Verse of the Day - 1 Corinthians 3:16

Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you? ~ 1 Corinthians 3:16 (NIV)

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I have heard so many times this verse quoted with regard to our physical bodies...don't smoke, drink, have illicit sex, etc., because your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, right? I'm sure you've heard it, too. And that makes sense -- but I just read through this chapter again (something I often do when doing my VOTD), and the context is not about our individual bodies! It's about the church body and divisions among it that destroy it.

Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you? 1f anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple. ~ 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 (NIV)

Paul makes a case prior to these verses about church members who were taking sides about who they were following: Paul or Apollos. Things were getting fractured in the church because of it. So Paul reminds them that he and Apollos are just men, and have tried by God's grace to lay a solid foundation among them. But he also says that we, too, must be careful how we build our "church"...not the building, itself, of course, but the body of believers that cling together to form a local congregation.

For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. If any man builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man's work. ~ 1 Corinthians 3:11-13 (NIV)

How we build determines whether it will stand up to God's refining fire. Are we building with the gold and silver of love and self-sacrifice toward others for the glory of God, or are we building with the wood and straw of pride, jealously and the pursuit of self-containment?

Then Paul gets pretty blunt about what happens to those who destroy God's temple. I believe, in context, this temple means the body of believers. God says we destroy the temple when we build with combustible materials, things that will not survive the Day of Judgment, when all things come to light.

We must stay grounded to the ways of the Lord in how we conduct ourselves personally and in our local church. We need to keep the main thing the main thing, which is Jesus Christ. Getting hung up on following this preacher or that preacher, by elevating ourselves and others and allowing jealousy to pervade the body, by focusing on ministry tools instead of the ministry....these things are wood and straw. Where is the gold? Where is the silver?

This is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. ~ 1 John 3:23

We need to lift up in prayer our local congregations, that we would be unified by the Holy Spirit, that our pastors would be free from pride and digression of the truth, that we would not become complacent in our salvation and dull in our worship. Let us pray to stay sharp and vibrant as we seek to lift up the name of the Lord to our neighbors, our community. Keep the gospel pure and simple. And love people in action and in truth, not just with words.

Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. ~ Hebrews 10:23-25 (NIV)

Love,
Joelene