Out Our Way:

Mark 11:15-19

Out our way, most congregations struggle to make their budgets not only because the congregations are small, but because a great many folks are on small, fixed incomes. Yet even so, it is always heartening to see how these struggling churches make sure a good portion of their budgets go to mission and ministry like the Food Bank, Salvation Army and the Soup Kitchen. Out our way, most Church folks figure the Gospel needs to be demonstrated with action as well as words. But sadly, it is not always so.

Years ago I attended a conference for pastors held at a retreat center owned by a famous TV evangelist. During my stay, I found a sidewalk that led from the retreat center to a reclamation pond. It was the "Million Dollar Sidewalk." You see, each slab of concrete on the side walk had been donated for a minimum donation of $5,000. The TV preacher also sold chips of marble that came off fancy statues he had put up in the garden nearby for donations of $1,000. Indeed, it turned out that some 49 percent of his weekly broadcast was spent asking people to support his ministry with generious gifts so that he could continue doing God's work. I don't know if any hungry people were fed or homeless folks given shelter, but I do know this TV preacher built a pretty nice sidewalk.

In the text from Mark's Gospel that Goliath chose for today is the account of Jesus becoming upset by the folks using the Temple of the Lord as a place of business, making a nice profit off the pious and faithful.

You see, the temple consisted of three primary areas:  The Court of Israel on the inside where only Jewish men could enter, the Court of Women behind it, where Jewish women and children could enter, and the Court of the Gentiles, which surrounded them both. Everyone was welcome to come to the Court of the Gentiles to worship the Lord.  

The High Priest and his cronies had set up shop there to make a few sheckles. People came to the Temple to offer sacrifices to the Lord, but each sacrifice had first to be inspected and approved by the priests. Strangely enough, animals and other sacrifices that had not been purchased at the priest's booths in the Court of the Gentiles were often found to be unacceptable. But any offering purchased from one of the booths owned by the High Priest and his crew was guaranteed to be acceptable to the Lord. Of course, you had to pay extra for that warranty.

But even better, you couldn't use regular money in the Temple. Only coins minted by the Temple establishment were acceptable, and of course, one had to pay a fee to exchange worldly coins for Temple ones. So the faithful ended up lining the pockets of the religious leaders who had turned religion into a profitable business. Jesus called them "robbers and thieves," for not only were the "ripping off" dedicated men and women who sought to worship God, but they also made the faith the laughing stock of the secular world. "Religious" and "sucker" were rapidly becoming synonymous in the pagan world.

So we ask ourselves, shall God's House of Prayer for all nations be known instead as a den of thieves? Do we tolerate our own versions of "money changers in the Temple?" 

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John Bruington and Goliath serve at First Presbyterian Church of Havre