MY FATHER'S HOUSE

     Jesus was a good man.  Jesus was a kind man.  Jesus was loving and gentle, caring and sharing.  He healed sick people, healed diseases, gave sight to the blind, and even raised the dead.  He also sat down in the homes of sinners, which the religious crowd would not do, for because of all their self-righteous piety, they believed they would get contaminated if they hung out with sinners.  Yet, Christ, who is sinless, did not get contaminated by the people.  But because Jesus was always cool and calm, He did not allow all the discomforts and attitudes of people to change the way He was.
    There came a day, however, when something happened:  when people saw a side of Jesus that they had never seen before.  That was the day He walked in the temple of God and Jesus, as we say today, lost His cool.  This was the only time in all of the ministry of Christ that He displayed anger, for the Lord was not happy.  For in that day and at that time, people had lost any and all respect for the temple of God.
    Jesus stood up!  He grabbed a cord, He flipped over tables, and He chased all of the people out of the temple, and said unto them,
     Is it not written, My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den of thieves.
    The people had regressed so far from God that they had turned the temple of God into a business enterprise.  The money changers were making money, hand over fist.  The people had moved Wall Street and Main Street into the temple of Almighty God.  And Jesus was furious!
    If Christ considers His Father's house as a house of prayer, should that be important to churches today?  If prayer is the most important part of our communion with God, why has prayer become so unimportant? 
    If you think about it, people of churches have gotten to be so good at conducting church services and orders of worship, we can actually do it by ourselves and without God's help, true?  We can take up tithes and offerings, pray a little bit, sing a little bit, preach or teach a little bit, and say Amen and run along home.   We write the programs, we follow the programs, we know our lines to speak, when to bow, when to sing, and then we're done.  We can mumble prayers from memory, or, read one.  In total, then, we have our churches doing exactly what we want done.
    Prayer, however, is the most important part of our individual lives, and prayer should also be the most important part of worship at church.  Thus we can say that the music and singing are important, but they are not as important as prayer.  Preaching and teaching are important, but these are not as important as prayer.  For God also wants to be in our singing and music as He also wants to be included in the sermons and teachings. But if we keep God out, then we are operating independently.
    Have churches also become business enterprises?  Do we have yard sales, bake sales, clothing sales in churches or on church properties?  Has the selling of books and DVDs become greater than people knowing Christ?  Are churches taking the Lord's money and putting it in banks, stock market and real estate investment opportunities?  Why are churches hoarding the money when there are so many needy people throughout the world:  widows, orphans, homeless, and children starving to death for lack of food, lack of adequate clothing, and lack of medical attention.  This is greed and selfishness, which are fruits of pride.  Thus, many churches today are very proud.
    We are living in a time of imminent danger, and unless we see the truth of the teaching of Christ in the temple and return to prayer in churches, what hope have we?  For if Christ is not first, who is?