Turning the Tables

On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple courts and began driving out those who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. And as he taught them, he said, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it ‘a den of robbers.’ Mark 11:15-17

Just because Jesus is kind to those in need and heals the sick doesn't mean that he's incapable of feeling anger or rage. Plenty of times the scriptures record him as being angry, and here we see what real congruence looks like - when emotions, thoughts, and actions all match perfectly. This is what that kind of internal health looks like - throwing some tables around! 

This scene is the first thing Jesus did on Holy Week. After riding in to Jerusalem in great humility (on a donkey fit for a peasant instead of a stallion fit for a king), Jesus shows another side of himself. He is enraged by the religious industrial complex that grinds up people like they are numbers or cogs in a machine. He will not stand for it when we treat people that way... and that includes when we treat ourselves that way. 

How might Jesus be confronting you this Holy Week, inviting you to clean house, to make room for your true self? And are you willing to make room for people of 'all nations,' to make room for the broken and the needy - by radically welcoming them into your community, your church, your home and your life?