From fields to buildings and now to the dwelling place of God, the Temple. That’s what Paul has been heading towards in his pursuit of clamping down on the divided church.
“Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in your midst? 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person; for God’s temple is sacred, and you together are that temple.” (1 Corinthians 3 v 16-17)
Verse 16 is plural. It heralds a concept which has been revolutionary since the day of Pentecost. Gone are the days of the physical Temple in Jerusalem where God’s people went there to experience His presence. Now He has come to them. The Holy Spirit is amongst them individually and corporately. We are not just individual temples we are forged together into one dwelling place for God.
How we treat one another matters because other believers are also houses of the Spirit.
Keeping the unity of the Church is primarily about the protection of the presence of the Spirit.
Do we live and speak in a way that recognises that our fellow believers are God’s temple?
If not then we are guilty of destroying the temple.
Paul has already told us how that destruction happens. It is through jealousy and quarrelling, v3. There are certainly other ways but these 2 attacks are from within.
The Church does the devil’s own work at times from Clergy who think their anointing gives them the right to abuse and those in the pews who believe they have the righteous right to gossip and complain about anything and everything. All this and many other things we have witnessed damage the church. I heard the other day of a mature Christian scold a young teenager within Church for not dressing correctly, the girl was 12 years of age! That mature Christian is very immature and is guilty of destroying the Church. God will not stand back and watch what we may have seen. He will step forward and deal with the person that destroys the sacred.
Fear of His presence needs to return to the Church. We need to be far more careful with the Holy Presence of the Living God. The Church is His Temple.
Missions Paul 