Tables

Let's talk about tables for a while.


I had a dream this night, and in it I saw tables. Tables being flipped over because they were standing where they should not stand, serving the wrong meal, and stabilizing the wrong ministry.


These are the tables in the temple that Jesus overturned when He entered Jerusalem (Matthew 21:12–13; Mark 11:15–17).


Matthew captures the transition of the story beautifully. Immediately after Jesus entered Jerusalem to the cries of "Hosanna!"—which means, "Save us!" or "Liberate us!"—He went straight to the temple.


Many of the Jews had misunderstood the prophecies concerning the Messiah. They had placed the military conqueror before the suffering Servant (Isaiah 53) and expected Him to overthrow the Roman government before the sun went down. To their astonishment, Jesus turned toward the temple instead of the tax office.


Perhaps they imagined He was going there to give the "tunaenda Kanaani" speech, rally His troops, and begin the revolution.


If that was their expectation, they were wrong. He instead walked into the temple and overturned their own tables. Not the tables of the Roman Gentiles, the tables of the Jews!



To many, He was a disgrace. Only His disciples remembered the words of the psalmist: "Zeal for your house will consume me." (Psalm 69:9; John 2:17)


Then I woke up.


Upon waking, what fascinated me even more was what I found in Scripture.


According to the NIV, the word "table(s)" appears only twice in this particular sense in the New Testament. The first tables are the ones Jesus overturned. The second are the tables the apostles refused to turn toward.


In Acts 6, when a dispute arose concerning the daily distribution of food, the apostles replied: "It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables.

Wow! The issue is not tables, but where we place them and the value we attach to them.


  • The tables in the temple had become a destruction to worship while the tables in the fellowship threatened to become a distraction from the ministry of the Word.
  • The tables in the temple existed to make money while the tables in the fellowship threatened to derail the men whom God had called to prayer and the ministry of the Word.


In both cases, the tables had come between God and His people. Instead of becoming a bridge, they had become a blockade.


Dear believers and fellow ministers.


Turn away from tables that block instead of build.

Turn over tables that make more money than men.

Turn toward the ministry of the Word and prayer before you turn toward the works of the flesh.


Remember what is written: "For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ... If anyone builds on this foundation... each one's work will become manifest, for the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire." (1 Corinthians 3:11–13)


The fire does not come to destroy people.

It comes to test what has been built.


Build on the sure foundation.

Build with the right materials.

Build what lasts.

Build the temple that God is building—not the kingdoms men are building with their own hands.


Thus says the Lord.

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