THE HEART OF CHRIST PASSIONATELY OPPOSES SIN

MARK 11:15-19

We are in this study about the heart of God.

The goal of this study:

I believe this is going to help up experience His presence more richly and see who we are in Christ more truly. I believe it is going to cause us to move to obedience to His calls on our lives. I believe that it is the first step to restoring the proper fear of the Lord in our lives.

We talked about how the heart in scripture rarely meant physical heart but talking

the physical heart.

The New Bible Dictionary, Third Edition Heart

It was essentially the whole man, with all his attributes, physical, intellectual and psychological, of which the Hebrew thought and spoke, and the heart was conceived of as the governing centre for all of these. It is the heart which makes a man, or a beast, what he is, and governs all his actions (Pr. 4:23). Character, personality, will, mind are modern terms which all reflect something of the meaning of ‘heart’ in its biblical usage.

One of my favorite commentaries said, “Its the motivation center from which decisions are made.”

So, as we are leading up towards Easter, we are specifically looking deeper into the heart of Christ. What motivated Him while He was on this Earth. Why He did the things that He did. Why He said what He said. We can see the heart of Christ through His actions and the way He treated people.

Last week we talked about the compassion of Christ towards sinners and those who suffer and are afflicted.

This week, we are looking at that heart of Christ passionately opposes sin.

Read Mark 11:15-19

Mark 11:15–19 ESV

And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. And he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. And he was teaching them and saying to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.” And the chief priests and the scribes heard it and were seeking a way to destroy him, for they feared him, because all the crowd was astonished at his teaching. And when evening came they went out of the city.

There are 3 things that I want us to look at and consider from this passage.

THE TEMPLE

Jesus comes into Jerusalem during the passion week, the week of His crucifixion. The week looking towards the cross and resurrection from the dead. Its almost like if you knew you only had a week left what would you do. Things that are very important to you. Jesus chose to visit and cleanse the temple.

The temple. The place where the presence of God resided. The place where heaven met earth. The place where God was worshipped. The place where the Lord received the offerings for the forgiveness of sin. The very special place where once a year, one man was allowed to enter into the presence of the Holy God. This was a holy and special place.

Jesus calls it in this passage, a house of prayer for all the nations.

This was meant to be a place where mankind communed with God. A place where man and God met and communicated. It was meant to be accessible to the nations. It was meant to be a place where all men, of all income levels, of all social statuses could come and met God, have their sins forgiven and pray to the Lord.

But men had gotten in the way of that… and turned it into...

DEN OF ROBBERS

The problem that Jesus saw was that mankind had created barriers or extra hoops to jump through for people to come to God’s presence.

They saw that there was a need to help people and they were charging crazy amounts and charging fees to do things that people needed to come to go.

They were creating barriers and hindering people from coming to God.

Jesus addresses three people here.

The money changers were people that exchanged money. The currency of the day was Roman denarius. But the temple required Jewish coins to used to offer tithes and offerings. So, these men would exchange from Roman to Hebrew currency and would charge a “service fee” to do it.

I read a news story the other day were a certain company was selling tickets to The Cure’s concerts and they were specifically making the tickets $20 for their fans. But this company that sells tickets were charging fees that cost more than the $20 ticket! And people are ticked!

Because we all know its wrong to charge a crazy service fee for something as simple as exchanging currency from one to the other. And they were costing the poor more money than necessary to come and tithe to God.

Jesus also addressed those who sell animals.

They as well knew that the people would need the animals to make sacrifices to the Lord for the forgiveness of sin. They need that they needed that and they new that some people had no other choice than to buy it from them. They had the corner of the market and they charged whatever they wanted and people paid whatever they charged because they needed to make a sacrifice to be right with God.

Its like a $6 bottle of water at a hockey game. I’m thirsty and you wouldn’t let me bring my own water in. So, I have to pay $6 for a bottle when I could buy a case for $6.

Its unfair and those who sold the animals were taking advantage of those who just wanted to be obedient to God for the forgiveness of their sins.

The third was He would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple.

I have never looked into this before this week. And what He did was, there was a portion of the temple that was used for this selling and exchanging was a cut through or short cut for those trying to get across the city. So, the temple was crazy and crowded by a lot of people that were there for the wrong reason. That wasn’t there for the right reason. That were there for the self reason to get to where they wanted to go and they were using the temple to serve themselves.

Jesus shut all of that down.

THE HEART OF CHRIST DRIVES OUT HINDRANCES TO GOD’S PRESENCE

Jesus mission, His life purpose on earth was to save man from the hindrances to the presence of God, our Father.

John 3:16–17 ESV

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

John 14:6–7 ESV

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

Jesus came to this earth to knock down, remove and defeat the thing that gets in the way for man coming to the Father sin.

And His heart is passionately opposed to sin. He came to defeat its power and remove any barrier for us to approach the throne of grace with confidence.

I don’t believe that Jesus was angry at them or trying to hurt anyone.

But I believe that Jesus’ love and heart for those sinners and suffers that were trying to come to God for prayer, forgiveness of sin, and worship, I believe that He saw their desire to come to the Father and people were standing in the way of that and He drove away all barriers. All hindrances. All things that took advantage of those who just wanted to come to God.

