My life, my dominion

The above two are perhaps the most polar of opposites. we often hear of Jesus telling other to give up all and follow him, or to leave the world and to carry his cross.

And rightfully so, for the world presents to us many temptations that would drag us away from God.

However, there are ways to reconcile the two.

But first, we will examine why the two cannot be as one in man.

In Matt 21: 6-13 we see how Jesus enters Jereusalem as a triumphant king only to subsequently cause an upheaval in the temple and upsetting the very people who welcomed him.

In ver 13 Jesus explicitly states that "My house shall be a house of prayer"
HOwever, we see that the religious leaders have misused the temple and turned it into quite something else."a den of robbers"

Keep this in mind as we go into a little background.
In the 19th century up till the 20th, there was a surge in the belief in science as new theories were brought up. There was this pervading belief that science could solve all. However, as we progressed, humans realised that science did not hold or provide many of the answers to our questions. In fact they cause more problems than answer questions.
Therefore there was a surge in religious piety and more people sought all things religious and spiritual in nature. Not surprisingly, attendance in places of worship rose. people were longing to be part of the entire scheme of things rather than be apart from it. what they don't know is that they have a longing to be with God.

That's where the temple comes in. The temple is the only conduit, gateway, door to God for the Jews. It housed the holy of holies where God was said to reside. It was made in fact for teh discovery of God by the Jews when they went there for teaching and not to search for the world. The temple was designed for the Jews to come forward and to pray to God.
The religious leaders knew this and used it and turned the temple into some for of market place.

They knew that roman currency was not pure metal so that set up money changing counters for worshippers to buy gold as offering. They sold sacrificial animals, they sold doves to be set free. With all the ruckus, and the dishonest dealings, the temple had become a noisy place where people no longer could pray.

The people themselves started to treat the temple as a place of cleansing rather than a place to pray. They came, bought their salvation in the form of sacrifice or offering and then went off to do their deeds. They treated their relationship with God as a business transaction rather than what it was meant to be. In many cases they and we treat God as a crutch so that we can "cleanse" ourselves, feel good about ourselves and subsequently chase other "gods", just as the jews felt that te temple was simply there to cleanse them so that they oculd go about their business.

When jesus mentioned that he would tear downt the temple and build it up 3 days later he was talking about his body and about the temple as a whole. what he was saying was that the temple of old would be gone and a new radical way of approaching God would be presented to all. His deathe would eliminate all sacrifice as he would be the ultimate sacrifice. The church was now a symbolism of a relationship where God gave so much grace and all we had to do was be willing to accept it.

So as we can see, being spritually at one with God, usually means that we cannot be great in the world.

Yet how about all those who are successful in the world and are christian?
The key lies in their motive.

One can have both if one is singular in one's zeal for the Lord.
As mentioned above, Jesus' death presente a new way to approach teh Lord. By doing away with the sacrifice but paying the ultimate price himself, Jesus made his body both the temple and teh sacrifice.No other religion can claim that, for no other religion has it's founder sacrificing himself.

when jesus messed up the temple courts and drove out the merchants he spoke of a zeal that filled up. There we see that Jesus not only was great in the eyes of those who saw him, he was great in teh eyes of the Lord for when he saw that the debauchery in the church he had to do something about it. For that day in his life, he was known both as king and as a man with zeal for the Father.

if you truly accepted His gift, then you too could lead a life of direction where you would be rewarded justly.