Then answered the Jews, and said unto him, What sign shewest thou unto us, seeing that thou doest these things? (19) Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. (20) Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days? (21) But he spake of the temple of his body. (22) When therefore he was risen from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this unto them: and they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.
It really should seem, by the conduct of those men, and their asking Christ to shew them some sign, for such an exercise of his authority; as if for the moment, they had been overawed, and more than half convinced, who Christ was. Had this not been the case, one should have expected to have seen them to a man reddened with anger, and seizing Jesus, to bring him to punishment. Whereas, they never attempted to oppose what the Lord did; neither to gainsay what the Lord said. Jesus called God his Father; and in confirmation purged the Temple, which they had profaned. To all which; the whole body of them made no resistance; but after a pause, they asked him for some further sign in proof of his mission.
Doth my Reader also wonder in beholding them thus panic struck? Surely not. He, I hope, can well explain the cause. Did not the countenance of the Lord Jesus, as well as his actions, manifest somewhat both of his Almighty Person, and Power? If the zeal of his Father's house had eaten him up; (as he himself expresses it;) did not his face bespeak it? Reader! think, I beseech you, if in the days of Christ's flesh such glory occasionally broke forth, as in this, instance, to the confusion of all his enemies; (See also John 18:6) and as in another, to the joy of his friends; (See Matthew 17:1-5.) what will be his appearance in that day, when the ungodly shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power; and when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe? 2 Thessalonians 1:9-10. Oh! the forbearance of our adorable Lord, when driving those buyers and sellers from the temple, that he drove them not into hell!
But I pray the Reader yet further to observe, the Lord's grace to his Church and people, in the sign he gave, to the demand of his foes. It is his redeemed, and not others, for whom this precious sign was meant; and to whom it ministers blessedness. When Jesus thus spake of the destruction of the temple, the Holy Ghost would not leave the Church to make her own comment upon it; but by the mouth of the Apostles, taught his redeemed, that Jesus spake of the temple of his body. So that when Jesus arose from the dead, which was at the distance of three years after this conversation the Lord held with the Jews, they called to mind what had then passed, and felt as we now feel under the divine conviction, the blessed testimony to the whole; they believed the scripture, and the word which he had spoken.
I must not suffer the Reader to overlook the greatness and compleatness of this sign; which, while it acted to those blind Jews as a stone of stumbling, and rock of offence; to the enlightened believer, it becomes a blessed testimony to that glorious Rock which Jehovah laid in Zion. They made this sign of Jesus the great charge of blasphemy against Christ, when arraigned before Pilate. Matthew 26:61. And, Reader! you and I, if taught of God, make it a most precious evidence of his eternal Power, and Godhead. Destroy this temple, (said the Lord), this temple of my body; and in three days I will raise it up! The former was done, when (as Peter under the Holy Ghost charged them) with wicked hands, Jesus was taken by them and crucified and slain. Acts 2:23. And Jesus accomplished the latter, when by his own Almighty Power, he arose from the dead. Observe the expression which Christ made use of, I will raise it up! And if you ask the cause? the Holy Ghost, by the mouth of Peter answers; having loosed (said he) the pains of death, because it was not possible that He should be holden of it. Acts 2:24. But it would not only have been possible, but certain and sure, that the pains of death, which are the wages of sin, would have held any man and every man a prisoner, which died for sin; had not the divine nature of Christ, been in this solemn transaction. But in the Person of Christ, God and Man in One, it became impossible. The Prophets which foretold his death, foretold at the same time, that his soul should not be left in hell; neither God's holy one to see corruption. Psalms 16:10. Hence, as the Holy Ghost by Peter, in another scripture, hath said; Christ was put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit. 1 Peter 3:18. Reader! what are now your apprehensions of this blessed sign?