Imagine Jesus played by Clint Eastwood in a spaghetti western, he comes riding into town and the bullets start to fly.
Except it isn’t a gun, it’s a home spun whip made of cords, and instead of bullets its yelling and the cracking of the whip, riding herd on a bunch of evil doers, starting a stampede.
Except it isn’t the Wild West, it is the Temple in Jerusalem.
What do we do with an angry Jesus?
Lots of people have found it very exciting, this angry Jesus, knocking over furniture, driving people and animals out, spilling money all over the floor, and that whip made out of cords. I imagine he got peoples attention. This isn’t Mr. Rogers, no more Jesus Mr. Nice Guy.
Some folks say this angry Jesus shows us that there is a proper place for anger, righteous indignation as it is usually called.
Others say it simply shows Jesus as human.
Others that it shows Jesus as reforming a corrupt religious institution taking too much profit from the pilgrims who visited the temple.
And then there are those that say Jesus was out to destroy the work of the Temple all together, establishing a new religious observance based not on temple sacrifice but rather on God being fully present in the world through the resurrected body of Jesus.
I don’t know which it is.
I see truth in all of these.
I don’t think there has to be just one thing going on here.
What was Jesus doing? What does John’s Gospel want us to understand about this show down at the Temple? This liturgical high noon at the OK corral between Jesus and the religious authorities of his day?
Ultimately it means that there is a new sheriff in town and that things have changed.
I’m pretty sure of that much.
But what gets me is how this story ends up talking about the resurrection of the temple of Jesus Body.
So in the midst of all this conflict and corruption and the angry Jesus we are reminded of the resurrection, and that catches my attention.
I keep looking for the raising up of the temple of Jesus body in all this, and that is ultimately what I walk away with, eyes looking for the resurrection in the midst of a sordid life and a chaotic world.
We are like those pilgrims making their journey to the Temple, the place where we find absolution and freedom from the tyranny of sin, the place that brings us together as a people, the place where we find meaning, the temple where we offer up our hearts, our longing, our lives to God.
The temple we journey toward is the temple of Jesus body, risen from the dead, the fullness of God born into our wild west world.
Where is the temple of the risen body of Jesus? How do we get there from here?
We can put aside the genre of the wild west story and pick up the genre of the mystery Novel, as we look for clues in the midst of mystery.
Perhaps that is where we should have started to begin with, Agatha Christie looking for evidence of Resurrection. Except it isn’t a murder mystery it is a love story.
So perhaps the genre of Romance is the better story medium.
No matter which way we look at the resurrection we are always drawn further in, invited to see it more and more, until all of life bears witness to the Risen Lord.
This is the story that we gather around as a people.
Our mission is to tell and live out this Gospel story of the risen one.
Our temple is his body, and our bodies it turns out have become his temple, where the resurrection story is opened up and the pages are turned and lived out anew.
What does it mean to be the Resurrection People?
I’m pretty sure it means more than being angry and starting a religious stampede, there is nothing particularly new or interesting in that.
I’m also sure it doesn’t mean hiding anger or ignoring injustice.
Maybe it has something to do with bringing life to all the dead and deadly places in the world and in our lives?
Maybe it is seeing and knowing the God who is alive and active in the world, revealed as fierce, relentless, determined to bring all things to their fullness, that all things rise up, that love be all and in all, the God won’t be stopped.
The resurrection, the inevitable force that is brining life to where we thought it could never be.
If we are determined to be dead, or to bring death, then we will be disappointed, we will be whipped and driven out of the temple of our twisted nature.
Jesus is that relentless love of God, causing a stampede, lassoing our hearts, and pulling us out of the grave.
However we tell the story Jesus always calls forth our love and adoration.
Lets ride that trail together.
Lets make Grace Church the watering hole where all may drink the waters of life and be refreshed. The resurrection of Jesus body, that is who we are about.