I believe that Jesus’ love and heart for us was so strong that it required a strong response.

He was showing in this example what He was about to do on the cross for all mankind.

Because the heart of Jesus passionately opposes sin or anything that hinders man from coming into the presence of God.

And Jesus paved the way. Removed the barriers. Removed the sin that hinders man from worshipping the Father.

For those of you that do not know Christ. You have never accepted Him as your Lord and Savior. You have never accepted His grace and allowed Him to place His righteousness on you.

You need to know that Jesus came to save sinners. To remove the guilt of their sins. To remove all barriers for you to be able to come your Father in heaven, your Creator, your Author. He came so that nothing would stand in the way of you coming to God.

You can not be too far gone for Jesus. He wants to reconcile you to the Father.

O, I pray that you would. I pray that you would accept His grace and mercy and become a child of God. That you would see that His arms are open and welcoming to you. His presence is sweet. His presence is life.

Would you open yourself to Him today?

For those of you that are in Christ

1 Corinthians 6:19–20 ESV

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

We have been given access to Father. We can enter into His presence boldly because of the sacrifice of Jesus. Because of Jesus cleansing this temple.

But when we willing allow sin in our lives, we willingly allow hindrances and barriers between us and our Father. We keep Him at a distance by worship other gods other than Him.

We allow money changers of sin to come into our lives. Sin always has hidden fees and cost more than we thought. Though the eternal cost of sin has been paid, there is earthly consequences of sin that still must be paid. Jesus paid the debt for our sin. But relationships damaged by our sins will need to be restored. Those we hurt with our anger and mean words will need to be pursued and seeked for restoration. Crimes will still need to be paid for in court. The hidden fees of sin is that sin still hurts and hinders relationships on this earth and there is still cost here even when the eternal debt has been paid.

Just like those who sold animals, sin allows cost you more than you think it should. It always takes more that you think it should. Sin comes to steal from us life, joy, and peace. Sin can provide a temporary joy or pleasure but it always leaves us empty and hollow. Its not lasting like the fruit of the Spirit. And we must choose to walk by the Spirit and not by the flesh like Galatians chapter 5 tells us to.

And just like those just passing through the temple. Sin and selfish motives have stand in the way of us receiving the fullness of God. If we are using the temple of God, our bodies, to serve our needs and pursue the short-cuts in life, If we are not using our temples as places of worship, prayer and communion with God, we are hindering our ability to come into the presence of God.

Sin and selfish motives hinder our ability to come fully into His presence.

1 John 1:6 ESV

If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

And the heart of Jesus is passionately opposed to sin.

Not because He hates those who sins but because He strongly desires for us to be able to fully come into the presence of the Father. That’s why He came. He came to be the way to the Father.

As a parent, I try to imagine my reaction of I can see my kids but someone or something is stopping them from coming to me.

My mind goes to Nazi Germany when the soldiers were taking the kids away from their parents and the parents being willing fight anything that stands in the way of their children coming to them.

When we are living in willing and knowledgeable sin, we are allowing barriers in our lives. But Jesus wants to bulldoze them down. He doesn’t want to bulldoze you, but He passionate desires you to come to the Father. and He is willing to fight those things that stop you.

Two interesting points about this.

First, according to the gospels, Jesus did this same thing at the beginning of His ministry in John chapter 2 and at the end of His ministry, in Matthew, Mark and Luke.

This shows us that if we are not constantly fighting sin, confessing and repenting, sin will creep back in. Continue a life of confession and repentance.

The second thing is this. Jesus came the first time to defeat sin and death for us to allow us into the presence of the Father.

but 1 Corinthians 13:12

1 Corinthians 13:12 ESV

For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

One day when He comes back, He will eradicate sin from this earth. Coming wipe it out. Purify this world of sin and all of the effects of sin. And if you are in Christ, you are not going to be caught up in the purging. You will be caught up with Him in the sky and brought into eternal communion with the Father.

Jesus’ heart is passionately opposed to sin and one day, He will return to completely wipe it away.

Invite Ashley up to play keys

The challenge

I want us to have a time of prayer.

If you are here and you don’t know Jesus, like we talked about. If you are here and you feel like you have never come to Him for His grace and mercy. If you do not know Jesus, because that’s what Jesus said, depart from me, I did not know you. If you do not know Him, I want to introduce you to our Savior, the one who came to remove all of the barriers for you to come to your heavenly Father. to Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.

During this time, will you come and meet with me or one of our prayer partners? Will you open yourself to to meeting Jesus today?

Or during this time, you have felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit of some willing sin in your life that is causing a barrier in your walk with the Lord. Its causing you to be separate from the presence of God, because you are pursuing something other than Him first. The Holy Spirit had laid upon your heart His conviction not pushing you away from God but drawing you closer to Him. He is calling you to repent of the sin that drawing you away from Him.

Would you take this time and ask Jesus to turn over the tables of sin in your life? To drive out the hindrances and barriers for you coming into the presence of God?

Pray

Psalm 51:17 ESV

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

1 John 1:9 ESV

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Psalm 51:12 ESV

Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit.