Jesus entered the Temple and began to drive out the merchants and their customers. He knocked over the tables of the money changers and the stalls of those selling doves. He said, "The Scriptures declare, 'My Temple will be called a place of prayer,' but you have turned it into a den of thieves!" (Matthew 21:12-13)(NLT)
In an outburst of righteous anger, Jesus chased the merchants and money changers out of the Temple. They had been defiling the Temple by turning it into a marketplace and cheating those who had come to make offerings. Jesus' rebuke of such sinful Temple practices reminds us to guard our own worship against corruption. We must always keep God and his desires at the center of worship and never allow other motives to lead us astray.
HOLY GOD, thank you for calling and enabling us to worship you. Forgive us when we corrupt our worship with selfish motives, and give us the desire to please you. Amen.
(from the Praise and Worship Study Bible)