The Church
The Temple: Now and Forever • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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The Temple: Now and Forever
Garden of Eden
Tabernacle after Mt. Sinai
The Temple of Solomon
The Temple in Ezekiel (God leaves, vision of future)
The Temple of Zerubbabel/Ezra/Herod
The Temple of Jesus
The Temple of the Holy Spirit
The Temple of God opened (Rev. 11 & 15)
The Temple of God in the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21-22)
Characteristics of Eden, the tabernacle, and the temple:
God’s presence (glory)
His people enter, others excluded
Priests work (Adam, Levites)
Fellowship (menorah facing bread & wine, God spoke with Adam)
Life-giving elements (tree of life, river of life)
Heaven and earth (God and man) united
When the day of Pentecost had arrived, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like that of a violent rushing wind came from heaven, and it filled the whole house where they were staying. They saw tongues like flames of fire that separated and rested on each one of them. Then they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled them.
Now there were Jews staying in Jerusalem, devout people from every nation under heaven. When this sound occurred, a crowd came together and was confused because each one heard them speaking in his own language.
He made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he purposed in Christ as a plan for the right time—to bring everything together in Christ, both things in heaven and things on earth in him.
So, then, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints, and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. In him the whole building, being put together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you are also being built together for God’s dwelling in the Spirit.
According to God’s grace that was given to me, I have laid a foundation as a skilled master builder, and another builds on it. But each one is to be careful how he builds on it.
For no one can lay any foundation other than what has been laid down. That foundation is Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay, or straw, each one’s work will become obvious. For the day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire; the fire will test the quality of each one’s work. If anyone’s work that he has built survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will experience loss, but he himself will be saved—but only as through fire.
Don’t you yourselves know that you are God’s temple and that the Spirit of God lives in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him; for God’s temple is holy, and that is what you are.
Paul deliberately echoes OT temple-building language (gold, silver, stones) to show that the church is the new temple.
The contrast (precious vs. perishable) highlights the eschatological testing of ministry work — a spiritual “inspection” of temple construction.
Just as Solomon’s temple required the best materials for God’s house, so Paul insists that ministry in the church must be built with enduring, Christ-centered work.
Flee sexual immorality! Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body. Don’t you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.
Therefore, brothers and sisters, in view of the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your true worship. Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.
The Temple and the Church’s Mission: A Biblical Theology of the Dwelling Place of God Chapter Thirteen: Practical Reflections on Eden and the Temple for the Church in the Twenty-First Century
In summary, all Christians are now spiritual Levitical priests (in fulfilment of
