YE SHALL … REVERENCE MY SANCTUARY

We might initially think that this is but one of a series of com­mandments in Leviticus 19 most of which seem to be unrelated to one another. However, examination of the context suggests that each commandment is an expansion of what is demanded of those who would ‘be holy’, v. 2. The command ‘reverence my sanctuary’ is linked in the first part of the verse to keeping the Sabbath, and both commandments relate to the service of God. Giving God His rightful place, and revering His sanctuary are seen as integral to holy living and, in light of the diverse scope of the chapter, ‘When the Lord’s day is kept holy, and a holy rever­ence for the Lord’s sanctuary lives in the heart, not only are many sins avoided, but social and domestic life is pervaded by the fear of God’, Keil and Delitzsch.

In Mark chapter 11 we have come to the final week in the life of the Lord Jesus prior to His crucifixion and we learn that dur­ing that last week the Lord entered the temple on three occasions, vv. 11,15 and 27. In verses 15-17 we see some very dif­ferent attitudes towards God’s house. In verse 15 there are those who ‘sold and bought’ and, since coins bearing the head of a for­eign potentate were not allowed to be used in such transactions, there were ‘moneychangers’ present, men whose only interest in the temple was personal profit and gain. In verse 16 there are others who used the temple merely as a convenience, a thor­oughfare, for ease of movement from one district of Jerusalem to another. In verse 17, in a quotation from Isaiah, the Lord reminds those present to whom the house belonged and that it was to be ‘of all nations the house of prayer’, Isa. 56. 7.

For Israel, God’s dwelling place was first the tabernacle, then the temple. In the New Testament the local assembly is pre­sented in that same character, ‘the temple of God’, 1 Cor. 3. 16; ‘the house of God’ 1 Tim. 3. 15, but what of our attitude and con­duct in relation to it? Is our attendance governed simply by thoughts of what we can get for ourselves, e.g. company, friend­ship? Is it no more than a practical convenience, void of spiritual exercise? Or, do we appreciate the sacred character and respon­sibilities of the assembly gatherings.