overthrew the tables.

And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and [both] the sheep and the oxen; and poured out the changers’ money, and overthrew the tables; -- John 2: 15

And said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence; make not my Father’s house an house of merchandise. – John 2: 16

Now look at it very carefully. It’s real simple.

He drove them all out of the temple. Okay. What? Both the sheep and the oxen. Sheep and oxen who do not understand reason. You can’t, you know, say to the old sheep, now look sheepy. Let’s talk about this a little old oxy. Whatcha doing in here? They don’t understand that. So on the sheep and the oxen, that’s what he would use the cord, the whip on. The inanimate objects. The changers’ money, overthrew the what? Tables. The tables, you know, you can use a whip on a table all day. That won’t move it out of the door. So what did he do with the inanimate objects? He flipped them over. He overthrew the what? Tables. Then comes verse 16. And said unto them, said unto them that sold, said to those who sold, those human beings that you can reason with, you can talk to. To those he said, he didn’t whip them, he said to them. Take these things hence, make not my father’s house an house of merchandise.

And there is that very difficult section made very simple. On the animals that can’t understand reason, he used the whip. That’s why he made the whip of the cords that he drove those both the sheep and the oxen out of the what? Temple. He drove those out with the whip. But the tables that the moneychangers were using badly and shouldn’t of been doing, he took the tables and he did what with the tables? Overthrew them. But to the people, the men that were doing it, to those he said. He didn’t whip them. He said, he said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence and make not my father’s house an house of what? Merchandise. There you have it all put together and it’s real simple. And you get a new picture in your mind, which is the accurate one. Driving the sheep and the oxen out, overthrowing the tables, but saying to the people, let’s get out of here. This isn’t right on, let’s move it. They’ve even taken this Scripture erroneously in some groups and they don’t even have an abundant sharing or an offering in a meeting. Because they think this is God’s house or something, and he would overthrow them and whip them or something, so they just don’t even take any offering. They handle no money within the church building itself, so to speak. But that’s all due to wrong teaching and wrong dividing of the Word. Then verse 17 is uniquely interesting.

And his disciples remembered that it was written, The seal of thine house hath eaten me up. -- John 2: 17

This is a quotation from Psalm 69 and I ‘d just like you to look at Psalm 69. Psalm 69: 9

For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up; and the reproaches of them that reproached thee are fallen upon me, -- Psalm 69: 9

This is a quotation in John from the book of Psalms. The accurate literal translation according to usage from the Aramaic that I have worked out to the best of my ability is as follows: “My zeal made me courageous to defend your house.” That is accurate. His disciples remembered that it was written, my zeal made me courageous to defend your house. If you will put that translation into the Psalm in 69, verse 9.

For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up; made me courageous to defend your house. My zeal made me courageous to defend your house and the reproach of them that reproached thee are fallen upon me. The following is a literal translation according to usage: -- Psalm 69: 9

Then it will fit like a hand in a glove in the United States. The zeal made me very courageous or made me courageous to defend your house. The disciples remembered that. Jesus Christ coming back into the temple. He was very courageous. Courageous to defend the house, the temple. You and I certainly could not do less regarding God’s Word today. And that is that our zeal should defend, be very courageous about defending, holding forth the greatness of God’s Word. The temple, at the time of Jesus was there with the fulfilling of the law. And Jesus Christ coming into that temple seeing how devilish they were using it, how just contrary to God’s Will they were utilizing it. He drove the sheep and the oxen out, overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and he said to the men get out of here. This is my Father’s house. Don’t make it a den of thieves.

What they were doing was they were cheating. They were selling second-rate animals at first rate prices. They were selling animals that were maimed at high prices. And God had demanded that the animals that would be sacrificed, for instance, had to be male lambs of the first year and without any imperfection in it. But they were selling older lambs, sheep, and they were imperfect. They couldn’t get the top dollar for them on the market, but they could get the top dollar out of the people and therefore they were selling them. And again, it’s an Oriental custom. In the Bible lands, whenever there was a man who was looked upon as a man of God or representing God, no matter what he said, people carried it out. So if they brought the bad animals, sell it for top price, the people wouldn’t say anything. They should have. Jesus Christ came in and he said something. And he was very courageous, very courageous, to defend God’s house. In the book of Nehemiah, there is a prophecy by a prophet who wasn’t really a prophet. He was a prophet but for the wrong side. And Nehemiah had to take a stand against him. And Nehemiah said his prophecy was erroneous. And the people so loved the prophecy of that erroneous prophet, or the prophet that was giving the erroneous prophecy, they loved that prophecy so much that they all got together and said, let’s kill Nehemiah. Nehemiah was very courageous to defend the truth that God had showed him. So Jesus Christ was very courageous to defend the house, the Temple.

That, my people, ties together John 2 along with Psalm 69 and records like you will find regarding men of God like in Nehemiah, chapter 28 and following. So when you put these truths all altogether, you see that our Lord and Savior took a real stand. Any man of God, any man of God, any woman of God today, who really loves God. You’ve got to take a stand in our country, in our day and in our time. And I’m real grateful and thankful that God allows us to do this. But that’s the way this Word works itself from the text and then you have no contradiction any place and it just fits like a hand in a glove.

Well, that’s what I wanted to teach. That’s it. [Ended with prayer]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~