Today's Gospel

Your Three Temples

Welcome back to Radical & Relevant, where each day we explore the genius of the gospel, looking for a word or a phrase or an idea that inspires us to live the gospel more deeply in our daily lives today. The gospel today is from the Gospel of Luke, Chapter 19, Verses 45 through 48. And Jesus entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold, saying to them, “It is written, my house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers.” And he was teaching daily in the temple. The chief priest and the scribes and the principal men of the people sought to destroy him. But they did not find anything they could use against him for all the people hung upon his words.

So today we see a briefer telling of the cleansing of the temple. Of Jesus coming in the temple and saying, "This isn't what the house of God is meant to be all about." And when we hear this reading, we naturally think about obviously the temple then, a synagogue, but also think about our own churches and God's temple. But these readings that we are so familiar with challenge us to think about them differently. To think about them in new ways; to think about them on new levels. And so today my challenge is to think, yes, about our church and our churches being houses of prayer, but also to think about our own homes. Are our homes homes of prayer? And finally, to think about our bodies. Jesus says our bodies a temple of the Holy Spirit. But are our body's temples of prayer? And if Jesus was cleansing our homes where we live, how would he be cleansing that? What would he be driving out of our homes where we live? And maybe we should do some of that driving out today. Have an amazing day. Remember, don't just be yourself; be the very best version of yourself. All that God created you to be.