Whip of Cords in Advent

'Why the Triumphal entry and the Cleansing of the Temple in Jerusalem on Advent Sunday?' number of people asked me this week as we encountered the Gospel for the third time in one week.  Did I chose to make a point?  Someone in the gathering responded, 'We have been reading this since 1637.'  St Matthew sets the scene vividly.  'And Jesu sent into the Temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple; and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the seats of them that sold doves; and said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of robbers' (Matt 21).
Matthew links the first coming of Jesus to Jerusalem to the ultimate Judgement in cleansing the temple.  This event has been our prayer since the 2nd of March 2024 when Bishop Dorsey preached on this, with the text from the Gospel according to St John.  You can read his full sermon here.  But here is the essence of it.
'But there is something in the text and the way it presages so much in the Gospel of John, that I think can be truly helpful for us in our current sufferings as a diocese. Jesus is always about exactly what we should be about. In the case of the Temple in Jerusalem, he is grieved by what he sees – the profiteering of the moneychangers, the exploitation of the poor, who had no choice but to buy officially approved animals for sacrifice, with officially minted temple coins (the exchange rate was not a bargain) so that by the time they got to the point where they might worship God and offer their sacrifice, they probably just wanted it all to end. Jesus realises this can’t be slightly changed or modified. The whole thing has to be taken apart just so that people can pray again. Hence, the whip of cords, the driving out, the overturning of tables, in short, the righteous anger of the Lord.'
It is reasonable to ask what is the purpose of such powerful prophetic preaching when our religion is designed to fail? Why do we make a mockery of the House of Prayer and squander the People of God?  It was pointed out by a wise one elsewhere that it has to change.   And since we failed to listen to the call of a sound judgement and a prophetic voice, we find ourselves being mocked.  Is this the best form of mocking the People of God?  'Blessed is the one who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked ... or sit in the seal of the mockers.'  (Psalm 1)
It took Jesus three hours to make the whip of cords.  It took him three hours of contemplation and prayer that ultimately led to the cleansing of the temple.  We shall partner with our Master and pray, 'give us grace that we may cast away the works of darkness.'  (Collect for Advent).  We shall cast away the works of darkness, in the name of Jesus.