Tag: Temple

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God at Home in Us

God made each of us for Himself. This reality is something we must embrace. For the Lord loves us and seeks to bring us into a mature, healthy relationship with Him.

The book of Revelation begins with Jesus sending specific messages to seven different churches. These messages are kind of like report cards. Each church has a particular character and a few of them are facing real issues that are affecting and even hindering the movement of God in the midst of their assemblies.

The church at Laodicea had fervency issues, it seems. The Lord addresses the lukewarm nature of that group. He used strong language to express His distaste over what was going on there:  “Because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew you out of my mouth” (Revelation 3:16).

Let’s be careful not to stop reading at that statement. God had more to say.

“To those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.” The strong language of the Savior was intended to wake up these sleepy believers. He wanted them to fully enjoy the life that He had for them. And this attitude of Jesus led Him to say what he said next:  “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock:  if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me” (Revelation 3:20).

God comes to our doors. He knocks upon them. He wants to sit at our tables. He wants to share a meal with us.

Our Soul

This is true for every single church of God. And it is true for every single believer in Jesus Christ. He wants to be with us. He wants to talk with us. He knows who we are. He knows our challenges and our struggles. He loves us and He loves those beyond us. He loves the world, “so loves” it, says John 3:16.

We may cool off in our relationship with Him. We may allow things to interfere with our fellowship. We can say the wrong things, just as we say the wrong things to the ones closest to us, to family and friends. We can do the wrong thing, from time to time. We offend people. We may have even broken someone’s heart at one time or another.

The Good News, the Gospel Truth really, is this:  He is still here, knocking on our doors, patiently waiting, hoping that we will open up to Him.

Every one of us is a member in particular of the Body of Christ. Each of us was fearfully and wonderfully made by Him (see Psalm 139). We are what we are because of His design and wisdom.

There are people all about us. We are members of families. We live in communities. We have neighbors.

However, we each stand and fall before God. We are believer-priests and we belong to Him and to Him alone.

We have responsibility before Him. Our soul is “continually” in our hands. This truth is communicated in verse 109 of Psalm 119, the longest chapter in the Bible. It is a psalm that emphasizes the importance of the Word of God over and over and over.

The Lord wants to be at home in us. It is up to us to open our doors to Jesus when He knocks. He’s not even concerned over what’s on our tables when we let Him in. He just wants to be there with us, heart to heart. One day we will be face to face with Him.

Temples for Him

Moses and Israel erected the Tabernacle in the wilderness according to the design of God. They made it and the Lord showed up with the cloud of His Presence. There was so much glory there that Moses himself could not enter. Solomon organized the construction of the great Temple. You can read of it in 1 Kings and 1 Chronicles. He imagined the magnificence of that building, which was mostly designed by King David as God gave the details to him. The Temple was completed and again God came in with His Presence and all fell upon their faces in worship.

Two other temples were built, one by the people of Israel and another by Herod, the Roman appointed king of Judea. But we do not read of the Lord showing up in those buildings.

That’s because God had something else in mind. Through Christ, a new and living way to worship was made, worship not based on place, time, and ritual, but worship that is rooted in Spirit and Truth.

Now, we are the Temples of the Living God. Paul wrote of our bodies as holy places (see 1 Corinthians 3:16-17, 6:19). Each of us can make our hearts a comfort zone for the Holy Spirit.

Oh, the Spirit does live in us, regardless of the state of our walk with the Lord. This is the fact of amazing grace. He makes us sons and daughters and this is a permanent identity. We cannot erase the seal of God that He puts upon us when we welcome His mercy and call upon Him to be saved. But we sometimes must choose to unclutter and dejunk the structures of our souls so that the Spirit will not be quenched or grieved.

So how are we to do this? Psalm 119 gives a number of instructions. No. 1 is to “take heed” to the Word of God. Paying attention to the Truth cleanses us in seasons of failure, and it can keep us from sin (see Psalm 119:9, 11).

One important prayer phrase in Psalm 119 is this one:  “Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law” (Psalm 119:18).  Here’s another good one:  “Your hands have made and fashioned me; give me understanding that I may learn your commandments” (Psalm 119:73).

