John 2:17 And his disciples remembered that it was written, The zeal of your house has eaten me up. I. ITS SPHERE. We cannot confine it to the temple or any other ecclesiastical structure. 1. The universe, in all the glory of its interminable spreadings, is the house of God. There is not a lonely spot which is not full of Deity. 2. And when we divide this universe into sections we know that there is some scene hououred above others with the Almighty's presence — where angels cluster, and where the Creator may be said more emphatically to dwell. 3. The whole company of the faithful upon earth constitute "the house of God" — builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit. 4. Nay, there is not a solitary individual, over whom the great change has passed, who is not tenanted by the High and Lofty One. II. CHRIST'S ZEAL WORKING IN THIS SPHERE. Zeal devoured the spirit of our Saviour, and in driving out the traffickers from the temple we can recognize the workings of the principle, but we cannot limit it to this. We gather from the expression — 1. That Jesus was consumed with a lofty desire to benefit the denizens of the universe. 2. Over the inhabitants of heaven Christ poured His amazing solicitudes. 3. An ardent longing to rescue this world from its degradation, and to build up its desecrated fragments into s temple of the living God, throbbed in the heart of Jesus of Nazareth. Confined, as it might have seemed, to a single race, its effect branched out into every quarter of the house of God, and orders of intelligence which needed not to be brought to the Saviour might have been confirmed and sustained by that which put man within the circles of acceptance. 4. Viewing God's house as including the believing remnants of Adam's descendants, we see Him entering on His course as the sun enters on his march in the firmament. His soul yearned over those who had destroyed themselves. He entered into the nature on which rested the awful curse; and when the race He had come to redeem rejected Him, the zeal of God's house kept Him fast on His pathway of pain. (H. Melvill.) Parallel Verses KJV: And his disciples remembered that it was written, The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up.WEB: His disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for your house will eat me up." |
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