A Dwelling Place

A little more than 25 years ago, I joined my parents in Europe for 10 days or so traveling through Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

The three of us, along with my dad’s best friend, made quite the impression among the Europeans. When I remember this trip, an image of Chevy Chase and his family from National Lampoon’s Vacation is always what comes to mind.

But we didn’t have a station wagon. We had a little, rented, European sedan with luggage piled onto the roof and wrapped in an ugly blue tarp that had to be re-tied multiple times through each day’s driving, depending on how fast we’d been driving on the Autobahn and how poorly we’d tied it up before leaving.

I cannot begin to describe how embarrassed I was as we would drive up to the doors of some grand Swiss hotel and pour out of that little car, sometimes bickering with one another about Dad’s driving or my navigation or some missed sightseeing opportunity along the way.

And then, as a bellman or a valet watched in horror, we’d start untying that big, blue bulk from the roof and pulling down luggage to take into the hotel.

I’m sure it was really quite a sight, and I wouldn’t be surprised to know that some of those folks still talk about us when they’re sharing stories with friends at the pub.

We made some great memories, too, on this trip, and we saw some of the most amazing scenery I’d ever seen as we wound our way through the Alps of Germany and Switzerland.

One of the best memories I have is the day that we visited Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria. I wish I could show you a photo here, but you’ve probably seen it on the Travel Channel or National Geographic at some point. It is, perhaps, the most castle-y castle in Europe.

In fact, Neuschwanstein was the inspiration for Walt Disney’s version of Cinderella’s castle. They’re not exact duplicates, but it’s clear when you look at photos of the two next to one another that Disney was recalling his visit to Bavaria when he described the design he wanted for his Disney castles.

Neuschwanstein is perched at the top of a hill, and its tallest tower reaches 213 feet into the sky. Built between 1868 and 1892, it encompasses nearly 65,000 square feet of space, and it was originally designed to have more than 200 rooms.

The castle was begun by King Ludwig II, and even though it took nearly 25 years to build, portions of it were livable within five years of the start of construction.

But here’s the thing: Ludwig never lived at Neuschwanstein. And of the 200 rooms in the original design, only 16 or so were ever completed.

Today, you can tour this beautiful castle, and if you do, you’ll be guided by someone who almost certainly has spent many more hours inside the castle than Ludwig ever did.

He built it as a home, but he never lived there. He never dwelt there. In fact, no one ever has. Within weeks of Ludwig’s death in 1886, the castle was opened for public tours. It has been a museum ever since.

Today, as we continue our look at the work of the Holy Spirit within the church, we’ll consider what it means for the Spirit to dwell within individual Christians and what it means for the Holy Spirit to dwell within the church.

You may recall that we have talked about how the church is born of and empowered by the Spirit. And you might remember that last week we talked about the gift of the Spirit as the seal of a believer’s security, authenticity, genuineness, and ownership in Christ.

We also saw how those things are true of the Spirit’s relationship to the corporate church and how He has been given to the church as a promise — very much like an engagement ring — of the coming marriage between Jesus and His bride, the church.

Today, we’ll consider what it looks like — both individually and as the corporate church — for the Spirit to dwell within us. And we’ll examine some implications of His indwelling to the church’s mission.

Most of our time will be spent in the Book of Galatians, but I want to start in 1 Corinthians, chapter 3.

While you’re turning there, let me remind you of some of the problems the Apostle Paul was addressing with this letter to the church at Corinth.

This was a church that was splitting on any number of issues. Its members had not yet gone their separate ways, but there were divisions on everything from spiritual gifts, to the administration of the Lord’s Supper to who was the most important teacher — Paul or Apollos.

And the divisions were threatening to topple the spiritual house — the temple of God — that was represented by this gathering of new believers.

And so, Paul reminds the Corinthians in chapter 3 that a temple of God is exactly what this church was supposed to be. Look at verse 16.

1 Corinthians 3:16–17 NASB95

Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy, and that is what you are.

