The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1924-08-14
SUNDAY SCHOOL LESSON
Prepared especially for The Republi-
can by Rev. U. S. Wright. D. D.
SUNDAY, AUGUST II, 1924.
JESUS CLEANSES THE
TEMPLE

John 2:13-22.
My house shall be called a house of
prayer.-Matt. 21:13.
THE WORSHIPPER.
Jesus had ever been a worshipper
From the days when Mary had taught
his lips to frame petitions thru all the
years He had sought solitary places
for prayer, had formed the custom"
of being present in the synagogue on
its worship hours, had visited the tenn
pie on the great feast days. Worship
was the breath of life to Him. 1t
made its impression upon the disci-
pies until they pressed Him to tell
them the secret of it. The worship
muscles were hard with use and clam
Oring for vigorous action. Not fab
by like our own so that an hour is
too exhausting to be taken upon the
top of an hour of bible study, but so
fit that He could spend whole night
under the stars engaged in it before
choosing Of that group of disciples
upon whose work depended the sue
cess of His. And as Paul puts it:
HE loved His church" With all its
deficiencies, with its childishness, it
was beloved of our Lord and our
passion for the present Improvement
upon that which He attended should
be as keen as His own. For we have
more occasion than had He, for it is
lovers of Him cannot fail to feel that
it shrines the spirit of their Lord as
well as being the Fathers house 1t
was with every worship sense alert
that He walked its courts and listened
to its music and watched its rising
smoke and incense and found His soul
thrilled by the contacts with the SUR
itual world.
He had been going thru great ex-
periences in these last months that
had given Him an entirely new sense
Of position and power and had inten-
sified His love for the Jehovah of
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob into the
passion for Father, This Passover
was unlike any other that He had at
tended and He came to it with a feel
ing that was more intense He had
been here many times in those years
of Nazareth preparation and had al
ways been stirred by the hours spent
in it. But now He had set His face
toward a new adventure in the set
ting up of the Kingdom and felt
somewhat like the knight of old who
spent his vigil in the church before
embarking upon his mission. 1t was
the only occasion of the same kind
that could ever come in all His life,
and He with His sensitiveness could
not help feeling an unusual thrill of
soul. So He turned with perfect nat
uralness from the wedding JOY of
Cana to the worship hour of Jerusa-
lem, giving all of Himself to both
with the utter abandon that marked
all His actions.
THE REFORMER.
The surroundings smote His spirit
with sudden chill that had not been
His on earlier visits. Perhaps the
traffic had grown worse, but certainly
He had grown more sensitive. Mexico,
in Ralph Connors Doctor" was
gambler and saloon-keeper who en-
joyed his life until he took to read
ing a little New Testament and found
that somehow the Book and the occu-
patton would not agree to go comfor-
tably together. His new sensitive
ness left wreckage in its path. The
new life tossed the saloon and gamb-
ler's paraphernalia out of its path. 1t
was something of the same thing
that happened when Jesus who had
worshipped as Jew before but was
now a world Man with passion for
all men to be redeemed by Him that
swept the Jew entirely out of sight.
And it was this new Parsonage that
entered the Temple area. The beau
tiful building surrounded by the
Court of Priests and by the larger
Court of Israel, would first catch the
eye. All around these was the wall
with its warning, "Let no foreigner
pass this boundary. He who does so
will be the cause of his own quickly
ensuing DEATH" Paul may have had
this day in mind when he said this
wall of partition was broken down
in Christ. In the spacious Court of
the Gentiles, which was not regard
ed as sacred by the Jews, Jesus was
jostled by great throng of chatter
ing folk whose harsh cries mingled
with the frightened bleatings and low
ings from the stock, while His feet
were fouled by the Uttered pavement.
1t had all come about probably in an
honest effort to serve the visiting
worshippers who must have sacrifices
that had been pronounced perfect
and must change their coin into Tenn
pie sheckles for the holy treasury. SO