Throw out the Thieves!

“I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes: I hate the work of them that turn aside; it shall not cleave to me” (Psalm 101:3).  “The eyes of the LORD are in every place, beholding the evil and the good” (Proverbs 15:3).  “Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, 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 thieves” (Matthew 21:12,13). 

Perhaps it’s time again to hear it,

Rehearsing what we knew before:
We are the temple of God’s Spirit,
Which should be holy evermore.

When we have trusted in the Lord

And Jesus Christ has entered in,
Our hearts as temples are explored
With holy eyes detecting sin.

The Lord within His temple heaves

The money changer’s tables there! 
He calls that place a den of thieves,
Which should have been a house of prayer.

The Lord is still consumed with zeal

For temples that He occupies;
His Holy Spirit will reveal
The things offending holy eyes. 

Now cast them out as Jesus did:

We should be living for His smile!
There’s nothing in us that is hid:
Throw out the thieves that will defile! 

O Lord, we know You are the same,

And we are glad this is the case,
That we might sanctify Your name
As You have cleansed us by Your grace.

O Lord, we hear the psalmist’s vow:

To him no wickedness shall cling,
And we would come before You now
To cleanse the temple of our King.

Lord, throw out, by Your holy view,

The thieves that rob Your adoration,
And sanctify our hearts for You
To preach Your Gospel of salvation.