Now, this was a strong warning from Paul about the sanctity of the church, and it’s one that we shouldn’t miss with our modern ears.

God considers this church — this particular church — to be holy, to be consecrated and set apart for His use.

And Paul warns that those who destroy it — those who ruin or corrupt or defile it or lead it away from the state of knowledge and holiness in which it ought to abide — risk a terrible judgment from God for their actions.

What would you do if you caught someone vandalizing your house? Or if you caught an arsonist trying to set it afire? You’d want them to be punished, wouldn’t you?

Because it’s YOUR house, your dwelling place, the place where you live. You want to be sure it’s protected, right?

What Paul says here is that God is similarly protective about the church, because it is His dwelling place through the Holy Spirit.

You are a temple of God, he writes here. In the Greek, the word “you” is plural, and the word “temple” or “sanctuary” is singular.

So the idea is that the Corinthian Christians to whom Paul is writing are collectively the temple or sanctuary of God. And the Holy Spirit dwells within them collectively, just as surely as He dwells within them individually.

Now, elsewhere in this letter, where Paul writes “your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you,” the context suggests that he’s talking about individual Christians being a temple of the Holy Spirit. And his point is that we shouldn’t defile that temple through sexual sin.

But here, the point is clearly that the corporate church, indwelt by the Holy Spirit, is something that God considers holy and worthy of protection.

And those who would sow division within a church — whether in the time of Paul or today — subject themselves to divine judgment.

But the main thing I want you to notice here is that Paul describes the Spirit’s indwelling here in corporate terms. He dwells within the gathered church. And He works within the gathered church.

And much as the work the Spirit does within individual Christians begins with changing them, so does the work He does in the church.

He turns it from a divided group of people doing the deeds of the flesh into a unified body bearing the fruits of the Spirit.

Turn to Galatians, chapter 5, and let’s see how this is supposed to look.

Now, Galatians is often referred to as God’s Emancipation Proclamation. Like the document signed by Abraham Lincoln that declared American slaves to be free, Galatians is God’s declaration, through the Apostle Paul, that mankind was no longer to be enslaved by the Mosaic Law.

The problem among the churches that received this letter was that false teachers were coming in and telling these new Christians they had to be circumcised and follow the other dictates of the Mosaic Law to be truly saved.

But Paul wanted them to know and understand that they were saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, for the glory of God alone.

Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision matter now, Paul says here, because God’s grace has set believers free in Christ Jesus.

But our freedom from the requirements of the Law does not give us license to operate in the flesh. In fact, Paul makes the argument, starting in verse 16, that those within whom the Spirit dwells will find that the Holy Spirit OPPOSES the things of the flesh.

The Spirit should be their constant guide to the moral will of God, motivating us to do what is right and to abstain from what is wrong.

And this is true for both individual Christians indwelt by the Spirit and for the church that is indwelt by the Spirit.

Let’s pick up in verse 16 of chapter 5.

Galatians 5:16 NASB95

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.

Walk by the Spirit. A better translation of the Greek verb tense here would be “keep on walking” by the Spirit. To keep on walking by the Spirit suggests subjecting yourself to the Holy Spirit’s moment-by-moment direction and guidance.

We don’t do so much walking in the modern West. I was looking at some memories Google reminded me of this week from when I was in Houston for a class a few years ago.

I didn’t rent a car on that trip, and I’d just returned from Haiti, so I was used to walking everywhere anyway. And my Google timeline reminded me that I walked 16 miles that week in the Houston summer heat. Believe me, I’m not up to that right now.

But in Paul’s time, they didn’t have cars, of course, and walking was pretty much how everybody got anywhere.

The thing about walking is that it’s slow. But even if it’s slow, walking suggests progress. If you keep on walking, you’re eventually going to get where you’re going. And for Paul, if a believer kept on walking, he would get somewhere.

And along the way, a believer who keeps on walking by the Spirit will not carry out the desires of the flesh.

Now, the flesh here is anything we do to satisfy ourselves. These can be the wholly evil things we will look at in a moment, but they can also be GOOD things that are done to justify ourselves before God.

