Dr. Bingham’s Lesson for February 26, 2012

Series in Mark

“Jesus comes to clean house, like a new Jehu” – Mark 11:11-21

Jonathan Edwards wrote a book where he argued that conversions are surprising. There is nothing we can do to bring about conversions; there is no methodology. The Holy Spirit must invade a persons life and change him from hating God and shunning God to finding God beautiful, to loving God, and believing that the cross brings salvation and forgiveness of sins. Conversions are surprising, and so is true worship because it requires the presence of the Spirit in our hearts. It requires conversion so that we can worship in truth and in Spirit.

Mark 11:11-17
The next day, on reaching the temple, Jesus drove out the money changers and those buying and selling.
As in the days of Jehu (2 Kings 9), worship had become corrupt.

Jesus quotes Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7:11.
Jeremiah 7:1-11
It’s so easy to appear spiritual when you are in the temple.
If you really are spiritual there are virtues that come with it. Only if you have the Holy Spirit living in you can you possibly be virtuous.

Isaiah 56:1-7
Even a eunuch who comes before the Lord God with a true heart is accepted into the temple. In Deuteronomy, eunuchs were banned from the temple.

Mark 11:20-21
In the morning, the disciples find the fig tree, that Jesus had cursed the day before for not bearing fruit, had dried up.
In Isaiah 56:3, God said, “Do not let the eunuch say, ‘Behold, I am a dry tree.'”

Those who belong in the temple are those whose heart has been converted by the Spirit of God, that has as its signs mercy, compassion, justice, righteousness, forgiveness, and acceptance.