ersonal presence and to His executive faculty.

Of course the thing made trouble. It was the talk of the town, and of all
the foreigners for days after. The leaders were aroused and angered,
deeply angered. This stranger had kicked up a pretty muss with His
inconvenient earnestness and inconsiderate quoting of Scripture. It was a
practical assumption of superior authority over them. It was an assumption
of the truth of John's ignored claim that He was the promised King.

Was not this arrangement in the temple area a great convenience for the
many strangers, who were their brothers and guests; a real kindly act of
hospitality? Yes--and was it not, too, a finely organized bit of business
for profiting by these strangers, a using of their proper authority over
the temple territory to transfer their brothers' foreign coins safely over
to their own purses? Aye, it was a transmuting of their holy offices into
gold by the alchemy of their coarse, greedy touch.

Jesus' conduct was the keenest sort of criticism of these rulers, before
the eyes of the nation and of the thousands of pilgrims present. These
leaders never forgave this humiliating rebuke of themselves. It made their
nerves raw to His touch ever after. Here is the real reason of all their
after bitter dislike. They had a sensitive pocket-nerve. It was a sort of
pneumogastric nerve so close did it come to their lives. Jesus touched it
roughly. It never quit aching. Scratch all their later charges against Him
and under all is this sore spot. The tree of the cross began growing its
wood that day. Their hot, captious demand for authority, meant as much for
the ears of the crowd as for His, brought from Jesus, who read His future
in their hearts, a reply which they could not understand. They asked their
question for the crowd to hear, He replied for His disciples to remember
in the after years. There could be no evidence of authority more
significant than this temple incident.

His first public work was done at this time. The great throng of pilgrims
from around the world, attracted to Him by this simple daring act of
leadership, witnessed a group of mighty acts during these Passover days.
The angry leaders had critically asked for "signs" of His authority. He
gave them in abundance, not in response to their captious demand, but
doubtless, as always, in response to pressing human needs. The result was
that many persons accepted Him, but the nation in its rulers, maintaine