“WE ARE THE TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT!”

“WE ARE THE TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT!”

1 Corinthians 3:16-17 Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.

Paul is still dealing with the subject of division in the church at Corinth. He tells them that when they divide among themselves over preachers, they are acting like children, like unsaved, ungodly carnal people! He has reminded them that no matter which preacher had preached at Corinth, there is only one foundation, and that foundation is Christ!

He further illustrates the church being a building, which is under construction, and now he reveals the nature of this building. It is a TEMPLE! He uses this illustration to issue another strong warning to these acrimonious (hostile) Christians. He compares schism in the local church with what he calls, ‘Defiling the temple of God.’ His argument is simple. There is one temple, and in that temple God dwells. To divide the local church is to divide the temple, and that is wrong, for God only dwells in one temple, not in several! WE ARE IN THE TEMPLE OF GOD!

In the Old Testament the Temple was the building where God promised that He would meet with his people. 1 Kings 6:11-13, Exodus 25:22, “ And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee… “

Remember, that this place was accessible only once a year, on the Day of Atonement. Even then, only the High Priest could enter, and that after appropriate sacrifice had been offered for his sins and for the sins of the people. Otherwise, to enter the presence of the living God would be certain death, for God is HOLY and nothing sinful or defiled can enter the presence of such a HOLY God. Their sin would condemn them and they would perish! But remember what happened when Jesus died on the cross? He took the punishment for our sins. He died that we might have His righteousness credited to us. We are now justified by faith, and we have peace with God. The practical manifestation of this reconciliation with God occurred in the temple at Jerusalem, when, as Jesus died for our sins, the veil of the temple was rent in two! Matthew 27:51 Because of Jesus, we can now enter right into the sanctuary, right into the presence of God! No more veil. There are two distinct points arising from this fact:

1. THE CHURCH IS THE TEMPLE OF GOD! Now, Paul says, the local church, the body of people meeting together to worship the Lord, is God’s temple! He is in their midst, and they are in his presence! This is very important indeed! The word ‘ye’ is plural, although the word ‘temple’ is singular! There is but one temple, but we are ALL members of it! What does this mean for us? It means that when we meet together in this fashion, God is here, and we are in his immediate presence! Therefore we don’t have to sing, “Come in the building if you don’t stay long.” That should have a mighty influence over how we regard our gatherings as a local church!

It will make us desire His fellowship! If we love the Lord, we will want to be where He is! Church going is never a chore when we get this doctrine of Christ dwelling in His church clear in our minds! Psalm 122:1-2 I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the Lord. Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem. Knowing that we are in the presence of the Lord when we meet together will influence our behavior in church! We will realize that we are in the intimate presence of such a HOLY and AWESOME being, and our attitude will change! We will respect Him, we will offer worship to Him, and we will humble ourselves before Him! GOD’S TEMPLE IS A HOLY TEMPLE! It must never become anything less than that! That is why worship in the temple must be what pleases God, not just what appeals to man! Furthermore, it will motivate us to pray! The temple is a place of prayer! People traveled for miles on pilgrimage just to pray! But there is no need whatsoever to go to any place to meet with God in prayer, for He is already with us! Jesus said, in Matthew 18:20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. God’s church is God’s temple! What awful judgement would befall anyone who went out of his way to harm the church! This is the point that Paul; was making. Some people were harming the church by grumbling, by misbehaving, by causing needless division. Listen to what Paul says about such, 1 Cor. 3:17… We need to learn again to fear God, and to have reverence and respect for His temple (his church), lest we defile the temple of the Lord and thus come under his terrible judgement! Think about how Christ reacted when he found that men had defiled the earthly temple! Matthew 21:12-13 And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves, And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.

A word of caution is needed here. We must remember that we are talking about the local church, a body of believers. Paul is not talking about a building! We must never do harm to the CHURCH, GOD’S TEMPLE! Second and last…

2. THE CHRISTIAN IS A TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT! 1 Cor. 6:19 What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? This is the next aspect of this truth that we should notice. Not only is the church the Temple of God, but the Christian is a Temple of the Holy Spirit! God’s Holy Spirit dwells within the Christian believer. Paul’s’ argument then is, because your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, you just can’t treat your body any old way! 1 Cor. 6:20. For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s. The context here is one of sexual immorality among believers. Look, Paul is making the point that because we are the Temple of the Holy Spirit; we just can’t live any way we like, as Christians. We are not our own! These Corinthians thought that their bodies were their own and that they could do just what they wanted with them! How wrong they were! The question to ask is…Is God glorified in your body? In mine?

The Temple in Hebrews. Hebrews 9:23-28 Christ is described in Hebrews as ‘our Great High Priest.’ This is a reminder of the earthly Temple, which was an earthly sanctuary made by the hands of men. But that earthly sanctuary was not the true sanctuary, it was only a copy and a shadow of the true sanctuary which is in heaven! That is where our Great High Priest is right now!

A. The Temple a place of sacrifice! So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation. The High Priest of the old Israel could only enter the Holy Place after sacrifice. But a more perfect sacrifice has been offered, and abundant was His sacrifice, that he only needed to offer that sacrifice once, then he sat down on the right hand of God, His atoning work completed! Place of sacrifice… B. The Temple a place of prayer! , now to appear in the presence of God for us: Just as the old temple was a place where man communed with God, so the Heavenly Sanctuary is a place of prayer also! What is Jesus doing right now? He is INTERCEDING for us! Hebrews 4:15 For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. So, you can see that the church on earth is a reflection of, indeed more than that, a very part of that great sanctuary in heaven! What Christ is doing in heaven is what the church on earth is also doing! 1 Peter 2:5 Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. We too are to make spiritual sacrifices! We are to sacrifice ourselves!

Without a struggle, there is no strength. Without a battle, there is no victory. Without repentance, there is no forgiveness. Without a Cross, there is no crown. Without death, there is no Resurrection. Without Jesus, there is no Salvation. Without Salvation, there is no Heaven. Without Heaven, your life has been meaningless.

We too are to be intercessors! We are to pray for others, knowing that our prayer arise as incense unto the Lord, and that He takes our prayers and offers them up before our heavenly Father!

The Temple in Revelation! Rev. 21:22 And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. Right at the end of the book of Revelation is our final reference to a temple, or, surprisingly, to the LACK of a Temple! This is amazing, for John is a Jew, and that he would envisage Jerusalem without a temple is very significant and important indeed! John is being given a glimpse into the place where God dwells, into heaven itself, and he remarks that there is no temple there! But then this is the New Jerusalem, and there is no need for a temple, a building to meet with God, for God is here, and we are in his presence! It is perfectly consistent! The temple of Heaven is the Lord Himself! Oh to be in Heaven and to see the Temple of God completed in all its splendour! A prominent citizen in town was dying. As he lay in his lovely home, the best doctors surrounding him, he whispered, with a note of despair, “I’m leaving home, I’m leaving home.” In a poorer area of the town there lay a solitary figure in surroundings bare. Her modest home contained only the most threadbare of life’s essentials. In her eye was a gleam. Before she died she was heard to say, “I’m going home, I’m going home.”

So, how shall we sum all this up? Well, the individual Christian is the Temple of the Holy Spirit, who dwells within each believer in Christ. The Church is the Temple of God, where God meets with His people!

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