KBM Indwelt Holy Spirit
KBM Impact 3:16 • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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It is good to finally be healthy enough to get back to recording this podcast. Pneumonia is not fun, let me tell you, but I am on the mend and feeling much better. We will continue with our theme, Impact 3:16 having last looked at Romans 3:16 we naturally find ourselves in the very next book 1 Corinthians.
In 1 Corinthians 3, we find the great apostle Paul making an observation about the spiritual maturity level of the church in Corinth. These brethren were not where they ought to be spiritually. They were still people of the flesh, infants in Christ and needing milk instead of solid food. The Hebrew write explains why this is so dangers in Hebrews 5:12-14.
12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, 13 for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. 14 But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.
Paul continues by pointing out what led him to this conclusion, and it was their division over something as trivial as “who baptized who.” Paul then points to the silliness of this by pointing out that “in Christ” we are all the same.
9 For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.
Paul uses his “building” illustration to further this discussion by pointing out how each Christian has a role in building the local church into the “temple of God” (1 Corinthians 3:10-17). This of course covers our passage and so let’s read 1 Corinthians 3:16-17.
16 Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.
Now there are, without a doubt, a lot of discussions on how exactly the Spirit of God i.e., the Holy Spirit dwells in Christians. My focus today is not to give my thoughts on that as there certainly is not enough time, what I do want to do is point to the facts that all of God’s people are required to believe concerning the indwelling however.
First, it is without a doubt that Christians, who make up the church, are the temple or house of God.
2 Corinthians 6:16 (ESV)
16 What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God…
1 Corinthians 6:19 (ESV)
19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you…
Secondly, because God dwells with us if we destroy the temple of God it will result in our destruction.
28 And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
Thirdly, God will always adhere to his word.
19 God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?
Because Christians are the temple or house of God, the place where God dwells it is foolish to tamper with his temple because it will result in the destruction of those that seek this according God’s law he has set.
In other words, do your best to present yourselves as approved to God instead of opposed by God (2 Timothy 2:15).