We might ask what was the justification for what Jesus did, as the Old Testament has detailed regulations concerning worship practice and temple sacrifice which had been given by God. These gave special emphasis to the standard of offerings to be made; substandard or second best was not acceptable.
The temple authorities had put arrangements in place to make sure those standards were maintained, and covering the cost of those arrangements was a reasonable practice. So, what went wrong?

We tend to skim through the parts of the bible covering those regulations concerning temple worship, decorations, and sacrifice. While they were important, there is a lot of detail there, and it’s difficult to see what is important among the many chapters and verses. And I’m sure it was for the ancient Israelites too. It would have been easy to pay special attention to secondary details and miss the important essentials, and I think that is what happened.

Prayer is the core part of our personal relationship with God. Public worship is an outward expression and proclamation of that relationship. And good works are a response to that relationship of God’s love, in extending His love to other people He brings into our lives.

These priorities were outlined in Mark 12:39-44
29 Jesus answered him, “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment. 31 And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
32 So the scribe said to Him, … (this) is more than all the whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
34 Now when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, He said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

But the temple authorities had confused their priorities, and allowed practical arrangements of worship to take priority over those essential aspects of faith. And when our relationship with God is given lesser priority, our fallen human nature takes the lead. As a result, neighbours as gentiles were denied access to the temple; and human greed had poisoned temple practices, with people paying extortionate amounts for the proper sacrifice and temple money.

And we can fall into that same trap, especially when there are many activities and programs in church, and in our personal lives. In a previous church I saw attempts to maintain band music create all sorts of stress and discord before the service began; it was a time that would have been far better devoted to prayer than band practice. And here in Blackwood there are many wonderful church activities going on during the week, but only as they have their source and direction from a faithful and prayerful relationship with God will they be worthwhile. Otherwise, they could easily go the same way as the sellers of sacrifices and money changers that Jesus threw out.

Beginning our activities with prayer is an important habit, both in our personal lives and in church activities.