Jesus has been causing havoc and mayhem in the temple courtyard, driving out the traders who provided the animals for sacrifice, as well as the money-changers who provided the special coins for the Temple treasury. And the Jews ask: What sign can you show us? Were not the overturned tables sign enough of his anger at all the noise and the clutter and the profiteering that was getting in the way of the temple’s primary role as a house of prayer. No doubt they were. But the question has a deeper significance than that.
What sign can you show us? Paul reminds us that the Jews demand signs, as the Greeks demand wisdom. Why? Because that is how they test the speaker’s authority. The ten commandments which we heard for our first reading are prefaced with a massive sign of the authority which underpins them: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. The God who had shown his power by calling down one plague after another on the Egyptians, until they were ready to set free their Israelite slaves and send them on their way, such a God had the authority to lay down the law and demand obedience.
So when the Jews ask Jesus for a sign, they are in fact asking for evidence of his authority, his authority for overturning not just the tables of the traders and the money-changers, but the very foundations of the temple, its worship and its religious leadership. They sensed all too well what Jesus’ actions implied. What sign can you give? And Jesus replies in terms which to them make no sense at all. They dismiss as laughable his cryptic statement that if they destroy this temple, he will raise up in three days what they have been building for 46 years. But they are blind to his true meaning. Jesus has only just embarked on his public ministry, but already, for those who have eyes to see it, the shadow of the cross falls fleetingly across the wrecked stalls and the sunlit stones of the temple precinct, like the shadow of a passing cloud.
As we move through the Sundays of Lent that shadow will loom ever larger in our own perceptions, until on Good Friday darkness briefly covers the whole earth. But to-day we can either dismiss it like the Jews as an incomprehensible mystery with which we don’t really have to engage, or we can take St Paul as our guide in seeking to explore what it means.
What sign can you show us? If the Jews in the temple courtyard had understood what Jesus meant, the cross, the sign of Christ’s death and resurrection to which John points his readers, would have carried no authority with them at all. On the contrary, the cross was a potent symbol of weakness, failure, defeat and shame. The Scriptures stated plainly that anyone hung on a tree was under God’s curse (Deut 21.23). Clearly such a person could not lay claim to any authority whatsoever. Similarly, if the Greeks demanded wisdom as a sign of authority, they might have been impressed by much that Jesus had to say as a teacher, but they would have to conclude that his teaching must be fatally flawed if it could not save him from what is probably the most painful and humiliating form of execution ever devised. If that is the destiny to which the wisdom of Jesus leads, then it cannot be as wise as it might seem.
And what of us? What sign does our culture demand as evidence of authority. That is actually a very difficult question to answer. Who do we look up to? Whom do we trust? Is it the rich, or the powerful, or the famous? I don’t know. I think we’re fairly sceptical about all of them, and usually happy enough to see them taken down a peg or two. But we probably do defer most to those whom we perceive as being successful. We don’t pay the same attention to the views of those who seem to have failed by the measures of distinction that permeate our society. If it is the distinction that goes with success that we value as a society, then the cross of weakness and foolishness and failure is not the sign for us either. The people who display such characteristics don’t get very far in such TV shows as The Apprentice or The Weakest Link.
We may have domesticated the cross by bringing it into church, insulating it from the violence and shame and humiliation of the place of public execution. But it remains uncomfortable. It stands for a costly, sacrificial approach to life that we find deeply unsettling. It reminds us of the rich young ruler who wanted to follow Jesus, but was not prepared to pay the price. It is not that we necessarily have to jettison any of the gifts or the resources with which we may have been blessed. Jesus himself did not for one moment set aside the intimate relationship with God his Father which was his most precious asset, nor did he fail to make the best possible use of the gifts of healing and teaching that flowed from that relationship. But as Paul says elsewhere, in taking those gifts and using them to the full in the service of others, he humbled himself, he effaced himself, he refused to grasp at the power and authority which was his by right. When the final challenge came he chose to give his life as the ultimate pledge of his love rather than shrugging off his tormentors. That was the true victory. That was and is the true sign of his authority.
And that is the way to which we too are called in the power of his Spirit. We give thanks for the diversity of gifts which he has showered upon us all, and we do not need to be apologetic about putting them to the best possible use in the service of others and to the glory of God. Our Father delights to see us growing up into our full potential as his children. Where we part company with the culture and values of our society is not so much in the use to which we put our talents and our resources, as in whom we seek to serve – not ourselves but others – and in how we respond to the lofty or lowly status which the world attaches to us. Some of us may need to reassured that we can be of service to others through our love and our prayers without needing a job or much of an income, whilst others may need to remember that Jesus did not cling to the lofty status and authority that was his by right, but was prepared to give it all away if that was what love required in the service of others.
What sign can you show us? In these weeks of Lent, as we turn with Jesus towards Jerusalem, we look towards the cross that is the disturbing mark of his authority, and we pause to reflect on what that may mean for the conduct of our own lives.