41 And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, 42 saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. 43 For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side 44 and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”
45 And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold, 46 saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of robbers.”
47 And he was teaching daily in the temple. The chief priests and the scribes and the principal men of the people were seeking to destroy him, 48 but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were hanging on his words.
(ESV)
STOP! Think a little 🤔 What is God saying to you?
- What is the writer saying?
- How do I apply this to my life?
As Jesus saw Jerusalem, He wept over it. He had come to bring peace (Luke 1:68-71). But instead of welcoming Him as the Messiah, the nation had rejected Jesus. Now they faced a future where their enemies would surround them, barricade them in and destroy the city. This came to pass in the Jewish war of A.D 66-70. Instead of being saved, the nation was destroyed because they didn’t recognise that God had visited them. The nation’s salvation will now wait until the second coming of Christ.
When Jesus entered the temple, He cleansed it a second time (see John 2:13-22). He drove out the money changers who had distorted the temple from a place of prayer and worship to a place to make money. Sacrifices had been warped from the solemn experience of bringing an animal to die on your behalf to a mere financial transaction. This business was all done in the area of the temple set aside for devout Gentiles to pray which also ruined their witness to the rest of the world. They had chosen money over God.
Jesus went on to teach in the temple daily. The Jewish leaders disregarded His teaching and sought to destroy Him but they could do nothing because the people were hanging on His every word.
How would you describe your relationship to the Bible? Do you hang on its every word, or do you easily disregard some of it?
Major Stories of the Bible Reading Plan
Israel’s Apostasy: Jeremiah 2-3