Andrew Murray puts it this way in his book, The Spiritual Life: “Dear Christians, you have a great many enemies, but watch specially against one. That one, how hard to be overthrown. It is self. Self is the flesh and the flesh is self. This is the one enemy you are in danger of allowing to come in between you and the Holy Spirit and leading you off, shunting you off on the wrong track. Beware!” [Andrew Murray, The Spiritual Life (Chicago: Tupper & Robertson, 1896), 108.]

The flesh is self-gratification, and it takes many forms, and it is enticing, and it is still present in the life of every believer. And it will ever be present until we receive our glorified bodies that no longer are subject to its enticements.

And, because the flesh is present in and enticing individual believers, it is also present within churches. Following the flesh is what causes churches to be inward-focused, rather than outward-focused.

The flesh and the Spirit are constantly at odds, both within individual believers and within the church. Look at verse 17.

Galatians 5:17 NASB95

For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please.

Here’s the thing: We can’t be neutral in this battle between flesh and Spirit. We must follow one or the other.

There is a real sense in which nearly every choice you make — and certainly every substantive one — will be either Spirit-led or fleshly.

And now, remembering that Paul was writing to people who were being told they needed to follow the dictates of the Mosaic Law in order to be truly saved, look at verse 18.

Galatians 5:18 NASB95

But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law.

We might have expected Paul to say, “you are not under the flesh,” but his point here is that it is the Holy Spirit who helps us to overcome the desires of the flesh, and not the Law.

The Judaizers were saying to lean on the Law for help in overcoming the flesh. Paul here is saying that the Law never had any power to do that, but the Spirit does.

And then, to make himself absolutely clear about what it looks like to walk in the flesh, Paul gives a catalogue of sins, “the deeds of the flesh.”

Look at verse 19. And as you do, I want you especially to consider how these deeds of the flesh appear in the church and the damage they cause to it.

Galatians 5:19–21 NASB95

Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Please understand that this isn’t an exhaustive list. Indeed, as I said before, the flesh can include good things done for the wrong reasons.

This list is representative, and it can be broken into five categories: sexual sins, religious sins, social sins, sins of intemperance, and other sins.

The sexual sins here are immorality, impurity, and sensuality.

Immorality covers “all types of forbidden sexual relationships.” The Greek word is porneia, from which we get our word, pornography. This is sex outside of marriage between a man and a woman.

Impurity is “all moral uncleanness in thought, word and deed. And sensuality is “the open, shameless display of these sins.”

The religious sins here are idolatry and sorcery. Idolatry is worshiping anything but God, and sorcery is attempting to aid the powers of evil.

So far, we haven’t mentioned sins that are common in the life of most churches, though they are sadly all-too-present in the lives of believers.

But look at the next set, the social sins. These are enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, and envying.

In his commentary on Galatians, Tom Constable describes enmities as hostilities, strife as antagonism, jealousy as self-centered animosity, outbursts of anger as eruptions of the temper, disputes as putting others down to get ahead, dissensions as disputes over issues or personalities, factions as divisions over issues or personalities, and envying as the wrong desire to have another’s possessions.

How many times have you seen these deeds of the flesh evident in the life of a church? How many churches have split because of these deeds of the flesh? How much damage has been done to the name of Jesus through the years because of them?

These are things that I watch very closely for as your pastor, because these are things that do real and serious damage to a church. And I praise the Lord that they are things I see very rarely in the life of this church these days.

The intemperate sins in this passage are self-explanatory: drunkenness and carousing. And the other sins, the “things like these” are those deeds of the flesh that similarly violate God’s moral will.

And what Paul says here is that those who practice these deeds — in other words, those whose lives are characterized by them — will not inherit the kingdom of God.

In other words, people whose lives are characterized by such deeds are normally unbelievers, even if sometimes some believers fall into such deeds of the flesh.

What all these things have in common is that they represent self-centered thinking. And self-centeredness should not be the norm for a follower of the Jesus who gave His own life for our salvation.

