January 28, 2007
Everyday Disciples_The Gospel of John Encouragement
Session
Cleaning
House
John 2:13-17
Introduction: The One Who Would Come to the
Malachi
prophesied to the remnant of
The book
of prophecy, which is a quick read, contains indictments against the spiritual
leaders, the priests, and the people for lame worship and lax living. Some of the problems they were having in
their relationship with God were: offering lame animals for sacrifice, offering
heartless praise to God, being selective in their teaching and their obedience,
wavering in faithfulness by marrying pagan women, failing to properly love
others, and they were not offering a full tithe to God. After revealing these problems, Malachi
prophesies about a time of judgment and cleansing. Among these words, we find the following:
"Behold, I send my
messenger and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek
will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you
delight, behold, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts.
But who can endure the
day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he
is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap.
He will sit as a refiner
and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them
like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the
Lord.
Then the offering of
Then I will draw near to
you for judgment. I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, against the
adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the
hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who
thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts"
(Malachi 3:1-5, ESV).
Notice again the statement, "And the Lord
whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple."
It's with
this background that we turn our attention to the second chapter of John's
gospel:
The Passover of the Jews
was at hand, and Jesus went up to
Malachi's prophecy was coming to pass.
Jesus
goes into the temple during one the highest feasts of
Isn't it
intriguing that for the Jews the celebration of the Passover had become
business as usual? It had ceased to be a
life-altering event. The original
Passover was the day when life had dramatically changed for a bunch of slaves;
freedom and deliverance had come. I'm
sure there was always some of hope of deliverance during Jesus' day. After all, the Romans were in control, and
most Jews longed for the day when the Romans would be driven out of their land
forever. The problem, however, was that
There's a
danger for us in this regard, too. The
religion of Jesus Christ is such that getting it isn't the end of our
responsibility to Him. We must maintain
it. The vim and vigor with which we
started this life of faith is ever in danger of being transformed into mindless
complacency. So we must be alert to this
danger, and make sure that we keep our houses clean. After
all, when Christ first came into our life, He cleaned us up, and now we must
allow Him to continue that work until the day we go to be with Him in heaven.
Indeed, there
is a great need to keep our houses—our lives—clean. The word that's translated "temple"
comes from a word meaning holy or consecrated.
Thus the temple is a "holy place," or a "consecrated
place," a sanctuary. Jesus' whole
point in coming, as John will continue to make clear in his gospel, was to make
sanctuaries of our lives. He wants us to
make us suitable for glorifying God.
In view of this, I wantus to ask ourselves two questions.
How's My Worship?
First,
how's my worship? Bruce Milne, in his
book on John, writes, "Modern-day worship which is irreverent,
superficial, distraction-filled, cold, lifeless, sloppy, self-indulgent,
hypocritical, ill-prepared or theologically inappropriate will likewise receive
[the Lord's] censure, as will worship which detracts from the honour (sic) and glory of the living God through a concern
for performance and self-display on the part of those leading it."[1] The Lord doesn't want heartless and lifeless
worship, and neither does He want worship that fails to meet the standards He
has set for it in His word.
In Malachi's day, when
the priests were offering lame animals as sacrifices, God said, "Oh that
there were one among you who would shut the doors,
that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you,
says the Lord of hosts, and I will not accept an offering from your hand"
(1:10). If you've merely vocalized the
songs, merely bowed your head and closed your eyes during the prayers, ate some
unleavened bread, drank some grape juice and threw something into the
collection plate, then you haven't done any better than if you'd simply stayed at
home and watched television. Worship
requires an investment of heart and mind.
Worship is humbly
emptying ourselves before the High and Holy God. It's about exalting Him, bowing down our hearts
and minds in reverent praise to Him, and bending the will to His. It's about resolving to deny ourselves in
order to live more completely for His glory.
If you've come for any other reason, then you've come in vain. When you've failed to prepare your heart and
mind for worship, then you've obviously decided that worship is simply business
as usual, perhaps one more thing to check off the list of Christian duties for
this week. Too many come in a mad rush in order to make it on time, or and some don’t rush
enough and consistently come in late. Some
come unprepared for the Bible class lesson.
Some are restless during the sermon, and others are getting some much
needed rest because they stayed up too late on Saturday night.
The
fact is that too many of us come with cluttered hearts and minds. Our time in worship is simply that, time that
passes by (ever so slowly!?). It’s not a
time that we’ve prepared for by reordering our hearts and minds with God’s Word,
accompanied by prayer. We haven’t been
confessing our sins to God—we haven’t even considered them—all week, and so
worship is one huge guilt trip that is sure to be taken again next week.
Frankly,
worship doesn’t really describe it for some.
When it’s nothing more than an item on a checklist or a guilt trip to be
dreaded, we never really get around to worshiping.
If any of these things describe you, then you
need to clean house.
How's Your Lifestyle?
Second, how's your lifestyle? One of the main problems in Malachi's day was
that the worship offered by the people was contradicted by their lives. They would utter praises—often heartless
praises—and offer meager tithes to the Lord, expressing some form of devotion
to Him, but then they would spend the rest of their time living for themselves,
which mainly meant building nicer houses and engaging in continual
pleasure. Can you say that you are
intentionally endeavoring to glorify God with your life? Do the words you utter in worship overflow
into actively living them daily?
Do you conscientiously endeavor to be faithful
to God? That is, are you continually
reminding yourself of what it means to be obedient to Him by diligently
studying His word? Are you seeking, with
a prayerful disposition, to implement those life-altering principles into your
daily life?
In not, then you need to clean house.
Conclusion:
It's Time to Clean House!
It's time for us to clean house so that we can
have a life that Jesus is able to inhabit.
Perhaps, we need to beg for Him to come in and drive out those things
that distort our purpose of being a holy place for God. Perhaps, we need to invite Jesus to reclaim
our lives for the rightful owner, God Almighty.
It's time to clean house!
Milne has written, "Jesus of all people
will not be misled by outward confessions of loyalty which do not involve true
repentance and heart commitment."[2] So, today, we are asking the question asked
by Elisha Hoffman in 1899, “Is Thy Heart Right with
God?”
Have thy affections been nailed to the cross?
Is thy heart right with God?
Dost thou count all things for Jesus but loss?
Is thy heart right with God?
Hast thou dominion o’er self and o’er sin?
Is thy heart right with God?
Over all evil without and within?
Is thy heart right with God?
Are all thy pow’rs under Jesus’ control?
Is thy heart right with God?
Does He each moment abide in thy soul?
Is thy heart right with God?
Refrain
Is thy heart right with God,
Washed in the crimson flood,
Cleansed and made holy, humble and lowly,
Right in the sight of God?
This is not simply a
song a question to non-Christians. After
all, “Hast thou dominon o’er self and o’er sin … Over
all evil without and within?”
It's time to clean house! If you
need to begin cleaning house, publicly, this evening we lovingly invite you to
come, as we stand together to sing.