Let’s allow the Word to give form and order to our souls. This will provide a frame of reference for the work of God in us. Jesus, of course, put it best when gave this amazing promise:

“If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you” (John 15:7).

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The Meaning of the Temple

The Chronicles, books 1 and 2, begin with a name – Adam.

This is significant because these books in our Bibles are the collected writings of men who served in the second Temple at Jerusalem. The words come from the priests and Levites connected to the care and the practices performed in the holy house of God.  This house was a reconstructed one, fashioned and built by those who suffered through Israel’s captivity and exile.

How is it that Adam is to be considered as so related to the Temple?

I think of Adam as really God’s first Temple, as the Almighty’s first holy house. It was into this original man that God put something of Himself. Consider this: the first human was formed from the dust of the earth and then was made alive in this fashion: “And the Lord God … breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul” (Genesis 2:7).

This reality should serve to color the way that we look at anyone from any place at anytime. “The spirit of a man is the candle of the Lord,” says Proverbs 20:27. God made man for His habitation, so that He could delight in him and rejoice through him (see Proverbs 8:30-32). He made space in people for Him to be present, to reveal His glory, for His will to be carried out on earth as it is in Heaven.

The books of Samuel and of the Kings report some of the same stories that we read in the Chronicles. In former books, the words are focused on the throne of the nation. We read of the kings’ rule and of how they battled and built along with their policies and reforms. Palace intrigue and political stunts and manipulations are presented. Foolish decisions and spectacular failures are also exposed and detailed.

In Samuel and Kings, all things relate to the one in charge and the words we get are oriented from the top down. But in Chronicles, we find that the communication is organized from the bottom up. We gain an understanding of the people and things at the roots of life among God’s chosen people.

And so it all starts with Adam – the one made in the image of God and instructed to exercise dominion over the earth that was made for him, a planet on which he was to be fruitful, multiply, and fill with his children. 

Book 1 of the Chronicles up front offers us pages of names, a seemingly dull registry of people and tribes and such. Look carefully though and see how the line of the human race is traced for us. In particular, the line of Israel is drawn clearly, starting with Adam through Noah and Abraham to Jacob and onto Judah and David.

Eventually, we come to the key element of the Temple and of the nation’s life as a whole. This is the Ark of the Covenant, with its Mercy Seat. It is symbolic of the presence of the Lord. His Shekinah, the glory of His Person, shines forth between the gold figures of cherubim positioned to frame the Mercy Seat, where the blood of atonement was sprinkled year by year.

David was said to have a possessed a heart after God. He did occupy the throne in the palace. The great thing about David is this: he understood that the real and true power of government rested in the Throne of Grace.

And this king strived to relocate the Ark to Jerusalem, to the royal city. His first attempt was done in haste and resulted in disaster – one died for touching the Ark as it tottered on a cart. Later, David had the Ark carried, transported on the shoulders of the Levites, according the Law written by Moses.  The Ark is set in place as David dances and leaps in celebration.

The Levites’ place in this story points to the order of God’s design for worship before Him. Before we get to all of the stuff about David and his days, it is the Temple servants who are noted and celebrated in 1 Chronicles.

Gate watchers. Doorkeepers.

Spice mixers. Furniture movers.

Bread bakers. Table setters.

Cymbal crashers. Singers of songs.

All of these are mentioned in some detail. For example, “a Levite called Mattithiah was entrusted with baking the bread. He was the firstborn of Shallum the Korahite” (see 1 Chronicles 9:31). These sons and daughters of Adam represented vital, cherished, gifted portions at the center of Jewish life. The works that they did and the tasks that they carried out formed the foundation for what went on in the worship of the Lord.

Sure, there were remarkable soldiers and their battlefield exploits were very well known. But the Lord wanted these ones to be known as well. God wanted us to see the hidden things and faithful servants who made the Temple all it was to be.

It all goes back to Adam and how God made man for His presence. And the gospel of Luke makes this clearer to us with the genealogy of Jesus Christ. This family record works in reverse, naming all the names through the line of the Savior all the way back to whom? Back to Adam, the first one to be fearfully and wonderfully made.

May we see ourselves in these words and pages and recognize the glory of the Lord that dwells in us and works among us.