1 Corinthians 6:18-20
"In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit."
(EPHESIANS 2:21-22)
Can you picture God wearing a construction worker's hard hat? Does that seem out of place? Yet it's not an inappropriate image. After all, God is engaged in a building project, fashioning all of us into His Holy Temple where He dwells in us through His Spirit. He is both the General Contractor and the Tenant!
The more familiar image, of course, is that of the temple in the Old Testament. It was the place where God's presence dwelt with His people, a picture of how things would one day be when the ultimate temple sacrifice would be made in Jesus. Then the curtain would be torn and Christ would take up residence in each of us. We would be His holy temple!
In Ephesians 2 Paul speaks of more than the individual as a temple. The whole church is the temple of the Lord; believers are the "living stones" being shaped, cut, and fitted into God's building. Whether the picture is of the temple as individuals or as part of the whole, it is holy, taking on the character of its chief Occupant, Jesus.
INSIGHT
"LORD, I WANT TO BE A TEMPLE IN WHICH YOU DWELL. USE ME TO BE HELPFUL IN THE BUILDING PROGRAM OF THE CHURCH WORLDWIDE."
READ THROUGH THE BIBLE IN A YEAR
2 Kings 11-12
Proverbs 16
1 Peter 4-5
1 Corinthians 6:18-20
New Living Translation (NLT)
18 Run from sexual sin! No other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does. For sexual immorality is a sin against your own body. 19 Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, 20 for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.
LOVE YOUR WIFE
with Justin Buzzard
Men are typically pretty good at pursuing the woman they love before marriage. After the wedding day there is a tendency to let the romance die. Husbands must learn to date their wives again!
No comments:
Post a Comment