Betty Owens Geary, 34-year member of St. Luke’s and the Gene Decker Study Class, married to Bob Geary
Matthew 21:12-13 (NRSV)

12 Then Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who were selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. 13 He said to them, “It is written,

‘My house shall be called a house of prayer’;
    but you are making it a den of robbers.”

Reflection:

One of my favorite authors is J.D. Salinger.  Like most of my generation, I read The Catcher in the Rye in high school, but I didn’t really fall in love with Salinger’s writing until college, when a friend lent me a copy of Franny and Zooey. I was profoundly influenced by it, and I soon read everything else I could find by Salinger. Salinger’s work, and especially Franny and Zooey, has had a powerful impact on my theology. I have reread the book many times.

Franny has come home from college. She’s having a crisis of faith and is basically falling apart.  Her brother Zooey is talking to her, trying somewhat clumsily—if not brutally—to help her through it. During their conversation, he reminds Franny how upset she became when she read this passage as a young girl. She had banged into his room, claiming she didn’t like Jesus anymore; she didn’t approve of him going into the synagogue and throwing all the tables and idols all over the place. That was very rude, and she was sure Solomon or Saint Francis wouldn’t have done that. After recounting the story, Zooey tells Franny that if we are to truly love Jesus, we must love him as he is and not as we want him to be.

Many of us—maybe most of us—are guilty at times of forming Jesus in our own image, making him into someone we are more comfortable worshipping. Maybe like Franny we need Jesus to be “nicer”—not someone who throws furniture around and drives people out of the temple. Or maybe we need Jesus to be someone who affirms our view of the world, who approves and disapproves of the same people and things we do.   

Sometimes we read a passage in the Bible that shakes up our view of Jesus; shows us a side of him that might make us uneasy. The Son of God throwing people out of the temple? Overturning tables and benches? The Savior dining with tax collectors or other “undesirables”?    

If we are to follow Christ and worship him, we must acknowledge all of him, even—perhaps especially—the parts that might make us squirm. It’s that squirming that should make us examine our own notions of what the Gospel requires of us and open ourselves to the truth of Jesus. 

Prayer:

Dear Lord and Savior, show me who you really are and what you really require of me.  Teach me your ways, guide me to follow your path, even—and especially—when that path goes in directions I don’t expect or want.  Help me remember that you are Lord of all.  Amen.