John 2:13-22

Contemporary English Version

Jesus in the Temple

(Matthew 21.12,13; Mark 11.15-17; Luke 19.45,46)

^13 (A) Not long before the Jewish festival of Passover, Jesus went to Jerusalem. ¹⁴ There he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves in the temple. He also saw moneychangers sitting at their tables. ¹⁵ So he took some rope and made a whip. Then he chased everyone out of the temple, together with their sheep and cattle. He turned over the tables of the moneychangers and scattered their coins.

¹⁶ Jesus said to the people who had been selling doves, “Get those doves out of here! Don't make my Father's house a marketplace.”

^17 (B) The disciples then remembered that the Scriptures say, “My love for your house burns in me like a fire.”

¹⁸ The Jewish leaders asked Jesus, “What miracle^[a] will you work to show us why you have done this?”

^19 (C) “Destroy this temple,” Jesus answered, “and in three days I will build it again!”

²⁰ The leaders replied, “It took 46 years to build this temple. What makes you think you can rebuild it in three days?”

²¹ But Jesus was talking about his body as a temple. ²² And when he was raised from death, his disciples remembered what he had told them. Then they believed the Scriptures and the words of Jesus.