To Be His Temple

The ultimate beauty of human life is to be God’s temple where He manifests Himself to us and to our world. The world exalts the poet, the author of great literature, the capitalist of immense wealth, or the actor that captivates the multitudes. God exalts the man or woman that invites Him to reveal Himself in their human vessel. This is what creationism truth is all about. God created us for Himself, and our greatest glory is to honor and magnify Him. Profound spiritual life will rise up and flow like rivers of living waters when the temple has been rightly given to the Master. Jesus said, “In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” (St. John 7:37-38)

He invites us to partner with Him to be His temple on earth. As much as I love the house of God, the ultimate is not His presence in our sanctuaries, but His presence in our temple-body. As I am writing, my heart is exploding with the joy of His presence. My heart-cry to Him is that by His grace I shall not ever defile His dwelling place. When we become conscious of His abiding presence, we also become aware of our responsibility to keep His temple set apart. Apostle Paul speaks eloquently on this transcending subject in First Corinthians, chapter three. He proclaimed, “For we are labourers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building.” (1 Corinthians 3:9) He further stated, “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.” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17)

This temple-body is so strategic to His design of redemption that He has established His plan of personal, eternal rewards to those that surrender their temple to Him. Every one of His saints shall be rewarded based on the spiritual activities to which we yield ourselves. I confess that this truth is beyond my human mind to fully grasp. The Spirit, by Apostle Paul, said, “I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour.” (1 Corinthians 3:6-8) Notice again that He said, “…every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour.” We are talking about eternal compensation and Heavenly retirement based on our labor for the Lord’s Kingdom.

While the world is buying condominiums at the resorts and beaches, we can be sending up materials and monthly payments on a manor estate facing Hallelujah Boulevard. There is nothing wrong with living on the oceanfront, but make sure that it’s not your life’s pleasure. Where your “will” is, there your pleasure will be, and where your pleasure is, there your “will” will be surrendered. What we must remember is that all of our life is an open book to our Heavenly Father, and His great Kingdom is open before Him. Every act and deed, and even our motives, are all known by the Lord.

Jesus Christ alone is the foundation of all our labors. It is grace that redeems, and it is grace that enables the redeemed to yield themselves to Him. Nothing is accomplished by the empty works of unredeemed flesh, but much is possible in the life where grace and the favor of God has been fully received. The Spirit settles that in this great chapter of truth. The Spirit said, “For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.” (1 Corinthians 3:11-15)

The Judgment Seat of Christ is a fiery judgment, and every work of His saints will be thoroughly searched. Only the labor of faith and surrender to His glory can survive this grave moment of truth. The grandiose plans of carnal men and women will be obliterated. All that we do for self-glory will vanish. Every deed that promotes divisiveness and strife will have no eternal value. The pure labor of self-surrendered saints will survive, and the Lord of Lords will reward the great company of His called and chosen.

This is a Heavenly calling that every saint has been afforded. Our body is a great treasure that the Father longs to possess. The world cannot see God until a temple is yielded in which God can be visible. There is no glory in this world that can match a Blood-washed temple that its previous owner has offered up on the altar of self-sacrifice, and wherein the Heavenly Spirit has come to abide.