Shoving

Jane Denniston October 22, 2026 0 0

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John 2: 13–17 (NIV-UK)

3 When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16 To those who sold doves he said, ‘Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!’ 17 His disciples remembered that it is written: ‘Zeal for your house will consume me.’

I wonder if you are familiar with an old poster of Jesus from the 70s portraying him in the same style as Che Guevara, the 1950s Argentinian revolutionary. The Che Jesus poster, like the original, was in red and black; the caption read ‘MEEK. MILD. AS IF.’ and invited us to come and meet the real Jesus.

Contrast that with a picture which often adorns the walls of church halls – a blonde, blue-eyed Jesus surrounded by children and lambs. ‘Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, look upon a little child.’

The two pictures could hardly be more different, but I do believe that the revolutionary Jesus is closer to the truth.

Our passage today certainly shows the revolutionary Jesus, but if we read the gospels with open eyes, we see that everything he did was revolutionary. He shoved over the tables in the temple, but he also (metaphorically speaking) shoved men out of the way to make room for women and shoved adults out of the way to make room for children. He shoved religious people out of the way to make room for tax-collectors and others who were beyond the pale of his society. He shoved the judgmental out of the way to make room for the penitent and he overturned accepted customs of his society to make room for the foreigner, the outcast, the forgotten, and the overlooked.

MEEK, MILD, AS IF!

Do we need to recapture the revolutionary spirit of Jesus in our world today?

Prayer:

Revolutionary God,

help us to shove against the wrongs in our society today.

Give our courage strength.

Give our compassion power.

Give our commitment resilience.

Give our care capacity.

Give our rage a voice.

Give our anger a platform.

Give our empathy a medium.

Give our concern an instrument.

Give our love wings. Amen.