Holy Sale or Wholesale: The Church and the Marketplace.

How much did your salvation cost you? Do you really believe you received it for free, as a Gift from God? What is a Gift anyways? According to the Webster Dictionary, Gift is: “Something voluntarily transferred by one person to another without compensation”. Did you ever hear a preacher on the radio or tv saying something like this: “If you send your gift of (10, 50, 100 bucks), we will send you a (cd, tape, book, etc.) as a “gift” from our ministry?” If you never heard that, you never listened to a radio preacher or a tv evangelist. Now think: You’re having a birthday party, you invite your friends and relatives, then, in the middle of the party, you call their attention and say: “Ok folks, give me some bucks to help me pay for the party’s cost”. Or, your friend gives you a beautiful gift, then, he (she) asks you: “Hey you, give me 50 bucks to help me pay for the cost of the gift I’m giving to you”. Of course your guests will be offended in the first example and you will be mad in the second. What friend will ever do such thing? Would you consider your friend’s “gift”, a gift? Would you? Of course not! Speaking about the preachers, I know they need money to pay for the costs of the ministry and If the person is being blessed by their preaching or teaching, that person should consider giving, offering, contributing to that ministry. I’m not saying here that I’m against the singer who is sells his music, a writer who sells his book, etc. But I’m trying to find a difference between the sale we have in the church today and the sale they had in the temple when Jesus Christ did the cleaning. Matthew 21:12 Then Jesus went into the temple of God and drove out all those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. Unfortunately, is extremely difficult to find any difference. I bet in Jesus' time, there were people with good intentions, “trying to help” the ones who came to the temple to offer their sacrifice, some of them probably thought they were doing a favor to the people. After all, wasn’t what God required from his people anyways? To offer those birds and animals as sacrifice for their sins? If so, why Jesus was so irrationally angry (that’s what they thought) to do something like that? (If you have the movie “The Gospel of John”, watch that part a couple times, it’s powerful) Because, just like today, the temple (church) lost its Identity, its Purpose. Matthew 21:13 And He said to them: It is written, My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves. From a house of prayer and worship, the church became everything but that! Of course, there are a few exceptions, but, we are making the Rule an Exception. With all of this, I’m just trying to stir up your spirit, trying to make you uncomfortable with the way things are in the church right now, to lead you to review some “forgotten” truths, like the one Jesus commanded in Matthew 10:8 Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. Why are we selling things that God gave us for free (gifts)? Have you ever thought that Paul, the Apostle could hire a bunch of scribes and start a publishing business, writing the Revelations he was receiving from God and selling it? If he did that, he would probably have written the first “best seller” ever and would make a lot of money. Why he didn’t do it? Because he was faithful to his Teacher and Lord Jesus Christ, who told him to give it for free. So, IS THERE A HOLY SALE? Did Jesus ever sell something? Again, I’m conscious about what the Bible says concerning the worker, like Paul writes in 1 Timothy 5:18 The laborer is worthy of his wages. He also writes in 1 Timothy 5:17 Elders who do their work well should be respected and paid well, especially those who work hard at both preaching and teaching. You see the difference between working for God and receiving recompense, and selling what we freely received from God to make profit. We have to go back to the basics, learn with Jesus Christ what pleases and displeases God and commit ourselves to do God’s will.