For the Ones Who Are Angry

here, in the week of it all // Holy Week series, day two

Can we say it? Admit the anger that boils, the words rising within and, perhaps, streaming, screaming, pouring out:

This is not how it should be.

Holy Week has an undercurrent running beneath of prophecies being fulfilled and promises being kept. There’s a story beneath the story, more than meets the eye at first glance, in every single day this week holds. There’s also an interesting contrast between these days, parallels that I’ve only started to see in the last seven or so years—dozens more, I’m sure, that I’m missing.

Here’s just one from yesterday:

The church in the shape of a teardrop, the one built on the western slope of the Mount of Olives? Well, it’s about halfway between the Mount that is now covered in tombs, a silent sea of cream, and the Garden of Gethsemane. Walk the road over the Mount down toward Jerusalem and you’ll weave your way past Dominus Flevit, past the Garden of ancient olive trees, down and then back up the Kidron Valley to the Temple complex. Fast forward a few days and Jesus will leave the city, walk that Valley, and stop in the Garden. He could have kept going, could have run right past where He paused to cry, over the Mount, to the home of His dear friends Martha, Mary, and Lazarus in Bethany. It’s only two miles away, and just like yesterday—all those words about seeing and being seen—Jesus couldn’t have missed the line of torches against the dark of night, headed toward a Garden. He saw and He stayed, refusing to run down the road He willingly walked days before. He would walk it to the end, and it meant staying. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves and it’s only day two.

So what about today? The day when God curses a fig tree and suddenly I have a lot of questions. The day Jesus goes to the temple complex, the one that will soon be filled with thousands of Passover lamb sacrifices, the one that contains the Holy of Holies, that place with a veil that separates everyone but the High Priest from the presence of God (and he, only to enter one day each year). The veil that will soon be torn in two so all can enter in. But here we are again, jumping ahead.

It’s just that it all goes together, like an Author who sees us saw it all from the beginning of time.

Jesus goes to the temple, looks around, takes it all in and then — the Prince of Peace starts flipping tables.

It’s not a metaphor, it’s right there in the text. (See Matthew 21, Mark 11, Luke 19, John 2)

What is happening, I can’t help but ask. What am I to make of a God who curses and a Savior who seems to become so angry that He turns furniture upside down and makes a scene?

I think the text invites us to ask, I really do.

It wasn’t until a few years ago that I learned: Jesus would have entered the temple complex through a specific gate¹, the one for “commoners” and not the Pharisees/religious leaders. Once inside, you’re standing in the Temple Courts. Depending on who you are, you may be allowed to come closer.