So the flesh has deeds or actions that it commits out of its self-centered nature. But the Holy Spirit bears fruit in the life of a believer and in the life of a church. And this fruit changes everything. Look at verse 22.

Galatians 5:22–23 NASB95

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

Love here is the Greek word agape, a “self-sacrificing affection for others.” Joy is a “deep-seated gladness, regardless of circumstances.” Peace is an “inner quietness, regardless of circumstances.” And all these are God-ward qualities.

The next three are other-ward qualities: patience, which is “forbearance even under provocation”; kindness, which is “benevolence and graciousness”; and goodness, which is “constructive action” that reaches out to others.

And finally, Paul lists self-ward qualities: faithfulness, which is reliability and trustworthiness; gentleness, which is submission to authority and “consideration of others”; and self-control, which is the “ability to master oneself.”

I grew up in a Christian home. I attended Christian schools for much of my life. I attended church regularly as a child. And I made a profession of faith at the age of 7.

But at the age of 38, at the leading of the Holy Spirit, I made an assessment of myself, and I could find no evidence of any of these fruits of the Spirit.

And I concluded that I had never been saved, that I had never truly put my faith in Jesus.

I wonder if you’ve ever done that. Whether you are a true follower of Jesus or not, it is a useful exercise.

If you can’t find evidence of the fruits of the Spirit in your life, then what you need is to place your faith in Jesus.

Only in Him can you find true love, true joy, true peace. Only in Him will you experience what it really means to be patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle and truly self-controlled.

The same exercise is valuable for evaluating a church. A church that is led by the Spirit is one that exhibits love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

And to the extent that the corporate church is walking in the Spirit, rather than in the flesh, these will be the characteristics that shape all it does.

Once again, Andrew Murray, writing in 1896, had something helpful to say about this.

"How can I live thus? By being twice as gentle or loving as I am? No! The fruit of the Spirit is love and gentleness every moment of the day. But how am I to be kept every hour of the day and walk thus in love? By having the filling of the Spirit of God.” [Andrew Murray, The Spiritual Life (Chicago: Tupper & Robertson, 1896), 113–114.]

We who have the Spirit of God dwelling within us are called to walk in the Spirit, to be guided and directed from moment to moment by Him as He bears fruit within us.

And we are similarly called to walk as a body of believers indwelt by the Holy Spirit, guided and directed in our work as the church according to the same fruit.

The flesh tells us to pursue those things that gratify ourselves. But the Spirit leads us to patience and kindness. The flesh leads us to look out for No. 1, but the Spirit tells us there is joy and peace in loving others sacrificially. The flesh wants us to return evil for evil, to respond sharply when we’re spoken to sharply. But the Spirit guides us to goodness, gentleness and self-control in our interactions with one another. The flesh says, “Do whatever you want to do, and find a place where that’s accepted. But the Spirit gives you the power to master yourself, to be self-controlled, to restrain the impulse to walk away from situations that aren’t as you would wish them to be.

These qualities are desperately needed in the church. The good news is that they are readily available as you walk in the Spirit, rather than in the flesh. These qualities are the fruit the Spirit bears as you submit yourself to His leading by prayer and by studying God’s word.

I don’t mean that they’ll come easily or that you won’t sometimes fall back into the deeds of the flesh. But what you will find is that as you keep on walking, you will go somewhere, and you will be nearer and nearer to your destination.

And as you put off the deeds of the flesh, you make more and more room for the Holy Spirit to truly dwell within you.

You who have followed Jesus Christ in faith have been made to be a dwelling place for His Holy Spirit. And we, as the Body of Christ, also have been made as a dwelling place for the Spirit.

Let us make ourselves and His church a place where His Spirit can dwell richly, so that He can bear much fruit within us and so that He might be glorified by the works His fruit enables.

[NOTE: Unattributed quotations are from Tom Constable’s commentary on the Book of Galatians — Constable, Tom. Tom Constable’s Expository Notes on the Bible. Galaxie Software, 2003.]