Tuesday 19 July 2016

Sanctified temples

For now I have chosen and sanctified this house, that My name may be there forever; and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually. - 2 Chronicles 7:16

God told David that He has chosen the Temple as His house and had sanctified it as such. It was set apart for Him. It was to be a special holy place where God presence could be done in a real way. It was God’s place. It was the House of God.

In the Old Testament God worked differently than today. Today God still has a house. There is still a place where He dwells in a way where His presence. It is not in a building. To call our church buildings the ‘house of God’ is something of a misnomer. Today God’s presence dwells in the hearts and minds of His people.

Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's. (1 Corinthians 6.19-20)

Did you catch that? God had a Temple built by the people of Israel. He dwelt among them there. But today we are that temple!

As the temples of the living God has sanctified and set us apart just like He did Solomon’s Temple. We too are holy vessels dedicated to Him and His purposes. We were made holy when the Holy Spirit came to live in us at salvation. For the Jews the greatest abomination was to defile God’s Holy Temple.

But we don’t seem to have that same attitude of holiness. We are sanctified – that will not change. But we still defile our positional sanctification when we choose to live holy lives.

God’s name is with us. His eyes are with us and His heart is with us. Oughtn’t we then live as the sanctified temples we are?

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