As I closed yesterday’s blog, I mentioned that today was going to be a big day for Jesus. When I wrote that, I did not mean in the sense that many things were going to happen on this day. I meant it in such a way that the couple of things that were going to happen were both going to be critically important. As a preacher, I have often described this week as a type of “funnel” that led Jesus inevitably to His death. It would seem the events before His arrival in Jerusalem, namely His raising of Lazarus from the dead and Mary’s anointing Him with oil for His burial set things in motion. His arrival “yesterday,” loaded with Messianic references and kingly symbolism, only angered the chief priests even more. We might say that He was, “already in the crosshairs” of their anger and hatred. The events of this week will only raise the intensity of the hatred and malice of the enemies of Christ.

On this Monday, many years ago, two important things would take place in the life of Jesus. First, Jesus would curse the fig tree-a popular and important story in the stream of these events. Matthew and Mark provide the Scripture references of this event in Matt 21:18-19 and Mark 11:12-14. This would happen in the morning hour as Jesus made His way back to Jerusalem from Bethany, where He and His disciples had spent the night. Being hungry, Jesus spots a fig tree, but found only leaves on it and no fruit. As a result, Jesus pronounces a curse on the tree that no fruit would ever grow on the tree again. The surprising act is loaded with symbolism. The nation of Israel is often characterized as a fig tree in the OT (Jer 8:13; Hos 9:10, 16; Joel 1:7) and Jesus’ cursing of the fig tree symbolizes the judgement of God upon a nation that had the outward appearance of life (fruit) but had failed to bear real fruit. Her Judaism had corrupted and dried up. The religious leaders had led her astray. Her time was over. Judgment was about to fall. A new covenant was about to be made. Honestly, it took me years to fully understand how important this act was. Jesus spoke volumes with a small action and a tiny handful of words that pass sentence on the nation and prepare the way for the Kingdom He had come to establish.

Second, He would go into the Temple area and drive out the moneychangers and merchants-thus cleansing it. This event is recorded for us in Matt 21:12-13; Mark 11:15-18; and Luke 19:45-48. With everything still fresh on the minds of His actions from the day before, we can rest assured Jesus was watched “like a hawk” as He entered the Temple on Monday morning. With Messianic shouts rising into the air only the day before, what would David’s descendant do? Jesus would provide an answer rather quickly. Having seen everything the night before, He knows what’s there and what is going on. The Court of Gentiles has been taken over by those buying and selling sacrificial animals. A corrupt money-making scam was well established as good study shows. The Passover pilgrim had to pay the Temple tax with a Tyrian shekel and present unblemished animals for sacrifice. The profiteers were only too glad to help and oblige. Jesus, consumed with holy zeal and righteous indignation, overturned the tables and chairs of the moneychangers, threw out the merchants and customers alike, and refused entrance to any who were coming to conduct business. Quoting from the OT books of Isaiah and Jeremiah, Jesus cries out, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you make it a den of robbers.'” Recently, I preached through the book of Amos in the OT. Amos gave us first-hand look at how God felt about fake worship under the guise of making money and actions that had nothing to do with Him. Such is the case here. The Temple worship in the Holy City had lost what made her special. Buying and selling had become the norm…exploiting the poor, of course…as the rich became richer. Perhaps this helps you to understand Jesus’ anger a bit more.

Needless to say, this does not go over well. In doing this, Jesus is directly challenging the very ones who had been in power over the Temple for generations. The spiritual and political leadership that had profited from this system they called worship would not have been dared called out by the commoners of Jesus’ day. But Jesus was no commoner. The anger of the chief priests, scribes, and other leaders in authority would have seethed even more. Jesus was on their turf…making claims. If Jesus managed, on any level at all, to get the people riled up in a way that might garner the attention of Rome, no time would be wasted in bringing the commotion to a halt, forcing those in power to lose their positions of power and wealth. No one in Jewish or local Roman authority had any intentions of letting things get that far. The animosity was escalating by the minute. What they didn’t realize…and what we often fail to realize…this was Jesus’ plan. He knew exactly what He was doing. Cleansing the Temple only made things that were certain…even more so. To say they hated Jesus is not a strong enough word. They loathed Him. And things will only worsen from here. Jesus will not simply die…He MUST die. When the evening comes, Jesus and His followers return to Bethany once again. Tuesday will only bring more animosity, as we shall soon see.