God's Dwelling Place

Introduction

How many of you have updated your phone recently?

I knew it was going to take forever to upgrade and I just wanted to look something up.

Every computer has a operating system. The Operating system is a set of core values that determine how the computer is going to function and what it will produce.

These values are written in the form of code and are not pretty to look at. As a matter of fact if you don’t know the code language you won’t even know what your looking at.

What if I were to tell you that you also have a set of core values that determine how you are going to function and what you will produce.

Your core values are set from years of experence and emotions that your mind uses to make decisions and form actions.

What if you were programed wrong? What if someone or something has encoded a core value incorectly? What that would mean is you would continueally have a glitch in your system that would make the same mistake over and over again.

Rebooting or just starting over is not going to fix the problem because the core value still has errors. What you need in an update.

An update is when the glitch has been found and the core values are rewritten to produce the proper result.

Some of you keep rebooting thinking it will fix your problem but what you need is an update of your primary oporating system and some of you need an upgrade all together.

We see this in Christianity all the time. People have been programed wrong. They have been fed the wrong information so they keep producing the wrong thing. Some time the core values are so deep that it’s hard to find the glitch.

In th coputer world a good programmer gets paid a lot of money because the code and core values that he produces with have less glitches and better results.

So don’t you think it is important who you allow to program your core values? Wouldn’t it make sence that the person pooring into your life would know what they’re doing.

Paul has been telling the church of Corith that they are carnal of fleshly and that they need to grow up in the Spirit and begin to function Spiritually.

This is going to take a reprograming of everything they thought was true. They must be upgraded with the new oporating system of Christ through the Holy Spirit.

So it is with many of us today. We are functioning under the oporating system of the world and therefore produce worldly results.

We also need to be upgraded with the Spiritual operating system of Christ, so that we begin to produce spiritual things.

God uses Spiritual men to build His Spiritual house.

1 Corinthians 3:5–7 ESV

What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.

1 Cor 3:5

1 Corinthians 3:8–9 ESV

He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.

1 Corinthians 3:8-

God uses Spiritual people to build His dwelling place.

Jesus is our sure foundation

1 Corinthians 3:10 ESV

According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it.

1 Cor 3:10

1 Corinthians 3:11 ESV

For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

The Rock

Ephesians 2:19–20 ESV

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,

The sand and the rock

The cornerstone

Ephesians 2:19–20 ESV

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,

Eph 2:19

Eph 2:19

Ephesians 2:21–22 ESV

in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Eph 2:21

Jesus is our sure foundation

The Rock

The sand and the rock

The cornerstone

We are building blocks of the temple.

Eph 2:

Ephesians 2:21–22 ESV

in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

“You” in Greek is plural and not singular.

Together we make the dwelling place of God.

Collective worship is important.

A collective body is how God functions.

Through the collective body glorify God.

1 Corinthians 6:19–20 ESV

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

1 Cor 6:19

Hebrews 2:9 ESV

But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

The Builder you choose determines the quality of the house.

The Wise Builder

1 Corinthians 3:10 ESV

According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it.

1 Cor 3:12

1 Corinthians 3:12 ESV

Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—

God

1 Corinthians 3:12–13 ESV

Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done.

1 Corinthians 3:12 ESV

Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—

Gold

1 Cor 3:12-13

The deity of Christ

Christ the King

We are joint heirs with Jesus

Silver

The righteousness of Christ

Christ our Savior

Through the righteousness of Christ I am forgiven and free.

Precious Stones

The priesthood of Christ

Christ our High Priest

We are a part of the royal priesthood of God

1 Peter 2:

1 Peter 2:4–5 ESV

As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

The Worldly Builder

Builds with materials that decay: wood, hay, stubble.

Wood

a) Wood: Lust of the flesh

1 Corinthians 3:13 ESV

each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done.

Hay

1 Cor 3

It’s only when the heat is applied that reward is given or denied.

Stubble

1 Corinthians 3:14–15 ESV

If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.

1 Cor 3:

1 Cor

3. He shall suffer loss

The Lord brings the heat

a) By the refiners fire (3:13; ;)

He is the refiners fire.

The pastor’s reward is the people.

b) He shall be saved so as by fire

The world brings the heat through the trials of life.

The Wicked Builder

1 Corinthians 3:16–17 ESV

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.

1 Cor 3:16

God protects his Temple

God destroys the wicked builder

Jeremiah 23:1–2 ESV

1 “Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture!” declares the Lord. 2 Therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who care for my people: “You have scattered my flock and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. Behold, I will attend to you for your evil deeds, declares the Lord.

Jeremiah 23:1–4 ESV

1 “Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture!” declares the Lord. 2 Therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who care for my people: “You have scattered my flock and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. Behold, I will attend to you for your evil deeds, declares the Lord. 3 Then I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the countries where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. 4 I will set shepherds over them who will care for them, and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall any be missing, declares the Lord.

Conclusion

1. Tares down the Temple

So who is setting the core values of your life?

a) He hurts the people of God

Do you have the sure foundation of Christ or are you living on shaky ground.

How sure is your foundation?

b) He destroys the work of God

If it’s not built on Christ it is shaky at best.

2. God will destroy him ()

Some of you need an upgrade from the flesh to the Spirit.

They have a form of godliness ()

Rebooting won’t get it done. You don’t need a fresh start, you need a whole new life. You need to trade in that old life and find the new life in Christ.

When the Iphone X came out last week people camped out in line for days to get the upgrade. This one is not an update it a whole new experience.

What if we cared as much about our life as we did about our phones and were willing to do whatever it takes to get the upgrade that a Spiritual life in Jesus provides.