A den of robbers

“Jesus entered the temple area and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. ‘It is written,’ He said to them, ‘“My house will be called a house of prayer,” but you are making it a “den of robbers.”’” Matthew 21:12-13
We usually think of Jesus as being someone who was always calm and would never hurt a fly. But there were a few times when He got angry, when He told people in black and white what He thought of them, and when He took drastic action to correct a situation.
The temple was to be a place where people would come to seek forgiveness from God, to worship Him and fellowship with Him. This involved bringing a sacrifice, which had to be without spot or blemish. However over the years, the priests’ love of money, power and status led to them setting up a system whereby people would be forced to buy, at an exorbitant mark-up, a ‘pre-approved’ animal to sacrifice. If they brought an animal of their own, it would be inspected until a flaw was found, which would render it ‘unacceptable’ so the person would have to buy one from the priest to offer. They had a similar scheme with the money people brought: Roman coins, it was said, were not acceptable to put in the treasury. However, people could exchange their Roman coins for temple shekels – again at exorbitant exchange rates. Coming to the temple became an exercise in getting ripped off, leaving the worshipper frustrated and angry rather than joyous and thankful to God. (As a side note, the tables that Jesus turned over were called the tables of Annas. No wonder Annas was keen to see the back of Jesus, John 18:24.)
Jesus got angry at how the priests, who were supposed to be God’s representatives, were ripping off the people in the name of God and destroying their view of Him. The same thing continues today, and we see it especially with televangelists who are only out to line their own pockets. They are ripping off the people of God, in His name, for their own personal gain.