1 Corinthians 3:16-17

Be Still: Lord Jesus, as I enter into your word today, would you bring stillness to my body and peace to my mind as I prepare for you to speak to me. Amen.

Read: 1 Corinthians 3
Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in your midst? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person; for God’s temple is sacred, and you together are that temple. (v.16-17)

Encounter: Occasionally, there are verses in the Bible that make us sit up and pay particular attention. Usually, it’s because there is something in those verses that makes us feel uncomfortable or shocks us. The verses of 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 are firmly in that category.

Paul asks the rhetorical question, ‘Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives among you?’ Perhaps, like me, your honest answer to that question might be, on occasion, ‘No.’ It’s a wild truth that is hard to fully absorb. The God of the Universe has chosen to make his home inside everyone who invites him. He wasn’t forced to or felt he should; he was delighted to make his home in you. The presence of God’s Spirit in each of us has life-changing implications – we are now a temple of the Holy Spirit individually and collectively. You are the holy ground in which God’s presence dwells. Ancient temples were the places that revealed the character of the God they were associated with. In the same way, we are to reflect the image of the One who lives inside us – this was the plan since the beginning (Genesis 1:26).

But, if I’m honest, I am formed more in the world's likeness than in the image of God. The task, therefore, of every follower of Jesus is to live more and more in the light of what you already are – a bearer of the divine image. Or, in other words, to become truly human. Do you see what’s at stake? This is why, in verse 17, Paul goes on to describe how seriously God takes his redemption and renewal project. 

Apply: We need God to open our eyes to the radical beauty that he is ready to unleash in each of us. But often, I lack the prophetic imagination to grasp all that God is calling me to become and I am too easily satisfied with who I already am.

Devote: This prayer is attributed to Sir Francis Drake, but it echoes the cry of my heart and maybe it mirrors yours too.

Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.
Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.
We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.